Understanding Consumer Influence: Audio Branding for the Holidays – Part 2

Understanding Consumer Influence: Audio Branding for the Holidays – Part 2

This is the second half of my Audio Branding for the Holidays discussion with sonic strategist and author Jeanna Isham, creative director and Grammy-nominated engineer Adam Pleiman, author and creative executive Colleen Fahey, and Soundwise sound strategist John Sanfilippo, as we discuss the changing habits of online consumers, the unique power of audio to tap into holiday nostalgia, and the value of authenticity as machine-generated content becomes the norm in marketing.

(0:00:01) – Music and Branding for Holidays

As the second half of our discussion starts, we talk about music in advertising, particularly during the holiday season. “I like Colleen’s idea of bringing being a little more worldly,” John says, “and bringing new compositions into the mix. I think we’re due for some new melodies just in the whole Christmas soundscape.” We discuss the impact of music on consumer behavior, referencing the well-known study of playing French music in a wine store to boost sales of French wine, and how the interactive nature of sound on such social media platforms like TikTok can help music marketing go viral. “I would love to see some of these really fun TikTokers that did these creative things with Home Depot,” Jeanna adds. “I’d love to see them come up with something more clever than Jingle Bells.”

(0:08:55) – Sonic Branding’s Power of Emotional Connection

We also examine the power of nostalgia and consistency in sonic branding and discuss the impact of using familiar songs and jingles in commercials. “I mean, there’s a trend here in the conversation that we talk about the nostalgia and these spots that keep coming back,” Adam notes. “There’s equity in that. There’s, I mean, there’s giant equity, even in a seasonal piece of music.” We also touch on the missed opportunity for brands to use their sonic identity to stand out and adapt to different situations, as seen during the COVID-19 pandemic. “It did show how little personality some of these brands had,” Jeanna says, “because they didn’t know how to portray themselves.” “I often liken it to personal relationships,” John observes, “like, the deeper you can connect with yourself, the deeper you can connect with other people. That’s true in personal relationships and it’s true in business.”

(0:15:13) – Exploring Audio Branding and Cultural Adaptation

We also consider the role of authenticity during the holiday season, and how AI content is becoming both more common and more controversial in the branding industry. Maima also joins the conversation with an intriguing question about striking the right balance between diversity and inclusion in sound, and how to reach the most people while retaining a distinctive voice. “If you’re forcing something,” Jeanna says, “it’s not working. The great thing about audio is that it’s a subtle thing, right, like if you do audio right, you’re not really noticing anything, it just feels right. You know, because it’s again. It’s about expression.” John agrees and, as our holiday discussion comes to a close, adds, “I think that there’s a cyclical thing that happens as well, because if you are authentic and you express yourself in an authentic way, you’re going to attract a certain type of person anyway to your brand.”

Episode Summary
– How music in advertising and online platforms impacts consumer behavior.
– The power of nostalgia and missed branding opportunities during the pandemic.
– Finding your ideal audience, and the value of authenticity in the age of AI.

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Yeah there’s a real opportunity here I mean there’s you know there’s a trend here in the conversation that we talk about this Nostalgia and these spots that keep coming back um there’s equity in that there’s I mean giant Equity even in the seasonal um in a seasonal piece

Of music um if it you know it it it boils down to this consistency and persistency and even if you’re you know Colleen you’re 100% right you know they have to be ready for this they have to be ready to to roll this out to all

Their touch points and it also has to to be their brand but I mean think of the immense power that it’s going to to wield year after year when it’s implemented Consistently welcome to audio branding the Hidden Gem of marketing sound plays a more important role in human behavior and our decision making than you may realize in this podcast I’ll help you understand the Art and Science of sound so you can better influence others in business and your life I’m your host jod

Crangle let’s delve a little deeper here’s the second part of my conversation with Gina aam Adam plyman Colleen fahe and John sanfilipo about audio branding for the holidays you probably all know about the music being played in um uh where they’re selling wine and they were selling you know they

They were playing French music and then they sold more French wine and then they played German music and they play they sold more German wine and uh Larry just mentioned that to me in our uh discussion Colleen so I mean it’s a pretty popular study so you would think

That a lot more people would use that to their advantage or at least think about it you know I I love your idea of zoning I think that this also plays into into like the whole Sonic diversity you know like the the the Sonic color line

If you’ve heard that term that Steve has mentioned before um but I I feel like if you’re in a uh primarily Urban location in a store perhaps you figure out what it is that they listen to and those are the Styles it could still be we wish you

