Music Licensing Archives - Level 77 Music

Choosing the right music for your brand

Music is an inscrutable part of everyday existence. Whether you’re streaming the latest releases, enjoying your favorite podcast, or catching it in the background of television shows and movies, it is part of our everyday lives. Music is such an integral part of our lives that you encounter it in places where we are barely conscious of it: while we shop in a store, while we dine at a restaurant, while we wait in line at the mechanic. Music is literally everywhere. Businesses use it to create an environment that helps their consumers feel comfortable and welcome.

So how can you select the right music for your business and brand? There are a lot of details to consider. Aesthetics play a large part, as in matching the style and tone of the music to that of your brand. Intuitively you probably have a good idea of what music exemplifies your brand, but the specific details require a lot of thought and careful examination of the pros and cons. We’ll talk you through a few critical points to ponder before committing to a specific music provider, or picking a specific genre. Because music has a powerful relationship to the emotions and responses of potential customers, making the right decision is important.

The Modern Business Model and its Struggles

Understanding the right music means understanding the way that music impacts businesses and brands. Business models have changed considerably in the last 20 years. The widespread use of the internet has changed the way that consumers shop, communicate, and entertain themselves. The success of companies like Amazon show that the convenience of online experiences represents a seismic shift in the way that things are bought and sold. However, many people claim to prefer brick-and-mortar stores when they are shopping, and that is largely based on the shopping experience itself.

Consumers want their in-person shopping experience to be tailored to their needs, and cater to their personal preferences. Choosing the right music in a shop or restaurant can help create that sense of belonging and pleasure that takes a window-shopper and makes them a customer.

The right selection expands beyond simply the background music playing in a store, however. A central aspect to creating brand awareness is finding the music for the background, or “bed” for radio, television, and internet advertisements. Selecting unique, curated sound content not only will tie into each customer’s experience with your brand, but will also help to make it instantly recognizable in a way that influencer and spokesperson content cannot.

How Music Choices Affect Your Brand

Sometimes it is hard for a potential customer to understand the vision behind a business. Having a clear understanding of both your product and your customer, then finding the music that connects the two is the most important consideration in music choice. The right music can influence customer interactions and drive sales.

There are some basic concepts to understand when selecting music as part of your brand. Tempo is one of the first things to consider. Slower music tends to be more calming and soothing, while faster music can often feel exciting and energizing. Think about how you want your customer to feel when they are examining your product. If you are selling motorcycles, or adventure packages, high-speed music might help to capture the excitement of your product. If you are selling spa services, you want something more tranquil and relaxing. The better your music matches your product, the more visceral the connection will be for your potential customers.

What Defines Successful Music Selection?

Once you have decided on a style, genre, and tempo that matches your product with your customer, it is time to find a music provider with content that helps you create the sort of curated experience your consumers will crave. Selecting the right vendor is important – there are a lot of laws governing the use of music. Music licensing and intellectual property law protect the rights of the composers of the music you would use in your business. You cannot simply play a series of tracks from your own playlist, as doing so without securing the rights could lead to potential legal trouble.

Using a professional licensed music provider will help you in a variety of ways. First and foremost, companies like Level 77 have already created professional production music in every imaginable style and genre, and secured the rights for them in advance. Having a vendor like that in your pocket helps you sidestep the potential legal entanglements associated with the use of music in a professional setting. Additionally, your original vision for your brand’s music might change, you will need a music provider that can quickly make that change without incurring additional costs or expensive delays.

Another important consideration is ease of access. Securing the rights to pop music can be difficult, and the process frequently takes years. You and your business do not want to spend the time to wait, or the legal fees to compensate a lawyer who is obtaining those rights. Pop music is especially difficult since multiple entities often own rights to the songs, requiring even greater coordination. A production music company can normally help you select from thousands of songs in any genre with just a few clicks, and at a fraction of the cost.

Overwhelmed? Let Level 77 Help!

There are a lot of things to consider when you are selecting the perfect music for your brand, and the process can be overwhelming. Contact Level 77, and let the courteous and well-trained professionals on our staff help walk you through the process of selecting and securing the perfect music. You will find the costs significantly lower than other production music companies, with a no-hassle billing process. More importantly, our knowledgeable salespeople can help provide you with the data and concepts behind selecting the perfect music, using their decades of experience to curate the perfect music for your brand.

How to Choose the Best Music Licensing Entity for Your Project

You have worked hard to create your project, whether it be an ad for television or radio, or a full length documentary. Regardless, you know that the music in the background of your work is going to be the final step in perfecting it. However, selecting music for a project such as your own requires several key conderations, including understanding the basic elements of music licensing, and the different processes involved in securing the rights to use works of music in your project without incurring liability.

What is music licensing?

