Jingles – sung promotional messages – have been part of radio advertising more or less since the industry was born in the 1920s. The two most common types of jingle are those used for radio station identities (think of “Bee Bee Cee – RAY-dio Twooooo!”) and those used in radio and TV ads for brand promotion known as “commercial jingles”.
In this short introduction to the power of the jingle we’re going to focus on commercial jingles for brand promotion. If you’re creating radio ads for your business, you’ll find that adding a jingle gives them life and character, and makes your product and company name much more memorable.
We often remember a jingle years and years after an ad has been forgotten: if you grew up in the seventies and eighties, short jingles like “For mash get SMASH!” and “A finger of fudge is just enough” have probably embedded themselves very deep in your memory, even though they haven’t been on TV or radio regularly for more than twenty years. When you consider examples like that, you can see how powerful jingles are – for a relatively small cost you can get a jingle that could promote your business for decades to come.
Deciding the lyrics
When you start working with a studio and composer to produce your jingle, one of the first things to decide is the nature of your lyrics. Clearly, you want some sort of memorable sales message in there, informing listeners of your key product’s benefit or simply repeating the name of your brand so people remember it.
How many words you can fit into your jingle depends on its length. Normally a jingle will be between 30 and 60 seconds. Commercial jingles come in two basic types. First is the “top and tail” – a jingle with a sung intro and outro and instrumental music underneath the voiceover section that forms the heart of the ad. Some of these jingles only feature a sung intro or outro; some use the same lyric as intro and outro; and some use a modified version of the intro version as an outro.
The heart of the commercial can be changed for each individual advertising campaign, but each different ad will be linked by the same jingle to reinforce your brand.
The other type of commercial jingle is a “fully sung” – a jingle that occupies all or most of an ad. Clearly, this type of jingle offers much more scope for creativity in terms of what can be sung and it’s important to make the right decisions about the theme, lyrics and style of music. Your studio and composer will be able to advise you on how lyrics can be made to work to the best effect.
Off-the-shelf vs. bespoke
Once you’ve got an idea of what you want to say, the next major decision to make is whether you want an off-the-shelf or bespoke jingle. Bespoke jingles are composed from scratch, specifically for your business, and are absolutely unique. An off-the-shelf jingle, on the other hand, is a readily available, pre-written instrumental track over which your studio can lay a custom vocal track, with lyrics written specifically for your business.
The big downside of off-the-shelf jingles is that other businesses may use them, too. If your jingle is not unique, it loses much of its power as an advertising tool. Additionally, because it hasn’t been composed for your business, it can’t be made to match your style and brand as closely as a bespoke jingle. Bespoke jingles may cost a little more, but the extra investment is definitely worth it.
Composition and recording
When it comes round to composing and recording your jingle, most reputable studios will provide you with samples of previous work. Very often, you’ll be able to identify one or two jingles that you think work well, and the studio’s composer will work up a custom jingle for you in a similar style. Alternatively, you can specify the genre of music you think would be most suitable and the composer and lyricist should work around that.
Recording the instrumental parts of the jingle is very straightforward, and is usually a wholly or partially computerised process. Once you’re happy with the basic jingle, singers will be brought into the studio, the vocals recorded and the entire tracked mixed. If you’re using the same studio to produce your radio ad, the jingle can then be stored ready for when the final ad is produced.
If you’d like a bespoke commercial jingle composed and produced, Clocktower Creative can help. Our team includes expert composers, writers and production engineers, and we have an extensive portfolio of successful jingles. Get in touch and we’ll send you some samples and advise you on your options.
For more information and contact details go to clocktowercreative.co.uk