A merry Christmas but maybe it’s like a hip-hop version or something like that you know like it doesn’t it doesn’t have to all be white people music you know there’s a lot more out there that and and it’s also something that like you know like we we force a certain type of

Music on people that wouldn’t necessarily go for it why can’t we be forced to listen to something brand new we might actually like it so uh yeah I think that just for a diversity in itself it would be super helpful well I like Colleen’s idea of bringing being a

Little more world and bringing new compositions into the mix I I think we’re we’re due for some new Melodies just in the whole Christmas soundscape I mean you know there’s there’s so much Christmas music that is so old and so traditional that a lot of it is in the

Public domain even not that these you know more worldly compositions wouldn’t necessarily be public domain but yeah just something to to freshen it up and to you know it takes some time before new compositions kind of work their way into the public Consciousness but on they once they do yeah they just become

The the soundtrack of your life and Christmas is a huge part of that oh of course yeah yeah to your point John it’s it’s it’s it’s I I do enjoy um when there’s uh Christmas inspired by tracks and how easy it is to through the use of

Just a couple notes be so close to such a traditional song that you immediately it immediately becomes a holiday song because of three notes are used in a melody and it’s so simple so I mean to your point like yeah like the need to spread the wings and and uh grow

The cannon if you will is definitely there yeah it’d be nice to have a a nice mix of nostalgia and Novelty at the same time yeah yeah uh yeah there is um so much more that can be done with the holidays that I think people are not taking advantage of and and not

Diversifying a little bit and and that’s uh that could bite them in the butt uh I I don’t think that the same old same old is going to work for all you know all time um you know the &m commercial [Laughter] notwithstanding well that’s that’s just

Me I don’t know how many people are I mean I have a few friends that exactly know that one too so that’s just a personal preference but there there are things that you can latch on to especially like I don’t know as a child you latch on to things stronger than you

Do as an adult so the things that um are really groundbreaking and memorable to me this year are you know they’re not I don’t think they’re going to last like the 30 years that this thing played when I was a kid right so yeah I don’t

Know it’s possible but you know I think there’s something to be said for things that become memorable and I don’t necessarily mean that it’s something that we heard in as a child and that it just lasted that long I mean there are things that if you hear them for long

Enough I mean really it’s the length of how long you heard it not maybe when you heard it does that make sense so I I think that the reason that we talk about these things as being something that we really connected to as children is because we heard them when

We were children and now it’s 30 years later and we’re still hearing them and we remember them so uh you know there’s there’s that memorability which I think is really important when you’re talking to about advertising that’s something you want right well with distinctiveness you want you want to be remembered for something

Um yeah another thought I I was thinking that people these days want to participate in the creation of things or participate in the activation or the activity and that would be another area to explore if your brand um would like to invite their own audience into

Creating a drum track for a piece or uh or creating recreating a a a remix maybe you could provide a remix um all the stems and they could remix their own carols or something like that and play them um in I don’t know while you’re e-shopping online or in the store or

Something like that I’m just thinking how could you involve these audiences who are desperate to create and um and use use some kind of a fusion of your brand and music I bet you could do it maybe maybe Tik Tok is the answer there yeah yeah that’s a plat and

I don’t claim to be an expert on it but I mean that is a a platform that is known for appropriating various pieces of music and remixing them and and doing all kinds of creative things with them right I was just gonna say that yeah okay sorry go ahead nope

That I think I was just building on an idea I was just continuing an idea that was spinning out and thinking well I suppose you could do stems from your own brand and stems from Joy to the World and have let people remix their own your

Branded Joy to the World it’s a great idea I know that Home Depot I mean you could have a DJ do it in store too you could have DJs okay uh Home Depot bad idea it’s a good idea go ahead Gina I was just going to say I spoke to um well

She’s she’s since retired but she was uh the VP of marketing at Home Depot about the orange song and how that came about and it went Bonkers on Tik talk and people were remixing just like you said Colleen it wasn’t even a call out to it

They just started doing it um and now that I think about the holiday season what Home Depot has done is just slapped Jingle Bells on their Orange song and that’s their that’s their Christmas one and I would love to see some really some of these really fun ticktockers that did these creative

Things with Home Dep I’d love to see them come up with something more clever than Jingle Bells cuz they came up with these great remixes why not come up with a great remix for the Christmas season very good point see it’s so easy so easy just to throw bells on it and

Look suddenly my Jingles yeah yeah only not um yeah it uh I also wanted to ask you now that we’re kind of on this topic what you think companies could do with their audio brand to be prepared for next year for next year’s holidays so I think that they should consider

