Hanging on the telephone

Over the recent Christmas break I heard on the radio an interview with a senior marketing person from Manchester Airport saying that in a drive to make their brand feel more authentic they would be changing the hold music at their call centre to the music of the Smiths, Stone Roses and other Manchester bands.

Brilliant.

Here was a brand which was actively seeking to take its brand into all the nooks and crannies of its brand experience. I only hope it’s doing the big things as well but if it is looking at the minutiae I am sure it will be.

Now obviously no one wants to be listening to hold music when calling a call centre but sometimes it is unavoidable even though I’m sure that as great marketing people you will be making every effort to minimise this! But it does make sense that the choice of music to be played should be totally reflective of your brand, its positioning and its personality.

Too often however we choose, if indeed we do consciously choose, some piece of classical music or worse still some random muzak, no doubt on basis that it is cheap and royalty free. But is classical music really what we want if we are trying to portray our brand as modern and progressive and in touch? Is muzak the right tone for a business that is trying to be distinctive?

At the very least it would be great if brands were to play the music from their advertising, if they are doing any. Given the efforts that agencies make to find the right music, as I know only too well, you can be assured that this will be on brand. I haven’t checked what music John Lewis are playing but if they are not playing the music from the ad that brought a lump to all our throats over Christmas they are most definitely missing a trick.

And by the by I think that an interesting and toe tapping piece of music can have the positive side effect of making the time our customers are waiting feel less long!

The real point I’m trying to make here is that great brands define what they are, what they stand for, who they are and how they behave. The brand is used to inform every decision that is made throughout the business. It defines the customer experience from start to finish and influences, especially in service businesses, how it expects its people to deliver. This, I think Manchester Airport, gets and understands given its obsession with the detail.

I think it might be time to check out what music our customers are listening to. And what other detail of the customer and employee experience should we be taking a close look at?