Digital marketing has created an environment where brands constantly seek new and creative ways to engage their audiences. With innovation, sound has emerged as an effective tool for brand engagement.
This phenomenon is a result of human nature: people have a greater memory for music and sound. Compared to lyrics, music strikes the mind more effectively, affects the brain more significantly, and has a longer-lasting effect on one’s memory than lyrics. Thus, even a small aspect of brand identity, such as a melody, can have a greater impact on the success of a brand than impressive visuals.
With audio branding becoming increasingly prevalent, sonic logos (not to be confused with audio company logos) have become the stars of the new soundscape. The blog discusses the importance of sound in branding, particularly these logos.
Sound logos (also referred to as audio logos or mnemonics) are brief audio assets designed to convey a brand’s identity quickly. Often, it is used to create a more comprehensive sonic branding strategy in conjunction with a brand’s visual logo design or related graphic. Sonic logos are used to unify a brand’s core purpose and mission under one branding strategy in a subtle, but meaningful manner.
The right sonic logo is unique, instantly recognizable by consumers, and reflects the style of the brand as reflected in advertising, marketing collateral, events, products, and other touch points.
Typically, it is composed of a short piece of music (2-5 seconds), but it can also incorporate sound effects, voices, or other elements that capture the brand attributes. An iconic Xbox 360 logo created by Audiobrain expresses key brand attributes with the breath unit. When used in conjunction with visual graphics, Sonic logos make a powerful statement about the Xbox 360’s living, breathing nature.
Here are a few steps to follow when creating sonic logos for brand awareness and recognition.
Consider your target audience – who they are, their tastes, and what will appeal to them. This will help you brainstorm with clarity and come up with a sound that can be identified with your sonic logos.
After that, you must spend some time understanding what this audience thinks about you. Are you able to build upon your brand’s sonic equity? Does sound play a critical role in changing the perception of your brand? A preliminary stage is laid out here, incorporating music, sound, and voice where appropriate.
A clear understanding of your audio strategy’s overall aesthetic is essential. Developing one from scratch is always a good approach. The mood board you build should be based on your brand’s values and positioning and a clear sense of the sound for the sonic logo.
Try it out, and don’t be afraid to fail! Only through testing audio with real audiences can you gain an objective insight into the uniqueness of the brand, attribute alignment, and brand recall.
Understand the audio landscape before anything else. Consumers have access to a wide variety of audible touchpoints. It is important to be clear about where you want the sound to be heard. It is important to create a unique identity for your sonic logos that can be adapted to the various expanding platforms. The number of platforms offering ‘sound on’ or ‘sound first’ content is growing, but audio strategies extend beyond these platforms.
Audio strategies can take many forms beyond the standard digital, TV, and radio touch points, including events, sponsorships, in-store and product placements. With such a comprehensive approach, your professional brand identity is enhanced and echoed.
A key aspect of your new strategy is knowing how to implement it. There is too often a lack of audio execution strategy, which leads to a successful audio strategy falling flat.
You should consider implementing a comprehensive audio strategy guideline for your sonic logos as a priority. Use these guidelines as a roadmap to ensure consistency of sound in audio assets across multiple platforms and situations.
To ensure a smooth implementation of the new audio strategy, everyone must understand the vision and align themselves with it. You can perform this by conducting onboarding workshops designed to help your team understand and implement the strategy.
Many people might get confused about audio and sonic branding. Well, there is a slight difference between both terms. As the name implies, audio branding involves integrating sound with brand identity. It may take the form of a song, jingle, or podcast. Sonic branding involves using sound effects to leave a lasting impression on the consumer. It takes only a few seconds!
By using certain sonic signatures, sonic brands create an emotional bond between audiences and brands. Additionally, these sounds also serve as a starting point for the audio branding activities of a business. These could be featured on social media channels and integrated within a company’s professionally designed website in video format as well.
Audio branding contains jingles (State Farm’s like a good neighbor), music tracks, and voiceovers, whereas sonic branding contains a whole lot of other things like a sonic logo, brand theme music, and user interface sounds.
Audio is much broader in scope, encompassing all sound elements related to a brand while sonic is more focused and strategic, often using specific sounds crafted to represent the brand identity all at once.
Sonic branding relies heavily on sound to create a long-lasting impression. We will explore how sound branding elements, such as sonic logos, jingles, and brand soundscapes, combine to create a distinctive audio identity for your company.
Whether it is a brief, distinctive sound or melodies, these are used to identify the auditory identity of a business or organization. The purpose of a sound logo is similar to that of a visual logo in that it captures the essence of the brand quickly.
Using audio or sound logos is a powerful method for establishing brand recognition instantly. An audio snippet that captures the brand’s essence becomes a symbol of the brand itself over time.
Similarly to a painter’s palette, a brand soundscape is comprised of sounds and music carefully chosen to convey a brand’s personality, values, and distinctive characteristics. Emotions, stories, and brand messages are conveyed through these auditory landscapes in sonic logos.
If you think of Apple, their commercials are characterized by a serene, minimalist soundscape that instills grace and creativity. Soundscapes have a similar effect to business name ideas in that they subconsciously reinforce perceptions of audio brands.
A jingle or sonic mnemonic is a memorable, often lyrical tune or melody that enhances brand recall. Sound branding is not only memorable but also an effective memory aid. A sonic mnemonic can transcend both cultural and linguistic boundaries, making it a universally effective tool for branding. You can also consider such jingles for music logos or entertainment logos (Think MGM’s Lion!)
It is best to use sound effects at the checkout to increase the customer’s trust and unobtrusively encourage them to complete the purchase. Audiences can connect viscerally with them beyond visual cues.
By creating moments of emotional connection with a sonic logo, you can strengthen trust and recognition among consumers. Most importantly, they can feel confident during the purchase process.
A study conducted by Mastercard has shown that more than 65% of consumers believe they are purchasing from a reputable retailer when the store’s sonic is played during the checkout process. In the retail niche, there must be a balance between the value of familiarity and assurance.
A further reason audio assets benefit retail niches is the fact that they offer multichannel functionality and are relatively easy to integrate. Easily accessible across many different channels, it assures customers at various touch points, including television ads, in-store advertising, films, street stands, websites, and mobile applications.
While visual elements play an important role in branding, sound can convey emotion and build a brand’s personality.
Emotions can be evoked more directly by sound than by visuals. Take, for instance, the thrill experienced when hearing the roar of racing cars when watching Formula 1 or the peace felt when listening to the gentle sound of waves breaking on a beach. Sound enables brands to connect with consumers on a deeper level, as emotional responses are often more immediate and powerful.
There is no language barrier or cultural barrier when it comes to sound. Melody and rhythm can evoke similar emotions in a wide range of audiences, making them effective tools for international brands. Visual elements may need to be translated or adapted to appeal to a variety of cultures.
It is possible to develop a multisensory experience for a brand by combining visual and auditory elements. An effective television commercial or multimedia presentation, for example, combines visuals and sound to give consumers a whole and engaging experience that resonates with them on more than one level.
Here are some notable examples of Audio logos and how the popular brands utilized the sonic branding:
It has been debated whether sonic branding is more effective than visual marketing. Despite this, research has shown that audio assets such as sonic logos can be as effective as a thousand words in a picture. There is a ten-fold increase in reactions to them compared to visual objects. Furthermore, they are more likely to be retained in long-term memory than lyrics.
Human emotions are profoundly affected by audio branding, thereby increasing brand recognition and recall more than any other component. In addition, it helps companies find new opportunities to enhance their position, reconnect with their audience, and refresh their image.
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