The Sound of Branding with Michele Arnese

Imagine you’re in a theater, seeing a legacy franchise movie, could be Star Wars, Marvel, Lord of The Rings, or James Bond – the lights dim and the music starts playing – from the very first moment that the soundtrack hits you, the emotional connection, the history, the scope and scale of the movie is locked into your experience and sets the tone for the rest of the encounter – music, particularly as it’s used in entertainment – is so much more than a rearrangement of 12 notes, it’s an emotional companion, it’s the fourth wall broken down, it’s a cognitive rollercoaster which sends you through the peaks and valleys of reaction.

So when it comes to music and marketing and sonic branding, the same cinematic experience we have with audio in movies is at work on the small screens of our lives – but how does a brand become linked to sound, how does an audio agency help create and sell the emotional experience of music back to a brand? This episode will explain and unpack the magic of marketing and music and hopefully leave you inspired about the many possible applications and experiences that sonic branding can bring to your marketing mix, so, let’s get to it.  

Sonic Branding Is Becoming More Prevalent

The Article today is from InsideRadio.com, “Sonic Branding Is Becoming More Prevalent As Brands Focus On Their Sonic Identity.”

Emotions just happen with music. With any other mode of communication in marketing, text or visual, there are conscious considerations being made by an audience that simply don’t happen in music. And maybe this is why more marketers ignore music, because it just works OR it doesn’t. Marketers will fill meetings up with tactical arguments on how things should be perceived by an audience but with music, it works on such a subconscious level, and this is scary to marketers because they have less wiggle room.

 It’s more than a jingle or a theme song – that can be part of it, but the landscape is much larger. According to the article, 75% of the top 25 brands analyzed in this year’s Best Audio Brands report utilize a sonic logo, with an increasing number of them sharing their efforts across digital channels.

Companies and brands are starting to realize there is a lot of opportunity – voice search, devices like Alexa or Google assistant, when apps open or close, when gaming consoles start up , point of sale devices – these are all spaces that are starting to be explored more fully with sound. Brands like Apple and Nintendo, both benefit from “a robust 360-degree sonic strategy through their exploitation of numerous touch-points across highly immersive user experiences,” the article continues. 

“Creating emotional connection through sound allows for increased recognition, loyalty and memorability, explaining their hold on the sector and their continued status as some of the best performing brands in the world when it comes to sound.”

The Man Who Can Tell You the Sound of Brand