Reinforce your brand values with professional on hold audio branding
Looks aren’t everything. Businesses must embrace their unique sound.
Pretty much every moment of our lives we are bombarded with messages – including advertisers and brands hurling information at us, creating a busy and confusing blur of noise.
Our senses can become well and truly overstimulated and inevitably we only pay attention to a handful of sources at any one time. For this reason alone, achieving cut through and attempting to actively influence the information that people consume is both difficult yet increasingly important – and finding a channel where brands can speak directly to customers is like a dream come true.
Make yourself heard
Adding to the cacophony of advertiser noise is the seemingly endless array of media channels, with each one providing multiple opportunities to tap into the consciousness of the consumer. Making the most of every consumer touch point is essential and can often include tapping into all of the senses – visual, tactile, and auditory.
Sound is incredibly powerful, yet many brands don’t always consider its impact across the business and the level of investment, compared to the visual brand, is often much less significant.
“The role of the visual brand is already widely understood and many companies invest huge sums to ensure their brand is perfectly in tune with the target audience. Similar to visual branding, audio branding can help position a brand and communicate values and meaning.” Nichola Rumboll, MD at Ruby Slippers Ltd.
One of the most frequently used customer touch points, the humble telephone, is completely reliant on the power of sound. The telephone provides a seemingly unparalleled opportunity for business to communicate with their customers. At that particular moment (when a customer is waiting to make contact) it is highly likely there will little (or no other) advertiser noise. This makes it pretty unique, therefore your audio brand and in particular your on hold messages, are a perfect opportunity to share information and engage with the customer.
What is audio branding?
Audio branding can often be mistaken for old-fashioned radio jingles or musical idents that companies once created. However, we think audio branding is a valuable part of the whole brand mix – it is far more subtle and much more powerful than many people recognise.
Developing a unique sound to establish a brand’s bespoke audio identity, is another way to express a company’s values and bring additional meaning and personality to a brand.
Businesses that want to build on their brand identity are likely to have already considered and identified all the distinguishing qualities and the values that make it unique. For example – What does the brand stand for? What do customers look for and find appealing and interesting? How are your competitors positioning themselves? How do you compare? But so many brands still don’t pay attention to audio and they miss opportunities to reach out to customers.
Can customers identify your brand with their eyes closed?
If the answer is no, then perhaps it’s time to invest.
Sound can convey meaning and build brand equity. It is so powerful that, done well, it will allow customers to immediately recognise a company without any visual prompts.
When customers make contact via telephone and are placed on hold, they might as well have their eyes closed, so it’s hugely important that the messages they hear are representative of your brand. Being distinctive and consistent helps to add meaning and build trust, which is incredibly important.
We work with Drumroll on hold, sound experts, that work with businesses to understand what makes them special and stand out in the marketplace.
Developing on hold messages
1. We research competitors to help see the bigger picture and understand the ‘value’ of your business.
2. We think about the core values of your business as well as any additional offers that compliment your services.
3. We look at how the on hold messaging can be updated with fresh information, seasonality and the needs of your customers.
4. We think about customer retention and providing information to encourage customers to keep in touch after the phone call has ended.
5. Finally, we craft bespoke messages to engage and educate callers, as well as keeping your customers satisfied.