The Influence of Music

I was reading a fellow classmates blog today, and he was talking about how music really does influence consumer behavior. I found it interesting because after thinking about it and listening to some old songs, I realized that just about every song is tied to a memory. Good or bad, music has an incredibly powerful influence on my life. Marketers use a very specific criteria when choosing songs to put in their ads. like it or not, music does has an effect on how people behave, people respond differently, but it does impact a person's actions.

Jake's article got me thinking about how music could be used to nudge people into making good decisions. The book "Nudge" written by Richard Thaler and Cass Sustein in 2008, defines a nudge as a way of using choice architecture to influence people's decisions, while not limiting all of their options. It is a nudge because it isn't forceful, it doesn't make you act a certain way, but it can alter or influence the way a person thinks and acts. Using music to nudge people would be like playing party songs on an advertisement for a Bud Light, or Sarah McGlaughlin singing sad songs for an anti-animal cruelty organization that is trying persuade television viewers to donate, or even playing soothing music to try to get a client relaxed for a medical procedure or a massage.

Music is all around us and has an impeccable impact on the lives of humans, it varies from culture to culture, but is consistent in the fact that every culture has their own type of music. Music has the power to latch on to your brain forever, when you hear a song that you haven't heard in years, you can still remember the lyrics. This is why music could be so easily used in marketing, if one only remembers to choose the right songs.