300. Jingles, Rhythm, and Beats: The Neuroscience of Branding Through Sound (Refreshed Episode)

Welcome to episode 300 of the Brainy Business. Understanding the Psychology of why People Buy Today's episode is all about the sense of hearing. Ready? Let's get started.

You are listening to the Brainy Business Podcast where we dig into the psychology of why people buy and help you incorporate behavioral economics into your business, making it more brain friendly. Now here's your host, Melina Palmer.

Hello, hello, hello everyone. Three hellos for 300 episodes.

My name is Melina Palmer and I.

Want to welcome you to the Brainy Business Podcast. Today's episode is all about the sense of hearing and before we get into why this is the episode for today's refresh, let's take a minute to celebrate and commemorate that milestone today, shall we? This is episode 300 of the Brainy Business podcast 300. We're also dangerously close to the five year anniversary of the show, which launched with its first three episodes on July 6, 2018. This past Friday's episode number 299 was showcasing the top episodes of the Brainy Business based on your downloads over these first five years from everyone tuning in from over 170 countries around the world. Thank you for that. That episode is linked in the show notes for you so you can check it out if you missed it. And as I mentioned last Tuesday, I've chosen to refresh episodes from the series on the Senses, like this one on Hearing, last week's On Smell and next week on Touch because I think they are hidden gems from the show that came out in a weird little pocket of time around the holidays in that first year. So I think they got a little lost in the shuffle, which is a shame because they're so important and I think the content is really interesting. I spent hours researching the senses for these episodes and the facts within them are so important for brands, so I wanted to refresh them for you. Now. This one on Hearing was specifically selected to complement my conversation with the amazing Jonah Berger, which is coming out on Friday to kick off the next hundred episodes. In it we talk about his new book Magic Words, which is so amazingly interesting and nuanced into language. So it felt like even though the insights include the written word as well as those which are spoken, this seemed like as good a time as any to bring this episode its moment in the sun. I hope you enjoy hearing about it. Pun absolutely intended. As much as I enjoyed creating and refreshing it for you, don't forget that the show notes for the episode, including all sorts of goodies including related articles, books and links to past episodes, including.

Many that weren't out when this one.

First aired back in 2018. Those notes are found within the app you're listening to and@the brainybusiness.com 300 all right, let's talk about the sense of hearing.

