Comments on: Music in Pubs, Clubs and Bars (ok in Retail and Hotels too!) http://www.dailydooh.com/archives/81 Digital Out Of Home - Insight, Knowledge and Opinion Sun, 12 Feb 2012 09:44:05 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Adrian J Cotterill http://www.dailydooh.com/archives/81/comment-page-1#comment-4 Adrian J Cotterill Sun, 05 Aug 2007 19:14:10 +0000 http://aideycot.weareon.com/index.php/archives/81#comment-4 Interesting statistics on the growth of the music streaming business. But please as an industry let's retain a commitment to both brand differentiation (as expressed in brand experience in all five senses) and to optimising customer experience.  Brand differentiation is being diluted by one-size-fits-all streamed music. With the prevalent use of relatively homogeneous pop music as a retail veneer, we have already got so 'me-too' that in many retail outlets there is no brand if you close your eyes: your auditory experience is indistinguishable from dozens, even hundreds, of other shops. Every retail brand needs to design its own soundscape from the ground up and ensure that it's appropriate, attractive and differentiated. At the same time customer experience is being undermined by over-messaging. We already receive thousands of promotional messages a day through eyes and ears, and according to Michael Bull's research the rise of the iPod is a direct response to this as people seek to re-establish some boundaries. Messaging in shops and leisure locations needs to obey the three golden rules: it must be targeted, appropriate and valuable. If not, we'll end up with people in bars wearing iPods! Many are already shopping with iPod in place because most retail sound is arbitrary, hostile and incongruous. Finally, customer experience is being eroded by the increasingly widespread assumption that everyone likes jolly pop music everywhere. This is wrong both psychoacoustically (actually fast-paced music will probably reduce dwell time as it causes people to move more quickly) and subjectively: the research I've seen shows that one third like public music, one third don't care and one third hate it. The question is: does any extra spending by the positive one third outweigh the loss of trade as many of the negative one third don't even enter the space? I am not aware that anyone has answered this important question yet. Sound is powerful. Licensed pop music is doubly powerful, coming with lots of personal associations. My advice for retailers and leisure brands is: define your brand sound and then create holistic soundscapes that optimise brand differentiation and customer experience. If music is part of that, great. But it may not be, so beware of me-too music! It could lose more customers than it gains. Julian Treasure Chairman The Sound Agency Ltd Interesting statistics on the growth of the music streaming business. But please as an industry let’s retain a commitment to both brand differentiation (as expressed in brand experience in all five senses) and to optimising customer experience. 

Brand differentiation is being diluted by one-size-fits-all streamed music. With the prevalent use of relatively homogeneous pop music as a retail veneer, we have already got so ‘me-too’ that in many retail outlets there is no brand if you close your eyes: your auditory experience is indistinguishable from dozens, even hundreds, of other shops. Every retail brand needs to design its own soundscape from the ground up and ensure that it’s appropriate, attractive and differentiated.

At the same time customer experience is being undermined by over-messaging. We already receive thousands of promotional messages a day through eyes and ears, and according to Michael Bull’s research the rise of the iPod is a direct response to this as people seek to re-establish some boundaries. Messaging in shops and leisure locations needs to obey the three golden rules: it must be targeted, appropriate and valuable. If not, we’ll end up with people in bars wearing iPods! Many are already shopping with iPod in place because most retail sound is arbitrary, hostile and incongruous.

Finally, customer experience is being eroded by the increasingly widespread assumption that everyone likes jolly pop music everywhere. This is wrong both psychoacoustically (actually fast-paced music will probably reduce dwell time as it causes people to move more quickly) and subjectively: the research I’ve seen shows that one third like public music, one third don’t care and one third hate it. The question is: does any extra spending by the positive one third outweigh the loss of trade as many of the negative one third don’t even enter the space? I am not aware that anyone has answered this important question yet.

Sound is powerful. Licensed pop music is doubly powerful, coming with lots of personal associations. My advice for retailers and leisure brands is: define your brand sound and then create holistic soundscapes that optimise brand differentiation and customer experience. If music is part of that, great. But it may not be, so beware of me-too music! It could lose more customers than it gains.

Julian Treasure
Chairman
The Sound Agency Ltd

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