Can You Hear Me?

Imagine building the finest marketing strategy having tick the boxes of, audience, data, technology, tech stack, recency, context but still not having been able to deliver an effective marketing campaign. Of the many reasons why a strategy may not have worked is brands not considering adding 'Sound' to its creative.

Brands often focus on the pack shots, logo, color theme, font, message, storyline of a video creative but if they forget to add sound to it, it's not worth the effort by any means.

Back in 2020, Ipsos analyzed over 2,000 TV ads (:15s & :30s) shown in "distracted" conditions. For sure, as a brand, you would have to be courageous not to show your logo in the ad creative, and while the majority of brands focus on the levers of logo, color, slogan & visual style, the lever that actually was recognized to drive strong brand branded attention or you can say, a better 'ad recall' was sound.

Consumers nowadays want brands to speak with them. Unless, as a brand, you are not communicating with your consumers, you can't expect them to 1) remember you as a brand 2) consider leveraging your product/services.

Because of the emotional response elicited from a piece of sound (which can be either positive or negative depending on the context and sound) – the associated memory also tends to be strong for consumers.

In what shape and form can the sound be?

Different melodies, chords, or key changes in songs can elicit responses. For example, strings playing short and sharp notes in a major key were found to elicit feelings of happiness and excitement in 87% of respondents.

Many advertisers specifically choose existing songs from artists they want to feature. However, others choose a strategy of deliberately creating music for new adverts. This often involves a mention of the brand in some way, or is more directly associated with the brand’s product or service – much like a jingle. 

Remember Microsoft's Windows 8 video ad and the song that was played over it. Or the Apple's Watch Series 6 ad. It just brings out emotions from within that drive the interest of a consumer towards the brand and wanting them to feel it by ending up buying the brand's product.