Doing a a complete package a 360 package that involves almost every touch point that they have and compose it in such a way that mirrors their brand recompose it in such a way that reflects Christmas in their own brand way so and they could start tomorrow they can start with their

Ecard yeah that’s that’s my thought totally yeah 100 start with notes right now figure out what’s going on right now take notes and be applying it all year until next year seven create your seven second Winks yep there you go Adam you had more there’s a real opportunity yeah there’s

A real opportunity here I mean there’s you know there’s a trend here in the conversation that we talk about this Nostalgia and these spots that keep coming back um there’s equity in that there’s I mean giant Equity even in the seasonal um in a seasonal piece of music

Um if it you know it it it boils down to this consistency and persistency and even if you’re you know Colleen you’re 100% right you know they have to be ready for this they have to be ready to to roll this out to all their touch

Points and it also has to to be their brand but I mean think of the immense power that it’s going to to wield year after year when it’s implemented consistently I mean the Eminem spot is something that has landed with you Jenna and it stays with you you know in a in a

Wonderful place in your heart and and and and it’s it’s a spot it’s a commercial it’s just a well done commercial I mean you know emotionally connect to that consumer the same way each year bringing these this these songs back it’s you know it seems like a no-brainer especially when you’re trying

To get your you know your brand into the black if it’s a if it’s a retail brand yeah Jingles are the same way I mean you know like Gina was talking about there are commercial that we remember from our childhood from 30 years ago or more and uh and I remember Jingles from

Back that far that I oh yeah yeah like they just stick with you you and it it’s amazing to me and I I mentioned this before it’s amazing to me that Brands will just let things go and just stop using them when they’re so popular it

Just doesn’t make sense to me are you looking for ways to improve your companies or podcasts impact you’d be surprised how powerful the use of an intentional audio branding strategy can be want to know more I have a free downloadable PDF that gives you my five tips for implementing an intentional

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Snippets of audio from my guests that no one else gets to hear so maybe it’s worth your while totally up to you and of course if you’re looking for voiceovers you can get in touch with me about that too now back to the podcast well it’s it’s just it’s all

About whether it’s a jingle or a Sonic logo or whatever it is it’s all about having just a really strong Melody and just sticking with it to the point where like you’re saying it does become part of the public Consciousness over time and and you just sort of keep it forever

You don’t forget them right and um in terms of holidays yeah I I don’t think that we we we we don’t flex enough I think with our Sonic branding assets and obviously the holidays are a great opportunity for that but I mean um even during the covid-19 pandemic where every

Commercial ended up being exactly the same I think we all remember when music and then pressing voice over and they try to take it into that sort of semi inspirational sort of tone someone even did a video on that do you remember seeing was a match up video I

Saw that so funny yeah it was amazing yeah but it was just it was so interesting to see how many huge Brands had such a kind of superficial relationship with themselves and they had never really forced to dig deeper emotionally and if you already have a well defined welldefined Sonic identity

Then you have that well-defined emotional core and if you push it far enough to what you’re talking about Jody where you you do have that that memorability and that relationship with the public then you are able to uh to adapt it to to different things and it becomes a very flexible and Powerful

Asset yeah it’s something that that Brands forget is they they work so hard and maybe Colleen maybe you can attest to this but I I feel like Brands work really hard on customer personas but how hard do they work on their own brand Persona because I feel like you know you

Can’t Market to everybody right you have to figure out who your Market is so shouldn’t that start within rather than like picking your audience that’s what it feels like to me and I wonder about the co because it was like your spot on Adam like it was

So fake and granted it had been like 100 years since something like this had happened so we were not prepared but like it did show how little personality some of these Brands had because they didn’t know how to portray themselves they were just trying to they were still

Trying to Market to Their audience almost yeah I think there’s oh go ahead Colleen go ahead I was just going to say that that that just goes right back to Christmas music Everybody Plays the same music therefore they don’t distinguish themselves and maybe it’s because they haven’t gone deep enough inside to they

Are yeah everything’s everything’s all about authenticity these days you have to build your brand from the ground up and from the inside out yeah and I think that if people do actually make an audio brand for themselves and give them their company some thought uh give that some thought

For their company that like you said John is the emotional intelligence that they get from looking deep so like it it audio branding is you know that’s the emotional core that’s that’s definitely how that goes so AB well and I I often liken it to it’s like personal

Relationships like the deeper you can connect with yourself the deeper you can connect with other people that’s true in personal relationships and it’s true in business and branding and all this stuff yeah I once had a client say when after leading them through the audio branding Sonic branding process that he

