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Tips For Giving Music Direction On Your Commercial

24 August 2022

Sarah Gray

Making a commercial for your business? Unless you have a huge budget, you likely won't be able to afford custom music for the finished video. Thankfully, there are plenty of stock music options out there to pick from, but you are essentially asking your video editor to find a diamond in the rough that will work great for your video. Here are some tips on giving good direction so that they can help you find the right music track.

Provide A Reference Track You Like

You can start the process by trying to find a music track that you like, even if you are unable to license it. This could be something popular that you listen to on your favorite music streaming service, another commercial that you saw, or even a part of a movie that has a really good score. This reference track can be a great start to a music search since it gives the video editor a good sense of the style that you are thinking of. They'll use this to start the search on their own to come up with a few music tracks for you.

Narrow Down On Instrumentation

With there being so many stock music tracks out there, it can be hard to narrow down the selection to something that is going to work. A good next step is to provide instrumentation that you are thinking of. Maybe you want all acoustic instruments so that the music sounds warm, or you are looking for all digital instruments for a more modern feel. You could also state that you want piano to drive the melody or something else along that line that can help your editor choose a track.

In addition, don't get too focused on there being an instrument in the track that you don't like. Many stock music sites provide stems for their stock music tracks, which means each instrument is its own track that can be controlled. Don't like the strings in the background? You may be able to get rid of it completely. 

Know The Music Edit Can Be Changed

Don't get too hung up on the music track not lining up with your commercial during the first preview with the track. Many times the editor will roughly cut the track for the commercial to get a sense of how it feels and then refine it later. If you are liking a track and feel like it could be tweaked, ask the editor to refine the edit a bit more because you may have a winner. 

Contact a company like The Slingshot Guys to learn more. 

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