Audio branding and marketing is a vocabulary word we don’t hear very often, but it is a powerful technology. A memorable and positive customer experience is dependent on creating sensory messaging about your brand. We know that your brand isn’t just a logo, but rather the logo is the visual language for your brand. In the same way, your audio or “sonic” logo is the auditory language for your brand and is more powerful than your visual logo in many ways.
Sound and music are influential components of the human experience.
For restaurants and hospitality businesses, audio branding creates an immersive multi-sensory experience that keeps customers engaged. It can also:
- Influence customers’ purchasing behaviors
- Build an emotional connection between the brand and customers
- Create uniformity across all locations
- Enhance productivity at work
- Shape brand recognition and boost brand loyalty
Playing Licensed Music in a Commercial Space
It’s easy for a new business owner to think that streaming your favorite iTunes playlist over a speaker system is the way to go. While you can listen to it individually, you don’t have the legal right to play it commercially or use it for your business.
Here’s an example. Say you pay a monthly or annual subscription to music streaming services like Apple Music or Spotify. It means that you are only paying for a license to play it on your personal devices and do not possess a copy of the song. Copyright law is a layered set of rules that provide protections for creators. It gives the author the exclusive right to copy, sell, distribute, display or perform the work, and prohibits infringement. In this digital age, it has become easier than ever to access music for personal consumption, but commercial use has its own set of rules. (Lavigne, 2021)
Setting Customer Expectations
Customer experience must align with customer expectations. Keep these five tips in mind when creating audio branding:
- Choose distinct music that matches your brand ethos
Music needs to complement your brand and align with the environment. Playing techno or heavy metal rock in a barbecue joint may get your customer’s mood out of joint making them rush their experience to get away from what feels like noise to them. This sounds like a no-brainer, but there are companies out there that impart a brand disconnect with the type of music that fills their audio space.
- Knowing your audience is the key
The next important thing is to know the demographic you’re catering to – your audience and how they interface with your product or service. Defining a customer persona is key to identifying preferences.
- Create a cohesive and consistent audio environment
Your audio branding should be recognizable and consistent across all customer touchpoints and multi-unit locations. Brand guidelines established as part of your overall marketing plan should include audio marketing and be made widely available to your organization’s sales and marketing teams.
- It’s Not Just About Music
While music provides an auditory marketing experience, you can include messaging that prompts action with personalization. With Artificial Intelligence coming into the marketplace and smart speakers that allow two-way conversation, your brand can follow consumer preference inside and outside of a physical location.
- Keep it short and memorable
A memorable sound branding welcome messaging. It’s a result of a solid cognitive connection between memory and sound. Think of the tune of your favorite TV show or an ad jingle that you remember more quickly than the previous day’s tasks. Over the years, it has been proven that the shorter the sound is, the easier it is to recall. (D’Angelo 2022)
Audio “Logo”
Sonic logos, those catchy audio signatures used by brands ranging from Taco Bell to T-Mobile, have become prominent and effective elements in a growing number of commercials.
Audio logos that mention the brand have five times the proper brand association than those that didn’t. As part of your audio marketing strategy, creating a recognizable “logo” sound that plays consistently across your digital network creates a strong neuro response. (Insider Radio, 2020)
How to Implement Audio Marketing
There are millions of hospitality businesses in America. Using an auditory experience can give you a chance to create a niche for your business and build a substantial brand recall value. But, choosing the right music and messaging for your business can be a daunting task, especially when it involves licensing rights.
The quickest way to obtain licensed music is to collaborate with a streaming music service company like BSC’s Steady Brand, which can simplify the process for your business.
BSC has teamed with Steady Brand, offering an array of musical genres that reflect your style. They have curated over 80 channels for various musical tastes and suitability for commercial business use. We also include ways to impart brand customizable messaging.
Are you looking for custom-curated audio? BSC’s Steady Brand offers music programming and design to elevate your customer music-listening experience. For more information, contact us at 281-590-3400 or sales@bsctx.com.
Works Cited
Lavigne, H. (2021, March 31). Music B2B: Streaming, licensing, and publishing primer. Business Law Attorneys – Fourscore Business Law. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://fourscorelaw.com/music-b2b-streaming-licensing-and-publishing-primer/
D’Angelo, Matt. “How Sound Can Help Your Business.” Business News Daily, 10 Feb. 2022, www.businessnewsdaily.com/10369-how-to-use-sound-branding-music-restaurant-sonic.html.
Here are the top audio logos in the U.S. Insideradio.com. (2020, June 15). Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://www.insideradio.com/free/here-are-the-top-audio-logos-in-the-u-s/article_867c1ff8-aed6-11ea-8f24-3f5cb2898f13.html