Understood his brand in a much more subtle way by having to do it without words interesting he’s it really helped him just know his brand and and maybe make a difference between okay you say you’re about leadership but what kind of leadership are you when you hear different kinds of

Leadership you can tell wait a minute I’m not this big bossy assertive brassy thing you know I’m this other thing uh so Sonic brand can be part of that Psychotherapy of your brand nuances on Colleen know that’s interesting and it does feel like that sometimes when you work with a brand

Because I find you’re often taking them to places they’ve never been before because a lot of the time visuals because everybody’s so visually oriented in The Branding and marketing world and a lot of it can be very superficial and a lot of the time visuals convey information but sounds convey emotion

And yeah it does necessitate a a deeper dig into the brand and its Persona yeah I think Gina’s point also of the fact that a lot of brands are very in touch with who their customer or client is but not all that in touch with who they are

In relation to that I think that when you’re coming into doing an audio brand and thinking about all of that you kind of need the van diagram of where those meet in the middle who you are and who your clients are and I don’t know that

You know all one or all the other you know obviously you don’t want to go to the extremes you want to learn how you can reach the people who are going to get you I’ve done several like breakout brand marketing strategy sessions with some clients in the past couple of years

And it’s so fascinating because when we step back and discover like why they’re doing what they’re doing the messaging is so much easier you know like why are you here why are you creating why are you doing all these things not who and not what but why are you doing it if you

Can get that that’s like your mission statement if you can establish your mission statement it’s going to be so much clearer to you how you’re going to personify yourself to others that’s a really good point yeah uh and then take that and be you know use it consistently and with persistency

I love that Adam oh that’s old P coming out right there yeah he’s been bathed in PNG oh I know all the acronyms yeah it’s all good yeah he just going to start talking to us in letters soon you have no clue what they said oh boy yeah there is there is so

Much to unpack with all of this um yeah so so interesting Trends or maybe where we’d like to see it go I guess and me more as a consumer than you know uh also I I guess I see it on the the tail end of things because of the voiceover part

Of this because I get asked to do things that are on Trend whenever that happens to be so it’s always interesting to see where things lead and I know that authenticity I mean heck it was the the word of the Year this year wasn’t it authenticity really yeah yeah feels like

It I’m pretty sure it was actually voted word of the Year by uh you know Webster Miriam Webster or something how do they figure that out do they just like the Google searches or something like oh this word this adjective was searched the most this must be the the word yeah

I want to yeah I want to be in that voting pool I want to vote for the word of the year that’s gonna be I’m gonna put something ridiculous it yeah just putting that out in the universe well you know they they uh they have all

Sorts of um I guess ideas of what the latest words are and they add new words to the dictionary all the time so it’s really yeah they’ve done some weird things we got to keep selling those dictionaries exactly always evolving oh well it’s all good it all

Works in the end I guess it’s you know the English language is totally evolving all the time right as is I have a thought about why authenticity might be very important this year as people are getting more exposed to Ai and the fact that change face and that it probably is

Making people feel very startled and it is true that at Christmas time you’re you’re a little bit more emotionally open and vulnerable and uh the those commercials that we’ve been talking about that are very warm and human must feel so good after seeing you know all these things about essentially

Robots and computers doing the creative work work I can see why authenticity would be important and definitely it’s important at Christmas I think you’re right on there Colleen I think that definitely is it because there’s there’s all these like I’ve been writing a lot more on medium and it’s it’s all talking

About like these Publications that don’t want to accept anything that was AI generated and then there’s some that are fighting it saying no no no it’s fine as long as you’re using it as a tool and then others are saying you know AI can come up with things that others can’t

Just I’m just talking about this one platform and it’s just interesting the conversations that are going on saying it’s right or wrong or fine there are some major Publications that have been called out for using AI in their writing and not not really policing it well

Enough I guess not really um you know making sure that they’re checking it over so uh but like major Publications uh and and people are not happy they you know they’re recognizing it and they’re not happy so I can see you know like you were saying Colleen I think authenticity

Is because of AI very valued at this point so yeah yeah so many our audience people members have anything that they’d like to chime in with or yeah if anyone in if anyone listening would like to raise their hand and join the conversation you’re welcome to ask a question of your

Own but uh but yeah we’re uh we’re just talking about audio branding around theall holidays and also what we can do to get ready for the next holidays not just this one because I think we’re a little Beyond when we could when we could uh conceivably do anything for

This particular holiday it’s probably a little late but uh here would be a great goal get a song that somehow alludes to your brand but is into the holiday Cannon of songs that people put in their stores over the holiday some new adjacencies I love this yes do

