The Music Behind Storytelling and What It Means for Brands
My earliest childhood memory is of me lying on the floor in our family room, my head scootched up against one of the two stand-alone speakers that accompanied our multi-piece audio cassette system (ah yes, cassette tapes…remember those?). I would lay there for hours, eyes closed, listening to the music pour out of the speakers and transport me to some place new. The thing about music that intrigued me the most was the element of storytelling. Sure, the lyrics play the most obvious role, but for me, the story was brought to life through the under beats in the rhythm, the rise and fall of the melody, and the tonal personality executed by the singer. If you listen close enough, every note that is accented or punctuated in just the right place helps to convey the message the entire song is intending. It’s the culmination of all these elements — the instruments, the harmonies, the tonality — that gets you to feel something. In a few seconds, the song can either capture the listener and make an everlasting connection with them…or it can lose them.
One of the reasons I fell in love with brand building was because at its heart, building a brand is about human connection and storytelling. Much like my afternoons of getting lost in the music as a child, I am fascinated with the opportunity to create moments of everlasting connection with consumers. If you think of a fully composed and executed song as the sum of many separate elements all working cohesively to evoke a specific feeling or create a specific message, you’ll understand the underpinning of what makes a successful brand thrive.
The motivation from within: Brand Purpose
If you talk to any songwriter or composer, they’ll tell you there’s a motivation, muse or inspiration for why they wrote the song. I liken this to the brand’s purpose because before you put something on paper, before there’s even a roadmap to building out the song, there’s got to be an underlying reason to be. The “why” drives how the composer thinks about the feeling the song should evoke, the tempo, the types of instruments chosen, the lyrics, etc. Similarly, the brand purpose is a foundational element of the brand that should drive literally everything — from the business decisions, the culture of the org/team, the marketing materials, the innovation pipeline, etc… But because we’re talking specifically about storytelling — your brand purpose is also the inspiration for the story you choose to tell. It guides the planning of message strategy to how the creative output is executed.
Many brand builders only think of storytelling as the external facing creative in an advertising campaign. For me, it is much more than that. Storytelling is every aspect of how and where your brand shows up. It includes the actions you take to further your purpose or cause, the way in which you interact with your consumers, the decisions you make on who will carry your story for you through any and all executions and in which channels you show up. All of these elements contribute to telling your brand’s ultimate story — but it begins with your reason to be.
Building the beat: Brand Foundations
The foundation of any song includes a beat (a basic rhythmic unit of time measure), the tempo (the pace at which a sequence of beats is performed), and a rhythm (which ultimately is the pattern of this sequence of beats). I like to think of rhythm as the underlying base and structure from which the song is built and other elements are then added to bring more “color” to the song. If we think of this in the context of a brand’s storytelling, these are the brand’s fundamentals. The base from which the story is built. Every organization has their own way of organizing these fundamentals (brand pyramids, houses, 4-boxes,etc…) the format, in my eyes, is irrelevant. The content is critical. Once you’ve identified the brand’s purpose, the other elements that create your brand’s foundation are at minimum:
· The brand’s benefit(s)
· Reason(s) to believe in those benefits
· The brand’s character (or personality)
· The brand’s values
As you think through building out your brand’s story, the fundamentals are your jumping off point because they help anchor the visuals, copy and other storytelling elements back to the roots of the brand. Put another way, they keep the brand’s story and all executional elements steady.
Layering in Colorful Melody: Visual Design
Melody is the part of a song that sticks in most of our brains long after the song has finished, and we find ourselves humming a tune…sometimes out of nowhere…even when we forget the lyrics. My mother is famous for this. I digress…
The art of creating melody consists of a series of sequences of notes, a combination of pitch, rhythm and tone that bring the story to life. It adds color, depth, and richness to the music. You can have multiple layers of melodic tone executed by different instruments and vocals to ultimately tell a holistic story. In brand building, this is the element of design and creative cues. The focus on color strategy, visual cues, font styles, and visual architecture are all executed simultaneously to bring the brand’s fundamentals to life in a cohesive way. Through design, we are able to visually signal the brand’s identity, which, as brand builders, we hope will stay in consumers’ minds long after they’ve seen a piece of advertising. Logos and iconic assets are prime examples of this.