Sound is basically just air. It hits the outside of our ears first, which helps to determine where a sound is coming from as sound waves bounce off of them. The ear canal then works like an amplifier on the way to the eardrum. And it's not just a clever name. The eardrum works like a physical drum. By turning the air that hits it into a physical vibration which will pass along to the tiny bones of the inner ear, they start to move and shake as well. This causes the fluid of the inner ear to sort of slosh around, stimulating tiny hairs in the ear which move molecules around and send signals to the brain to be interpreted as sound. This is also what controls equilibrium and allows you to stand up and know the difference between what's up and down. Basically, it's what allows us to live life not in the fetal position, I guess. So the sound and vibration will then move along to the snail shell shaped cochlea which has 20,000 fibers to help determine different sounds and translate those to electrical pulses which make their way to the brain for interpretation. They start out small and stiff, and as you wind your way through the cochlea, they get longer and looser and they can resonate at different frequencies. Think about a harp or guitar strings that can bend differently based on the type of sound. This is what allows you to interpret different sounds through those different vibrations. High frequency, fast moving waves have a higher pitch and those with a lower, slower frequency are going to be coming in at a lower pitch. The brain knows what you're hearing based on the specific hair that's moving. And the louder the sound, the more it moves. If they're too loud, those little hairs can get damaged, sometimes permanently, which leads to hearing loss or ringing in your ears after going to a concert or something like that. The vibration of sound waves is at the core of all sound and what we hear. Different instru, or voices make different sounds because they vibrate and amplify the air differently. Eventually, all this information makes it to the frontal lobe in the brain so that you can make sense of everything and understand what it is that you're hearing. I've linked to a couple of really interesting and useful YouTube videos in the show notes if you want all the technical terms and things like that. But as with the other senses, all you really need to know for our purposes is that your body takes in a stimulus that needs to be interpreted by the brain to actually mean anything to you. It's really amazing when you think about all the things our brains can do at once, isn't it? We can quickly figure out where the 11 million bits of information coming to our brains comes from. There's a lot going on that the subconscious has to sift through to decide what your conscious brain can can actually pay attention to. No wonder it's hard for our businesses to break through the clutter. Speaking of which, hearing has a similar ability to distract and take over everything in the same way as smell does, which I've talked about before. If you remember from my It's not about the Cookie series, I talk about the scent of the cookies triggering the brain and how a good smell can flag your brain in a positive way. But a bad smell like burnt popcorn in an office can make it so no one can get any work done because they're too distracted by that gross scent. Last week I actually had a call where one of my clients needed me to repeat something because they were distracted in their office. They haven't had not yet heard that episode on Change Management. We ended up talking about it, but they had said after part of the conversation where there was a bit of a pause, they said, sorry, someone burned a bag of popcorn and we were just talking about how awful it was and I completely missed what you said. Oh man. It ended up being really funny and very perfect timing as I'm in the midst of these episodes on Senses. They were very excited to learn more about the burnt popcorn smell and its impact on the office and I love to share, so we talked about that for a few minutes before getting back to the direct mail campaign we were working on. Anyway, sound has a similar impact on our ability to perform. While doing some research for this episode, I brought some articles with me to the salon while I was getting my hair done. Often it's pretty quiet in there so I can get some work done while my color's setting in. But today everyone was very chatty and I was so distracted by the sounds around me I couldn't take anything in that I was reading. I kept trying and going back and thinking just focus on the words. But I couldn't. My brain got so focused and caught up on all the sounds and words and tidbits, things coming in through my ears that I could not fully interpret or retain anything I was trying to read. I'm sure you've experienced this before when too much is going on around you, it's easy to get overwhelmed and be unable to focus. This is why noise canceling headphones are so great on airplanes and are used by professional athletes everywhere. They help block out everything else and bring focus. Beats by Dre has a campaign called above the Noise and another one called Hear what yout Want, which showcase different athletes wearing their headphones to create the experience they want in training or walking through a slew of paparazzi or opposing fans into a game. You can literally flip a switch and tune everything out, which is appealing when you want to focus. Many athletes have been known to have pre game rituals and much of that includes sound and music. They have songs they need to listen to in order to prep and get pumped for the game. Have you ever listened to a really great song and felt your whole body change? Maybe you were in a slump, driving home, tired, unfocused, and then boom, this is my jam, right? All of a sudden you're dancing and feel electrified, awake, ready to go. How does that work? Music is amazing and powerful. I've linked to a fantastic Netflix series called Explained, which has an episode dedicated to music. I'm going to give you some of the highlights here, but it's really interesting, especially if you're someone who loves and makes music and hearing all those notes and the things they talk about can make a difference. So there's a link in the show notes if you want to check it out. The video gets into what music is, how and when sound becomes music, and why humans have been able to master the art of music. Researchers have found musical instruments as old as cave paintings. And every single culture on earth has been found in to have some sort of musical component. Clearly, this is very important to humans, and it turns out we are unique in our ability to understand, predict and interpret music. There have been a few cases of animals, you could count them on one hand, that can identify a beat or a melody, but they can't combine all the facets together. Pitch, melody, harmony, rhythm to make music. A bird that learns a tune can't recognize the same notes when they go up or down the scale. When you tap along to a beat, you have to be able to anticipate what's coming and start the tap or clap or snap before the sound comes. Monkeys can know that there is a beat, but they can't predict or match it. We truly are unique as humans in being able to understand and create music. And this impacts more than just our ears. Studies have shown that our bodies physically react to music in amazing ways. A quick tempo in a song will make our heart beat faster. A slow song can bring your heart rate down. Music releases chemicals in the brain. Some make you feel good, and some can be tied to negative emotions. Singing releases these positive emotions even more. The body actually changes when music is played, which is really amazing. If you want to get pumped up before an important call, maybe you've got a sales call, you're wanting to close a deal. You can choose a really great song and listen to it before to get you excited and ready to go. And I know for me, I personally can't exercise without listening to uptempo music. I need that beat in my brain. But how does sound become music? The easiest way to turn any sound into music is to repeat it. Have you ever seen a video of Ed Sheeran performing any of his songs using a loop pedal? I have, of course, linked to one for you. In the show notes, he essentially makes a bunch of random sounds and sets them to repeat. First, he strums out a quick guitar line, sort of like the bass line, Then a few notes on the keyboard. Then he sings the various pieces of the chorus, Building the piece as he goes, and voila, a song is born. I've said it on the show many times before, but our brains love repetition. Familiarity is favored, and music is all about repeating. When researchers played the sound of rainfall to a group of participants, they were then asked to rate the sound quality from completely environmental sound to completely music. The first time they heard it, they all said it was an environmental sound. Then after it was repeated a few times, everyone started to laugh because magically, it became music. Music impacts our brains differently than words, and it can actually help people to heal. Studies have shown that people with Parkinson's who might not be able to move without shaking or that have trouble controlling their movements can actually move around with much greater control and range. When there's