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Renting Music Is Costing Your Brand. Here’s What Owning It Looks Like
Two sonic branding veterans break down why agencies need to stop borrowing other people's equity
Danielle Venne, Executive Creative Director at Made Music Studio, has spent close to 20 years helping brands like AT&T, Corona and Frito-Lay figure out what they should sound like. Eric Singer, Partner and Creative Director at Coupe Studios Music + Sound Design, has been doing the same from Boulder, Colorado for 17 years—building sonic brands, branded podcasts and audio for healthcare, UX and film.
Together, they make the case that most brands are renting when they should be buying—and that independent agencies are positioned to lead the shift.
The gap between “important” and “afterthought”
Ask anyone at an agency how important music is to a campaign and the answer is almost always the same: critical. But the process tells a different story.
Venne points to the difference between campaign thinking and brand building. “If you’re thinking campaign mode, you’re thinking 13 weeks,” she says. “Brand building needs a longer vision. Whether you spend $100 or a million dollars, the question is the same—what are you building? Is it going to last?”
Singer puts the disconnect more bluntly: everybody has an opinion about music, but those opinions rarely connect to strategy. “The average consumer doesn’t have an opinion on color correction, but everybody’s got an opinion about music. A lot of times, these decisions are made based on somebody’s taste without any strategic thought behind it.”
Renting versus owning your sound
Singer frames the cost with a metaphor that lands. “Every time you create a spot and license a piece of music, it’s like renting an Airbnb mansion to throw a great party one weekend,” he says. “Maybe you impress some people, but you don’t own that house.”
Contrast that with investing in ownable sonic assets—a mnemonic, a branded sound suite, an audio identity system—and the math starts to change.
Venne agrees. “You’re borrowing somebody else’s equity and then you kind of have to give it back.” She compares it to the Nike swoosh: impossible to put an exact number on its value, but impossible to argue it isn’t worth something enormous.
Every time a brand puts content into the world without thinking strategically about its sound, it’s missing an opportunity to build that same kind of equity—through ears instead of eyes.
What you’re upselling is speed to emotion
Singer offers a reframe agencies should steal: when you’re selling sonic branding to a client, you’re selling speed.
“We hear sound 10 times faster than we can process visuals,” he says. “It bypasses the conscious part of our brain. What you’re upselling is speed to emotion and speed to decision.”
He points to Immersion Neuroscience, which measures dopamine and oxytocin responses to branded content through smartwatch biometrics—a way to quantify what gut instinct has always known.
Venne builds on this with a practical framework for getting sound decisions approved: good creative, good data and a good story. “If you don’t have those three things,” she says, “then it’s the loudest person in the room.”
Why indies have the advantage
Independent agencies are positioned to lead in sonic branding for the same reasons they win in other areas: speed, intimacy and fewer layers.
“You’ve got more permission to color outside the lines,” Venne says. “You can sense and adapt to client needs quicker.”
Singer takes it further. “Indies tend to know their clients better, and so much of the hard cost of developing sonic brand assets is tied up in the back and forth and endless revisions. You don’t have to have 12 people from the agency on every call.”
For agencies that want to start small, both guests suggest beginning with a single ownable asset tied to the highest-value or highest-repetition touchpoint. From there, the value proves itself. “Before that one year is even up, they’re going to recognize the value,” Singer says.
Give nostalgia a break
When asked what brands should stop doing with sound immediately, Venne doesn’t hesitate. “Give nostalgia a break. We’re running out of past. Just be present.”
Singer agrees—and adds the opposite end of the spectrum. “Chasing trends and developing music in K-pop style might be super cool this year. It’s probably not a great look a couple years from now.”
The takeaway for agencies: build something that belongs to the brand. Not something borrowed from the past and not something chasing the present. Something owned, strategic and designed to compound in value—just through a different sense.
Learn more
Made Music Studio
Coupe Studios Music + Sound Design
Danielle Venne LinkedIn
Eric Singer LinkedIn
Made Music Studio LinkedIn
Coupe Studios LinkedIn
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