While it might blend in with it sometimes, music isn’t just background fodder—it’s your brand’s identity in sonic form. More than you might ever know, music affects people in ways that can transcend any other form or stimulus.
There’s a reason we love the McDonald's “I’m Lovin’ It” jingle. It reassures us, it makes us smile. Despite the widespread adoption of music in nearly every form of content, it can still be overlooked or ignored by brands and creators.
After all, how much of a difference could good music vs bad music actually make when shaping your brand’s image? Let’s explore just how music is more important than you might think, and how good music in particular can affect your brand’s image in your marketing materials and digital content.
Finding the right music for your brand
The first step to discerning between good music vs bad music for your marketing campaigns and videos is to find the right music for your brand. For better or worse, as a form of art, music is subjective. And deciding whether a song is “good” or “bad” also depends on the context it is used in.
That’s why stakeholders should take a moment to reflect on their preferences before deciding on the music for their projects. Ask yourself questions about your brand. Is your brand bold, playful, serene, or luxurious? What emotions do you want your ads and videos to evoke?
The goal isn’t to find just good music, it’s to find brand music that connects with your audience.So, research and understanding of your current and target audiences are crucial. Try to identify elements like demographics, culture, and expectations.
The format in which you deliver your content is also quite important. There are significant differences in how videos and ads are displayed online today. There’s long-form content found on YouTube, and there’s short-form content found on TikTok. There are also many differences between social content and web content, as well as how ad spots work versus more in-depth brand films.
The goal is to identify your ideal brand identity and to build familiarity through recurring audio themes. This is called Sonic Branding, and it can be used to create an audio branding strategy for your brand.
Why music is crucial to brand perception
As we’ve covered before, the psychology of music is quite fascinating. Not only can music literally alter your brain chemistry, but it can influence mood, perception, and—yes—even purchase intent.
This isn’t new information, per se, but studies continue to cement the fact that music is a crucial part of how people perceive different people, places, and things. This science-backed data can be invaluable for those looking to create better ads and content.
For example, picking the right intro track to a video can be hugely important to “hooking” a viewer within those all-important first few seconds, capturing their attention against their desires to look (or, often, click) away.
Music is also a powerful tool for building identity and loyalty, serving as the foundation of your sonic brand. Just like our logos, which employ color theory, music theory is vastly helpful in developing a signature element to your brand in the minds of your viewers.
How Soundstripe can help you find the right music for your brand
With all of this in mind, how do you actually use the right, good music for your projects? It’s with music licensing, of course. If you aren’t familiar with the concept, we can quickly explain that all music used in any ad campaigns, commercials, or online digital content needs to be properly licensed.
Here’s a helpful guide that covers everything everyone should know about music copyrights. In short, though, it’s important to understand that all music has copyrights associated with it, and to use any music in any of your content, you’ll need to properly license and compensate the musicians and artists for their work.
A library of curated options
To help you find the right royalty free music for business campaigns and videos, the Soundstripe library has curated options with many different genres, moods, and use cases tailored for your branding needs.
Soundstripe music is pre-cleared for all your marketing needs and can be safely used in your social media videos and ads. We’re talking about high-quality, royalty free tracks vetted by professional musicians, as well as other helpful resources like custom playlists and search filters to help you find the right vibe fast.
If you’re looking to license music for your company or work for an agency representing several clients, Soundstripe has enterprise music licensing options that offer advanced protection and indemnification, which can protect the biggest of brands.
Remember: sound is your signature
At the end of the day, while there might be many factors that go into what defines a “good” or “bad” song, it’s best to think of music in terms of what fits or doesn’t fit your brand’s identity. If you can lock into what makes your brand great and resonates with your audience, you can tailor a sonic identity that will get stronger with every music-aided piece of content that you put out.
If you haven’t already, check out the Soundstripe library, which features nearly 60 thousand tracks from Grammy-winning talent and rising independent musicians. All of our music is polished by pros in Nashville and perfect for all types of projects.
For more insights into how to pick the best brand music for your marketing projects and campaigns, check out these additional articles from the Soundstripe blog below.
- How to Avoid Copyright Infringement in Marketing Campaigns: Protect Your Content and Brand Online
- Soundstripe's Music Library Grew 80% in 2024: How We Turned Up the Volume on Commercial and Production Music
- How to Make the Perfect Brand Video
- 4 Lessons From Our Latest Commercial Campaign
- The Secret to Finding Game-Changing Music for Commercials