It a big hairy audacious goal would be to get into the the mix of those Christmas songsa hi Mya welcome yes am I pronouncing your name right yes can you hear me yes we can what did you want to say go ahead yeah I was so interested in

The idea of like create involving uh as aspects of different cultures into the audio branding and it also kind of how do you marry that idea with the fact that you have to also be tailoring um your content to a specific audience and so it kind of seems like

It’s competing I’ll just phrase my question differently essentially if the idea is to be as specific as possible in terms of who you’re talking to and targeting your audience then how do you do that while keeping your audio branding open and um keeping it and taking different aspects

Of different cultures so how do you like do both if that makes sense I really appreciate you being here know anyone that you think would make a great guest for this podcast someone who works in sound on behalf of clients please do get in touch I’d love to hear

About them your recommendations are always super helpful and now back to the show I think it’s a question of proportion how much you put in uh this is a a interesting problem that we often have when we’re doing audio branding and I’m not talking about Christmas at this

Moment but when say you’re an airline and you’re coming out of the Arab Emirates but you’re speaking so you want to say I’m I’m from the Arab Emirates but you also want to say and we’re open to the world come travel with us all people and so it’s it’s almost a

Question of putting in the proportion that you want so you could say 30% International and 70% Emir emirati or you could do the opposite way depending on how the brand is but I think that’s a decision that you make before you start to compose or before you start to

Compile if you’re compil in a list it’s a very simple answer yeah and and and to to to add on that K because that’s that’s spot on it’s you know it’s always that understanding of what that connection is between the consumer and brand um and what the consumer’s expectation is and

Sometimes that’s able to dictate what the Brand’s able to get away to help to help understand if it’s 7030 3070 um you know that that connection that understanding is that authenticity right the the good old word of the year right there um that if you can understand what their expectation is of

You you’re going to be able to understand how to communicate to that with your own voice agreed it’s it’s a balancing act I think you know you C if you’re forcing something it’s not working um the the great thing about audio is that it it’s a subtle thing right like if you do

Audio right you’re not really noticing anything it just feels right you know cuz it’s again it’s about expression it’s about feeling and personality and if these Brands can explore what their personality is I think that it’ll be that much easier for them to come up

With is this too much or is this not enough good point yeah and yes to everything everyone else said and Adam again that that overused word of the Year authenticity but it really is important and I think that there’s a cyclical thing that happens as well

Because uh if you are authentic and you express yourself in authentic way you’re going to attract a certain type of person anyway to your brand now that may vary depending on your your business of course but uh the thing about music and sound like music really is a universal

Language to to a certain degree and I think sometimes we get a little too caught up in in trying to visualize our customers and trying sort of digging a little too deep uh into demographics and and we touched on this a little a little earlier and and while we were talking I

Actually I had to bring up that Meme that you’ve probably seen where they compare uh King Charles and Aussie Osborne because it said they’re both male both born in 1948 both live in a castle both wealthy and famous ET that’s disturbing it is isn’t it oh my goodness okay well yeah but

Very different people very very with very different experiences and lives yes yes yeah well it’s uh it’s a fascinating study and thank you for the question that was a really interesting question hopefully your question was answered yeah no thank you for answering all of you thank you

Wonderful well we are getting very close to the end here and I just want to thank my panelists here very much for this really insightful and interesting conversation thank you Jody yeah thank you Jody really enjoyed this and I hope we’ll do it again sometime very soon but

For now I’m going to wish everyone a wonderful holiday whatever it is that you’re celebrating and uh and just uh yeah uh sound is powerful listen around and and you know obviously make your own decisions based on that but uh it’s worth paying attention to the sound it’s

Not just a background thing and it influences you a lot more than you think indeed absolutely thank you very much for being great power comes great responsibility great responsibility yes definitely yeah we have to be careful with that yeah so when you’re making this kind of stuff that’s something to pay attention to

Too uh yeah but thank you very much topic for next time yes definitely a topic Count Me In yeah yeah I know when I was talking with uh with Larry Colleen he was we were talking briefly about you know the the power of that responsibility to not uh overly

Influence People in ways that they don’t want to be influenced that it can be uh something you need to be very careful of psychologically there’s true absolutely yeah and we have created sound also to keep people from shopping and keep people from buying too much yes you can

Do it in both yeah you can do it both ways yeah definitely yeah okay well thank you very much and I hope everyone has a wonderful rest of their day yeah Happ holid happy holidays take care everyone well that’s the end of this episode thanks for listening and if you

Like what you heard why not tell a friend about this podcast it’s available in all the usual locations until next Time