Cut Through The Noise: Effective Marketing Communication in the Music Industry

“In the old games of life, best play it smart, with love in your eyes and a song in your heart, and if you’ve had problems since way back when, did the noise in your head bother you then?”

Aerosmith’s frontman, Stephen Tyler, hit the nail on the head when he wrote lyrics to the song “Something’s Gotta Give” from the Nine Lives album. Lyrically, the song is about going through trials and tribulations within yourself, but it must not distract you from your goals.

Effectively communicate with our audience.

As effective communicators, we need to work on the messaging to help us build our brand and continue building our working relationships. This is something that everyone should do despite their role in the industry. Whether you are a musician, a record label representative, or a fan, we all need to communicate with one another, and the best way to do so is to follow a method that will work for your platform and audience.

Consider implementing the Intentions-Based Communication Model.

Brand strategist Anthony Miyazaki developed the Intentions-Based Communication Model to enhance the perspective of how communication works for all communicators. He thoroughly details the roles overlapping between the messenger and the receiver.

“This model sparks better thoughts and creativity to improve communication with our audiences,” he adds. We intend to explain why the sender wants to communicate this idea to the receiver.

Artists usually send messages through different channels (a song lyric, a video, a social media post). However, how a message is perceived is essential, as we must improve our communication with peers. We must ensure the messages we send are clear and fit the message we are trying to convey. But what does this have to do with noise, you may ask?

Noise prevents you from transmitting a clear message.

Miyazaki clarifies, “Our goal as marketers is to facilitate a mutually beneficial exchange relationship, and effective communication can do much to help us reach that goal. Our communication goal is to get our audiences to receive, decode, interpret, and understand the concept or idea we’re trying to communicate and the intention behind our messaging efforts.” Furthermore, we need to be cautious about communicating with our audience so we don’t overload them with potential noise.

Change the channel to satisfy new generations.

GenXers like myself grew up with cassette tapes, the radio, and MTV. Those were your three main channels. You could hear a song on the radio, make mix tapes for your friend, and look at the Top 10 songs that week by dialing into MTV. Back then, you didn’t have social media pages, message boards, or podcasts. It was impossible to talk to a celebrity unless you mailed a letter to a fan mail address and hoped for a response. Today, many channels in which artists can send their messages have become confusing and overwhelming. Now, start adding likes, comments, and shares. It all becomes too much. It all becomes noise. Marketing author and consultant Phillip Kotler explains in his book Marketing Management how digital communications have changed how people talk to one another since the launch of the internet.

“New technologies have encouraged companies to move from mass communication to more targeted, two-way communications,” notes Kotler. “Consumers can now play a much more participatory role in the marketing process.”

We are now inundated with ways in which we can communicate with our audience and with each other. Cut the middle man. You can directly speak to that person in seconds by tapping your phone. Online marketing has revolutionized how we see, think, feel, and speak. It has become highly convenient but also incredibly dangerous. Opening our communication avenue can also increase the chance of bringing unwanted noise and damaging our brand.

“Social media offers marketers the opportunity to have a public voice and presence online for their brands and reinforce communications,” Kotler adds. “[They] are rarely the sole source of marketing communications for a brand.”

Focus on where your audience lives.

Although modern, cool, and quick, social media is just another channel that, if done incorrectly, can tarnish and destroy our messaging. Our goal here is not to have a presence in every single channel but that deepen the relationship between you and your audience. Target your message and speak to your audience directly and effectively without using “loudspeakers” that distract them. Focus your messaging through channels that resonate with you and your brand.

As communicators, we need to work on getting the noise out of our heads out of our consumers’ heads and focus on what’s important. We need to work on avoiding a thousand channels that will bring us static and focusing on one or two that will get our message across - loud and clear.