music playing, the music changes them the way their brain processes and helps them to move. Similarly, someone who has a brain injury that caused them to lose their ability to speak, maybe they can't say more than two or three words together, can sing full songs and remember all the words, notes, and speeds. It's fascinating to watch, and you can see a little of this in that Netflix documentary in the show notes. So what does all this have to do with business? Back in the 70s, Philip Kotler published a paper called Atmospherics as a marketing tool. This revealed how different emotional states can be triggered by businesses in retail environments to influence buying behavior. This includes all the senses, including sounds. Remember how I said a song can pump you up and get your heart beating faster? Studies have shown that restaurants playing faster music can turn more clientele than those who play slower music. But if you play slower music, people are more likely to stay longer and buy more. For example, when medium tempo music was played, diners ordered three or more drinks. Understanding how you make money can make it easy to pull the right levers so you can increase your revenue by getting people to naturally shift the way they interact with your business on a subconscious level. And what about the type of music? Grocery stores tested out playing stereotypically French or German music in the wine section and it impacted the type of wine customers bought. And of course everyone said the music had no impact on their choice. But the receipts showed a very different story. Many grocery stores will play slow music to encourage you to reduce your pace and stay in the store longer and you end up buying more. Mall shoppers have been found to take longer and pay more attention to each item when slower music is playing as well. If you have a physical location, what type of music are you playing? Often people feel that the individuals working in the store all day should be able to choose the music playing in the space. After all, they're going to be listening to it the most, so it should be something they like, right? Unfortunately not. Studies have shown that stores need to carefully select music that matches the brand to encourage shoppers to stay in a store longer. Perceived fit of music to the brand, increased time in the store and the amount people purchased locations that played music that was a better fit increased time in a store by 22 minutes. That can make a really big difference to the bottom line. So while it may be tempting to give in to employees who want to select music based on their tastes, know that if it's outside your brand Persona, it could be doing a lot of damage. What about familiar music? Customers reported that they shopped longer when they were exposed to familiar music, but in reality they were there longer when exposed to music they didn't know. So familiar music may make it seem like someone's around for a longer period of time and this could impact perceived wait times. The emotion of the music can impact the way a consumer feels about the brand they're interacting with and the way they think about the wait times. I've linked to a study on perceived wait times and perception of the services environment in banking for all my bank and credit union friends listening. In short, the music playing impacts the way people approach you and all the interactions you Have. This is all about priming, which is the focus of episode 18, and I've linked to that in the show notes so you can go back and listen to it after this one. As I say, in that episode and so many others, everything leading up to the sale, conversation, price, or item being sold matters more than the price or item itself. Everything matters, including the sounds people hear before they interact with you and during the time they're interacting with your company. Of course, I could not complete a section on music and brands and not mention jingles. I get it. You hate them, right? You think they're annoying. You vow you would never use one yourself. But they work. Just like brands should have scent logos. Many have sound logos as well. Sounds have a strong connection to memory, emotion, and behavior, and jingles associate brands into our brains in a different way than images or words alone. And jingles don't have to be just jingles. They can be all sorts of things, and you probably associate all kinds of sounds with their brands and don't even realize it. Let's play a game, shall we? I'm going to play some sounds and you guess the brand. Go ahead and shout out your answers like I can hear you. Are you ready? Okay, here's the first sound. Do you know what that was? It's Microsoft Windows xp. All right, next. How about that one? That was T Mobile. All right, here's one more for you. That, of course was State Farm. And what about this one? That was McDonald's. And here is one of my personal favorites to show how an entire franchise can be tied to sound. If you are one of the millions of fans of this, you should get it nearly instantaneously. All right, here we go. All right, I won't play the entire theme song, although I would love to. But for all you Harry Potter fans who heard that, did you instantly get excited like I do? It only takes a split second, but you know right away what that sound means and it can change your entire demeanor, right? That is the power of sound on the way we relate to brands. And little changes can make a big difference. I've linked to a fun article that shows what the creepiest scary movie soundtracks sound like. When changed from a minor to a major key, they become almost comical. Check out the show notes to hear what Jaws or Psycho sound like when in a cheerful major key. And in case you didn't know, sounds can really make or break movies. They say if you're ever watching a movie and get too scared to put it on mute, it completely changes the experience I've also linked to a video of Mrs. Doubtfire recut as a horror movie. The trailer is only two minutes long and a happy version of the Shining. In short, sound matters. For example, when I was choosing the sound for my podcast intro and outro, I was very selective of what would bring the right feeling and vibe to the podcast, and I've matched that in my speaker reel video. I didn't want something everyone else had or could use, so I bought the rights to a song that less people will get instead of using free stock music. This helps people relate to me. And when you hear the podcast music, if you've been an avid listener of the brainy business, you should know it's me even if you hear it out of context, because you probably haven't heard it anywhere else. Similarly, when choosing a voice for the intro and outro, I had to be really strategic about whether I had a male or a female voice, how that would come across, what words they were saying, vocal inflection, and more. I use these tools when recording episodes as well. I'm often smiling while I'm talking. Learned that from my days working in a call center. People truly can hear if you're smiling or not, and it makes a difference in the way they interact with you. Think of how different the experience of this podcast would be if I said welcome to episode 27 of the Brainy Business. I'm your host, Melina Palmer. Wah wah wah. Same words, completely different experience because of the way it sounds. And before we close out this episode on hearing and sound, I want to give a brief introduction to a very advanced lesson on how sound can impact pricing. The study I've linked to found that the way a number is sounded out can impact the way the price is perceived as being big or small more than the mere number does alone. They did this by testing out the way words are formed, vowels and consonants to determine what is a big sound versus a small sound. And this was built on research from 1929 and another study from 1933. So it's been around for a while. But the new research was specifically looking at pricing and the way people interpret discounts. Some vowels can sound bigger or give the perception of being bigger, but than others based on the shape your mouth creates. To form the sound, think of an versus an e. This is also different than consonants like t, which can be more closed off. I'm not going to get into the nitty gritty, but this study found that bigger associations in the phonetics translated to a bigger price in the brain like the form of a discount. It felt bigger when it was associated with this bigger space than with the smaller sound and space. This was done automatically on a subconscious level and they tested across languages to show the difference. So someone who spoke both English and Chinese fluently was shown the same price in both languages, like $7.88 788 where one had a big sound and the other had a small sound when you were to translate the way someone would say them and that impacted the way they perceived the price and the item overall when that same person was rehearsing and thinking of it in English versus Chinese. And this can impact the way prices are interpreted even when they're not heard or spoken, which is important to know as well. Pretty cool, but very, very advanced. If you want to know more about pricing, check out the episode on Unlocking the Power of numbers. That's episode 17 and it's a little bit easier to relate to. You can also learn more about this in episode five, the Truth About Pricing.