The use of Lyrics: Key Message Takeaways
None of us are gifted with an infinite length of time to tell our story. Composers and songwriters know this all too well. That’s why figuring out the key message takeaway of the song is important because it guides them in the process of choosing lyrics intentionally. In brand building, when we think of our overarching message strategy, we also must identify our key message takeaway: the ONE thing we want our consumer to walk away internalizing about our brand. The rest of the lyrics or copy are around that overarching message. Also remember simplicity is key. The simpler and clearer the message, the greater chance the audience has to remember our key takeaway.
The role of Plot: Empathy & human truth
But lyrics and how they are used in a song play another fundamental role as well — they help create relatability and connection. We can dissect the various parts of a song all we want, but at the end of the day, if the song doesn’t make us feel anything… what good is it? The most critical element in any type of storytelling is the art of creating empathy…usually through plot. In the musical world, personally, I think the genre of country music does this better than most other genres because by nature, country music relies on the framing and arc of a narrative. Now all you country music haters out there, hear me out before ya’ll jump ship on me — I’m aware folks may consider the plots and storylines to be cliché and repetitive and I also recognize that other genres of music also tell impactful stories, but in my opinion, if you think of a good country song, you’ll find that the structure of compelling storytelling is all there: the theme is centered around a relatable human truth, a key message takeaway as a POV to this human truth is carefully thought out, and the lyrics are used to paint a colorful picture for the audience around an event, feeling or person.
Let’s take Maren Morris’ Bones as an example: a song about how a relationship that lasts is one that is built on a strong foundation. It’s a universal human truth that most of us who have been in, are in, or are looking to be in a relationship can relate. She conveys her point through the use of metaphor as a literary technique to take her audience through moments of tension in a relationship and resolution, while embedding a catchy melody and rhythm — all of which when executed together allow her to capture & hold her audience’s attention (and, you know, receive the 2020 CMA Song of the Year award). This technique is what effective brand builders strive to do as well — identify a universal human truth and insight (this makes the story relatable), then build a narrative around that insight which can include the creation of tension and ultimately leveraging their brand as either the hero (resolution) or the sidekick (assists in the resolution) — all via an impactful visual and audio experience.
The role of the refrain: Consistency of brand message
Ever wonder why songs keep bringing you back to a refrain over and over again? Well, not only does it help a song create rhythm, but it also increases noticeability and memorability. It doesn’t only happen with refrains, sometimes the songwriter will repeat the key message of the song multiple times throughout, so it sticks in the listener’s head. For example, continuing with the Maren Morris Bones example, the phrase “Bones are good” (i.e. there’s a strong foundation) is used 9 times in the span of a 3 minute song…essentially, she repeats her key message on average about every 20 seconds!
The same is true for consistency in brand storytelling. The key message takeaway (that is built on the backbone of memorable design principles, supported by the steadiness of brand fundamentals, all guided by brand purpose) shouldn’t waiver or change (often). And while this may seem like it could get monotonous, a lesson I learned in my early years was that as brand builders, we think about our brand much more than our consumers. So even though we may get bored of hearing and seeing the same consistent message, for the average consumer, the repetition of our key takeaway is what makes our message stick. It creates recognition and brand association over the long run. This is also how equity is built. Said another way: there’s value in the broken record.
No matter how you choose to think about it — whether through the architecture of a song or through any other device, stories are powerful. We all have them inside of us. We all yearn to tell our own versions of them. And in the never-ending battle for impact and noticeability amongst brands, the ones that can bring their audience along on their journey, vest their consumers in their own narrative arcs, and are consistent & authentic while doing so, will ultimately be remembered.