We hear music on television, in movies, and even on the radio all the time. Podcasts use music in the background, Youtube and Tiktok videos have music in them as well. All those songs were written, performed, and recorded by artists, and those songs are their intellectual property. As a result, those artists have certain legal protections for the use of their work, protected by copyright law. We have all seen videos get removed from the internet because the person who recorded it did not have the rights to the music. Music licensing is the process of getting permission from the creators, performers, and producers of a piece of music to be used in someone else’s production. Failure to acquire licensing rights can result in the removal of a production, or, even worse, a lawsuit with serious financial consequences. As a result, it is important to acquire licensing before using another artist’s work in any of your own projects.

How complex is the licensing process?

The short answer is “it varies.” If you are looking to use a pop music track which you can hear on the radio or on Spotify it can be quite complicated. There are often several entities that took part in the creation of that music – the person who wrote the song, the artist who performed the song, the production company which recorded the song, and even the music company that distributed it. Each of those entities needs to agree to the use of the music before you can be granted a license. The process of getting approval from each of those groups can sometimes take years, making it challenging to get that music for any project which has a specific deadline.

How can I acquire music for my project quickly?

There is music made specifically to be used in a project such as yours. Production music companies offer large libraries containing thousands and thousands of pre-recorded tracks organized by genre, length, style, etc. These tracks were written and recorded expressly to be used in radio, television, cinema, advertising, or other creative projects. These properties are owned by the production company, purchased in advance from any of the other entities involved in creating the music. As a result, the process for acquiring and purchasing music is streamlined. Tracks found in music licensing libraries like Level 77 can generally be added to your project in just a few clicks of the mouse, at prices which are a fraction of those charged for similar pop music tracks.

You have put too much time and effort into your work to have it taken away from you because you did not acquire the appropriate licenses for the music. Understanding the process of selecting music in your work is a critical element in both choosing the music that is best for you, but which also fits into your timetable and budget. Production music libraries such as the one offered by Level 77 can help you quickly secure the rights to music which will perfect your project. The lower costs and expedited licensing of the production music libraries will make finding that perfect track a breeze.

Production vs. Pop: Which is right for you?

Recognizability is a double-edged sword

Certainly there is a comfort in pop music. The instant recognition of a track can provide familiarity for both yourself and your audience. However, those pop tracks are ubiquitous, and using the same song as other, competing franchises to your project can ultimately be detrimental. For example, if both your podcast and your biggest rival are using the same songs it can be hard for your audience to differentiate between your products. The unique qualities of your content require similarly unique music. In similar fashion, the same familiarity which the music provides can be a distraction from your work. Suddenly the listener is reveling in the glory days when that pop song was on the radio instead of listening to the content that you toiled to perfect and make relevant. You want your background music to amplify your message, not replace it.

Using pop music can be prohibitively expensive

That song you hear on the radio has the benefit of being instantly recognized by millions of people, and that recognition comes at a high premium. The process for acquiting pop music for a project can be arduous, but the cost is typically even greater than the expense. Using a top-40 pop hit can cost over 100 times as much as using a production music piece with the same energy and style. Paying significantly more money for a product that will run in the background of your own content will quickly make your own production costs skyrocket. The affordability of production music makes it an attractive alternative to the exorbitant costs of pop.

Aligning with a specific pop artist can have unintended messaging

In the modern day and age of “cancel culture” pop music artists frequently share their opinions about politics and global economics. While they are certainly entitled to their opinions, those opinions begin to be associated with their music. If your audience does not have the same opinions, then that pop song, with all its familiarity, may start to become a point of distraction and dissonance from your own message. Time and time again we have seen pop stars put out messages specifically requesting their music not be used by specific political or corporate entities. That sort of political activity is typically detrimental to your bottom line. Production music is created by music professionals specifically to be used for your project, and won’t have the same potential political backlash as popular music can have.

Getting licensing rights to pop music can be painful

You know the perfect pop music song for your project, so you contact the company which pressed and released their albums about using the track in your own work. Then the headaches begin. While the record company generally controls the rights and licensing form the music which they published, the individual artist (or artists) often still have first right of refusal. If tere are several artists credited as the creators of the piece, each one has the opportunity to refuse, for a variety of reasons. Most pop musicians are ery protective of their product, and frequently refuse the license if a potential project does not align with their own ethos. Additionally, the more steps involved in getting licensing rights means that the timetable to acquisition gets similarly extended. Getting permission for pop music can often take over a year. Because production music is designed specifically for purchase and use, those obstacles simply do not exist. Choose the track from a company like Level77’s massive music library, and the process of getting full licensure is almost instantaneous. The artists who have created the music in a production music library did so specifically for it to be used in movie trailer production music, sports production music, or other media.

There are a lot of factors to consider when deciding between using pop music or production music in your project. The timetable for licensing, the cost to access the music, and the effect the music will have on your final product are all important points to ponder. You may not have initially considered using a company like Level77 to fulfill your music production needs. The musicians at Level77 have used their considerable skill to create memorable music that can help bring your project to life without some of the problems which can plague pop music.

Category Music Licensing