When—or if—you return to the office, you might notice something different in the entryway, kitchen, or throughout your workspace: carefully curated sound.

Maybe there’ll be an energizing soundscape playing in the parking lot to wake you up when you arrive in the morning, or swelling around your desk in the afternoon as you fight the post-lunch slump. Collaborative spaces could be filled with quieter, relaxing sounds that inspire focus and productivity. Music meant for unwinding may filter through speakers at the end of the day to let you know when it’s time to wrap up.

Many employees in corporate America have spent almost two years working from home, growing accustomed to the sounds of children, roommates, pets, and more while they work. Now, as some companies consider reopening strategies, a silent office could end up feeling like a thing of the past.

• Made Music Studio, a sonic branding agency that creates signature sounds for brands—like HBO’s movie-presentation audio logo and AT&T’s four-note jingle—is betting that will be the case.
• It’s working with Spatial—a software company that specializes in tech and powers what it describes as “immersive audio experiences” for retail spaces, museums, theme parks, and the like—to develop a series of sounds with corporate settings in mind, allowing businesses to experiment with audio as they try to lure employees back to the office.

Zoom out: Getting employees back to IRL work is more important for some companies than others, according to Calin Pacurariu, the cofounder and CEO of Spatial.

“Employers that are in very high-growth, rapid-change industries with a lot of potential competition realize that if their teams are not together, they’re going to lose out,” he told Marketing Brew. “So this is not just about the employees’ benefit—which it is—but it’s for the corporate survival, quite frankly.”

Soundtrack to my life work

Last fall, Made Music Studio and Spatial debuted three sounds inspired by the four elements to tease the concept to potential clients. Companies that purchase the software and “sonic ambiances” can create more bespoke experiences beyond the three initial sounds.

Details: The “welcome ambiance,” designed for use in lobbies and entryways, is meant to inspire a feeling of warmth, while “focus ambience” aims to reduce distractions in coworking areas. An “energizing ambiance” was designed for high-traffic spaces, like hallways, to create a sense of “optimism and motivation,” according to the companies.

For large offices, leaders can commission more customized soundscapes to fill different spaces, according to Alex Coutts, SVP, head of experience at Made Music Studio.

• “We want to make sure that we’re really scoring each and every room and space so it is either focused on a specific function, or gives workers the personalization they want,” he said.

Made Music Studio and Spatial won’t name clients yet, Pacurariu said, since the offering is still new.

Read the full story, including how companies can avoid “sensory overload” in offices, here.—AM

Typically, brands get to choose the agencies they work with, selecting them after extensive reviews. But that’s not always the case.

Last year, Omid Farhang, CEO of the Atlanta–based agency Majority co-founded by Shaquille O’Neal, strategically slid into the LinkedIn DMs of Charlie Quirk, Realtor.com’s director of brand strategy, offering up a campaign idea that already had the perfect celebrity on board. Turns out, Quick was interested—which is how Realtor.com’s latest campaign came to be.

Marketing Brew spoke with Farhang and Micöl Rankin, Majority’s associate creative director,  about the unorthodox way the agency started working with Realtor.com, collaborating with rapper Big Boi, and the campaign’s larger goals.

The inception

“You don’t know me. I don’t know you. You might be familiar with an ad that we made that’s sort of breaking the internet today.” That’s how Farhang said he began his LinkedIn message to Quirk.

• The ad he was referencing? “Vax That Thang Up,” a spot Majority created over the summer for dating app BLK. The music video, which now has more than 3 million views on YouTube, features Juvenile, Mannie Fresh, and Mia X turning Juvenile and Mannie Fresh’s rap classic “Back That Thang Up” into a vaccine anthem.

“We’ve got an idea for you,” Farhang went on in his DM to Quirk. “We have a celebrity who we’ve already spoken to, who is in on the idea. I’d like to share it with you for free. If you love it, let’s make it. If you don’t, have a nice life. No hard feelings.”

Quirk, already familiar with Majority’s work, replied right away. He looped in Amit Kulkarni, Realtor.com’s VP of brand and creative, and with his approval and assistance, Majority got to work.

• “My knee-jerk reaction to a cold email on LinkedIn is skepticism,” Quirk told us via LinkedIn. “Most agencies will share a boilerplate creds deck before asking for a project. But Omid and the Majority team had really done their due diligence about our brand and product.”

Read more of what they had to say here.—AM

This past weekend was a great one for football fans—and an even better one for the NFL and its broadcasting partners.

The overtime nail-biter between the Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs averaged 42.74 million viewers, according to ViacomCBS, making it the most-watched divisional playoff game from any network since 2017. The game capped off a weekend-long series of ratings wins:

• Fox Sports’s Saturday broadcast of the NFC divisional playoff game between the San Francisco 49ers and Green Bay Packers averaged 36.92 million viewers, making it not just the most-watched Saturday NFL divisional playoff game on any network, but Fox’s most-watched Saturday telecast ever.
• Also on Saturday, the Bengals–Titans divisional playoff game on CBS Sports averaged 30.75 million viewers, making it the most-watched divisional playoff game on a Saturday afternoon in six years.
• NBC Sports’s Sunday afternoon broadcast of the Los Angeles Rams and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers averaged 40 million total viewers, making it the most-watched NBC sports game other than the Super Bowl since the company’s Sunday Night Football franchise rolled out in 2006.

It’s not a fluke. This season’s NFL ratings have been through the roof, showing how live sports ratings have remained higher than much of the rest of linear TV. The NFL’s 2021 regular season averaged 17.1 million viewers overall, the highest regular-season average since 2015, the NFL said earlier this month. And postseason is already racking up ratings wins: CBS Sports says it is so far seeing its best postseason in a decade, with an average viewership of 35.88 million viewers during playoff games.

Two-point conversion: Seems the Super Bowl, which is less than three weeks away, could deliver big audiences to advertisers willing to pay as much as $6.5 million—nearly $1 million more than last year’s high of $5.6 million—for a spot in the game. Knock on wood.—KS

There are a lot of bad marketing tips out there. These aren’t those.

Higher and higher: We love a good infographic—here’s one on elevating your social media ROI.

Pin it: You probably already know about impressions and engagement, but here are the other three metrics you should be tracking on Pinterest.

Growth: We don’t have a hack for growth, but can we interest you in a system?

Watch: Morning Brew is on YouTube! Our shows cover the tech, trends, and companies you care about, but we do it in a way that won’t make your eyes burn from jargon or boredom. Check out some of our newest shows.

Stat: 27%—the percentage of women who directed Best Picture–eligible films at the Oscars.

Watch: Everyone is sharing this video essay on NFTs from YouTuber Dan Olson, so we will, too.

Quote: “My star is rising on TikTok—my star has been falling on Instagram for the past, like, five years straight. So I’m going to go where the people like me.”—Influencer and Ladygang podcaster Jac Vanek on what she’s seeing on her own social media profiles

Read: Smell that? Scents are a key part of store’s identity, even in Covid—Retail Brew’s Andrew Adam Newman

Catch up on a few Marketing Brew stories you might have missed.

• Media companies are loosening Nielsen’s grip on the ecosystem
• Google’s latest replacement for third-party cookies
• Marketing Brew’s latest Coworking