For Steve Keller, audio branding seamlessly blends together the three overarching passions in his life: music, psychology, and marketing. Steve had a passion for music from a young age but never considered it as a career. He became fascinated with and obtained his college degree in psychology. During what some may consider a “gap year” before he had planned to pursue a master’s degree and Ph.D., Steve decided to go in a different direction and ultimately found himself producing music in Nashville, Tenessee. While there, he discovered his passion for marketing and advertising. In 2005, all three passions came together as he began to delve into the world of audio branding. Steve now works for Studio Resonate, Pandora’s in-house consultancy for advertisers.

In the first part of our conversation, we discussed Steve’s three passions and some of the research he has done, as well as:

• Starting the audio consultancy iV (http://www.ivaudiobranding.com)
• How Steve and iV began developing the sonic identity for Pandora
• Measuring KPIs and return on sonic investments
• The importance of developing the sonic piece of brand recognition at the beginning of the branding process, not at the end
• Understanding the entire ecosystem of a brand
• How audio influences buyer behavior
• Steve’s work with Studio Resonate
• Cross-modal hacking to influence consumers’ perception of flavor not only with taste but also with sound (this part blew my mind!)
• How sound affects our body’s release of dopamine and oxytocin
• How biases influence our decision-making processes

You can find more information about Steve Keller at www.studioresonate.com, or you can follow him on Twitter at @AudioAlchemist_ (that underscore is important). You can also find him on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevekeller1/.

This episode was very skillfully made to sound beautiful by the talented Humberto Franco (http://www.humbertofranco.com/).

Would you consider reviewing the Audio Branding Podcast?  If so, here's the Apple Podcast link: https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/audio-branding/id1489042453  And if you like what you hear (and read!) - please do share it with anyone you think might be interested. Thanks so much!