The Power of Background Music… If Done Right
By Andrew Ingkavet
As humans, we rely on visual information for a lot of our decision making. If you are a marketer, you know that you need to have visual aids to accompany your presentation. But what speaks directly to the audience is the audio. Audio is invisible and slips right past the judgement gates. You can close your eyes but not your ears!
And one of the best ways to influence your audience is through emotional music.
Placing background music in your marketing presentation, or web video or 30 second spot is not a guarantee you will sell. But think of all the commercials you have seen that you actually like. 90% or more have a great soundtrack that pumps up the emotion whether it be comedy, action, pride, or fear among others. Hollywood and Madison Avenue both use music to push our hot buttons, so why shouldn’t you?
Obviously there are a lot of bad examples of background music in commercials and presentations. Think of the late-night local access variety. Horrible! But if you use some judgment and quality music, such as the tracks we license in our library, you’ll stand out among the competition. I wrote a previous article on how to match music with your visual. So now you don’t need to be a professional music supervisor to think like one.
The NFL is one of the master marketers in the world. They have an amazing sense with music. Why? Did you know they have staff music supervisors, an in-house music studio and staff composers to help them create the exciting, action packed trailers, montages and hours and hours of original programming. Some of the music is licensed from big name stars, and other is created in-house. So now, you can use some of the same tricks by using adrenaline soaked music to raise the pitch of your presentations. Take a look at our tracks in the Action category or Sports Themes or Trailers. I bet you can find something that will keep people watching (and listening) all the way through.
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Andrew Ingkavet is Head Monk of 300 Monks, an audio agency for creative professionals.