So what got your brain buzzing as you learned about the sense of hearing today? For me, as someone with a musical background, I'm fascinated by sound, rhythm, tone and everything to do with our sense of hearing. I also love how much hearing can tie into our familiarity bias. The episode on that is my top recommended next episode to listen to after this one. It's linked for you in the show notes, of course, and how we might hate something when we first hear it, but over time it grows on us and our opinions change and suddenly it can become our favorite. It's amazing how sound can make you hungry and another can make you tired and still another can bring you to tears. And of course, whether it's a jingle or the noise your system creates as it powers up, or leveraging the power of a rhyme, brands can really learn a lot and get great value from incorporating the sense of hearing into their work. To learn more about this, I highly, highly, highly recommend you tune into this Friday's episode with Jonah Berger on his new book Magic Words. And of course to pick up a copy of it. Because while we're going to talk about a few of the amazing things in this book, there is so much more in there and it's fascinating stuff that will help anyone in business and life to be more successful by making a few slight changes to the words they use. And to get more tips and insights on applying the sense of hearing and all your senses into business. They're heavily featured in the priming chapter in part two of my first book what your Customer Wants and Can't Tell youl, which is linked for you in the Show Notes. Of course, if you want to expand your thoughts on this concept and dig in even more on the senses and how to apply them to your work, go ahead and flip to chapter six in your copy of what your Customer Wants and Can't tell you. Before we close out the show, I want to take a moment to thank you. Thank you for 300 episodes, nearly five years and a million downloads from the more than 170 countries around the world. Thank you for all you do to make the Brainy Business what it is. For listening, subscribing, rating, reviewing, sharing it with friends and colleagues. For checking out and reading my books for all the amazing clients. This show has brought my way. For all of you, whether we have met yet or not, I appreciate you. And just think, without a Sense of Hearing, what would a podcast even be? I'm just realizing how fitting it is to have this be the episode for number 300. Celebrating a mostly audio show with an episode on the Sense of Hearing.

I love it.

And again, I appreciate you. Whether this is your first episode or you've been here for all 300. Thank you. And of course, don't forget about all the resources including related past episodes, books and many articles. If you want to really dig in on the Sense of Hearing, they're all waiting for you in the show notes@the brainybusiness.com 300 and just like that, episode 300 on the Sense of Hearing is done. Join me Friday for a brand new episode with Jonah Berger to discuss magic words. It's going to be a lot of fun. You don't want to miss it. Until then, thanks again for listening and learning with me. And remember to be thoughtful.

Thank you for listening to the Brainy Business podcast. Molina offers virtual strategy sessions, workshops and other services to help businesses be more brain friendly. For more free resources, visit thebrainybusiness.com.