Brand tune up: building value for brands through strategic sonic planning

While often overlooked, sound and music play an important role in marketing communications strategies. To stand out in today’s competitive marketplace, top companies are investing in strategic sonic planning to build value for their brands. This paper will investigate the role of sonic branding in marketing communications, and how brands can authentically and cost effectively integrate music and sound into their overall communications strategy. Looking at the history and future of sonic branding and the impact of sound and music on brands and consumers, this paper will seek to define a practical guideline for marketers and practitioners of sonic branding. The paper concludes that although it is difficult to quantify the impact of a sonic strategy, brands that embrace the principles of sonic branding can more effectively reach customers across all touch points. Moreover, the paper asserts that best practices for creating customized audio solutions differ from culture to culture.

Brand tune up: building value for brands through strategic sonic planning

While often overlooked, sound and music play an important role in marketing communications strategies. To stand out in today’s competitive marketplace, top companies are investing in strategic sonic planning to build value for their brands. This paper will investigate the role of sonic branding in marketing communications, and how brands can authentically and cost effectively integrate music and sound into their overall communications strategy. Looking at the history and future of sonic branding and the impact of sound and music on brands and consumers, this paper will seek to define a practical guideline for marketers and practitioners of sonic branding. The paper concludes that although it is difficult to quantify the impact of a sonic strategy, brands that embrace the principles of sonic branding can more effectively reach customers across all touch points. Moreover, the paper asserts that best practices for creating customized audio solutions differ from culture to culture.

Crisis communication

An advertising campaign from Marketing Greece during the COVID-19 pandemic urged international travelers to “#staysafe” during the difficult times, while images of the idyllic Greek Islands allowed viewers to continue to dream and plan an escape to the stunningly beautiful country of Greece. Clever, one might think, sharing the message with the international tourist that better days are surely coming, while urging them to stay safe in the meantime. Yet some suggested that promoting tourism during the pandemic was borderline irresponsible (Spinks, 2020). In fact, quite a few destinations even campaigned against tourism – Visit Wales, for example, urged travelers to stay away. How should the travel industry have responded to this crisis? What was the correct tone of message? And what would persuade travelers to venture out of their homes once the coast was clear? This chapter will explore such issues, in addition to examining internal communications strategies employed by the industry during the pandemic.

The under-reporting of sexual harassment in Australian workplaces: are organisational processes falling short?

Sexual harassment is persistent, prevalent and under-reported in Australian workplaces despite its legal regulation over many decades. The most recent survey data in Australia indicate that the majority of individuals who are subject to sexual harassment at work do not make a formal report or lodge a complaint. The opportunity for voice that organisational processes provide to those who experience sexual harassment at work is a particular focus, given the under-reporting problem. The paper also considers the impact of organisational processes on those who observe the inappropriate behaviour and/or the organisational response. Ultimately, this paper argues that organisations should reduce their reliance on individual complaints by expanding the pathways by which concerns can be raised or observed behaviours addressed that offer alternative voice mechanisms, with an emphasis on problem-solving and early intervention where this is appropriate. The paper also considers different communications strategies, such as approaches to training, the sharing of information about workplace incidents, and leadership on the issue within organisations.

When More Is Not Better: Three Common Mistakes in Health Messaging Interventions

Health messaging interventions frequently make three well-intentioned but mistaken choices in their communications strategies. To increase their persuasiveness, these messages frequently call attention to the greatest possible numbers of people engaging in undesirable behavior, victims of this behavior, and reasons why one should change the behavior. We raise recent research suggesting how and why the intuitively attractive more-is-better heuristic can be unproductive, and suggest ways to overcome these pitfalls.