Jessica Entner
The Role of Music in Brand Personality
Meet Jessica Entner of JEM Sound Music Strategy. With more than 20 years of music industry experience, Jessica created the company–a 100% percent female-owned full service music agency–to help uplift underrepresented talent such as women in the composition space and to build more transparency between the advertising and music industries. She speaks with us about better understanding the role of music in advertising and social media today.
How does Jessica know so much about the music industry?
Lovingly known for her encyclopedic knowledge on musical artists and genres, Jessica was raised in the era of MTV music videos and stacks of albums often given to her from her father, who worked as a music manager.
Whether it was blues, rock ‘n roll, or disco, Jessica could name each member of the band and the label they were signed to and memorized the mixers to albums she loved. She’s the person that knows the different dialects of how to speak music. Agency partners might say that they want something that sounds “organic”, and she knows how to translate that to her composers.
Why is music marketing important?
Auditory components in marketing are extremely memorable. We can recall them instantly, and people have an emotional connection to music. When you watch an Apple commercial, they are going to have some really cool music which can make people feel Apple is a cool brand. It cultivates a brand’s personality in a very simple way. If you’re a gaming company, it’s high energy, new, cutting edge and techy, but, if you’re a financial institution, you want to be calming, trustworthy and confident.
What are brands actually trying to accomplish when they’re using music in their marketing?
What is the sonic emulation of a brand? Is the brand cheeky? Are they straight to the point? Are they trustworthy? Are they honest? Do they build confidence in people? Are they cool? These are things that you have to take into account when you’re building a sonic chart of what your brand wants to sound like. They’re trying to connect people and their brand to a feeling subliminally.
Who are some of the brands that are killing it with their music?
The Sims and EA have an amazing music supervisor, and they’re doing great work in that space. They do a lot of collaborations with artists where they have artists sing in Simlish, which is the Sims language. Just to be able to cross collaborate in that way I think is fantastic.
And then there’s Roblox. Roblox is killing it in their metaverse. They’re utilizing events and activations in Roblox for bands, artists, and different brands; even Spotify has a game in Roblox.
What was the first job you did for JEM?
The first job that I did when I launched my own company was a NFL milk campaign for social. A week before I had started reaching out to composers, I got a lovely email from this female composer out of Atlanta. She said, “Hey, if you ever need anybody, I’d love to write.” A week later I’m like, “Hey, I’m doing this project, and I wanna see if you wanna work on it,” and she’s like, “Absolutely!”
Well, she nailed it. It went final. And the fact that, first job out the gate, I was able to work with a female composer, which is few and far between, made my heart sing. Because I was so excited to work with somebody and bring somebody in who’s never done this before.
How important is it to uplift women composers?
Nobody seems to realize how few jobs go to female composers in my world. There’s a lot of male writers, and I love my male writers. But one of my goals is to have at least one female composer on every job.
In this space, you don’t necessarily know the composer you’re working with, so I’m trying to be a lot more transparent with that. I bring my composer into the conversation.
When I created JEM, I wanted to create the company that I wanted to work for and a company that was inclusive and equitable and diverse and put our money where our mouth is.
Resources and Links
Jessica Entner on Linked In
JEM’s website
Twitter @Jeecaj
Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/jessica-entner-janis
6 Key Sound Attributes to Help Your Video Go Viral: https://musebycl.io/music/6-key-sound-attributes-help-your-video-go-viral
