There’s an Echo at Your End!
For most people, audio might have been something you didn’t pay attention to, until recent years. You watch a television broadcast, you hear a reporter on the radio, and the audio was clear.
Then Youtube came along, and some audio was great, some audio was merely adequate. Maybe you noticed that in some videos there was a lot of echo in the background, if the microphone was far from the speaker’s mouth, and if they were in a room with a lot of hard surfaces. Audio waves bounce around the room.
In 2020, everything became like Youtube. Late-night talkshow hosts had to record their monologues and interviews in their houses. Many stars never had to think much about audio before, because they had sound experts doing all that for them. Despite their huge status, big budgets, and viewership, many of these shows suddenly sounded no better than Freddie’s Cat Blog on Youtube (I don’t know if that’s a real channel, but it probably is).
Meanwhile on Zoom, we are all aware of how poor audio can distract from what is being said. If the audio and video continues to buffer, we anxiously wait for the second half of a sentence. If there is feedback, creating a distorted echo, it becomes unpleasant. Sometimes we can find the source—often one person who needs to turn the volume down. If it continues, I usually turn down my own volume, so it isn’t quite so irritating, as long as it’s loud enough so I’m not straining to hear the message. Here’s the problem: I’m describing a meeting in which I’m thinking more about the audio quality than the words themselves.
Audio is important. I can recall the two worst audio experiences in a movie theatre, and also that time as a kid someone showed us Empire Strikes Back, in a church basement, without the audio track (to go with the popcorn that had no butter, I suppose). I saw Romeo and Juliet in 1996, and perhaps the speakers at the theatre needed replacing. The sound was distorted, and…hey, Shakespeare is hard enough to understand when I can hear the words. The other film I remember was a documentary, I saw in Toronto’s Hot Docs festival in 2001, called Life & Debt. This was a well-reviewed, and eye-opening film. But the audio was terrible. I was not totally able to fully appreciate the film, or focus on its important messages, because of the poor audio.
I’m not a total audio snob. I think adequate audio is fine. If you can hear the message and understand, it works. If someone is calling into the CBC, and their end of the conversation isn’t perfect, well, who cares? But I feel that if you are marketing a professional business, a law office, a contracting business, or ceramics shop, using Youtube videos, and the audio is at the very bad end of the scale, that impacts your audience perception, and audience retention. It doesn’t seem professional, and it may turn some people off the video, who would otherwise listening to the end.
When your audio is not perfect, maybe you are speaking into the mic, but you are in windy conditions, or on a warehouse floor, where there is lots of hard surfaces, or background noise, I think there is value in putting professionally produced bookends onto your video. What do I mean? Just a very short introduction, with some music, and clean voiceover with your brand’s name, maybe the tagline, or maybe the topic being discussed. For example: “Brandon & Stoller Personal Injury Lawyers: You’re Safe With Us. Today’s focus: How to Stay Protected.” It doesn’t have to be as long as that, even a five second tag would work. Follow it up, with a short message at the end, in the same professional fashion. “Brandon & Stoller. Call 1-800-555-OUCH.” (Whatever) The video content may not have perfect audio, but the viewer sees it as a professional message. Surprisingly in this particular brand of sh— sandwich, people really do appreciate the bread!