Cafes, Karaoke, Customers & Cars . . . By Director Wayne Hall

March 31, 2008

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Being in the business music game, our primary focus is one of helping our clients deliver the right music for their target audience. Consequently (and understandably), we - and our clients - often tend to think that once we get the “music strategy” right, everything will be fine from an audio perspective.
A couple of recent personal experiences reminded me that this is far from the case.

Anyone who has been to Perth lately will have experienced the incredible property boom -  spiraling real estate prices, the construction of new subdivisions and commercial property . . . and lots of new venues and restaurants.
These new areas can provide a good indication of the amount of thought that is going into delivering an effective “modern” audio strategy. If Perth’s new restaurant and venues that I visited are an indication of where things are headed, we need to be more then a little concerned. Hard surfaces and irregular shaped rooms dominate (tiles, glass, metal, atriums, raised-ceiling areas), some of which were pleasing to the eye . . . none of which were delivering an acceptable audio environment. During quiet times the smallest of sounds became irritating as they bounced around the room, while during busy patronage it was impossible to hold a conversation.
As for listening to music in this type of environment . . .

Many of our larger corporations have been re-establishing general meeting areas, supported by top notch café style service. The concept is great - practical, morale-building and aesthetically appealing. On the face of it, a nice place to sit and have coffee, enjoy a meal, or hold an informal meeting. But dig a little deeper and you will find that little or no thought has been given to the audio strategy.
During a visit to one, this lack of thought (even care) was rammed home by the fact that a person behind the counter yelled out every order as it became available for pick up. We’re talking a good, solid five seconds of loud, irritating voice every minute across a fit-out that must have cost a million dollars.
A music strategy, at the cost of a cup of coffee a day, with it’s capacity to mask noise & warm and brighten the area generally, hasn’t even come up on the radar . . .
(plus I’d be working out a better way to notify purchasers that their order is ready).

Audio is all pervasive. Get it wrong and it can destroy an environment, no matter how much money has been spent making it visually appealing. All of us have to take responsibility for demanding more accountability from our designers and architects to create audio environments that work.


Karaoke . . . we all thought is was a fad, but is keeps coming back stronger then ever. SBA is pleased to announce it has finalised negotiations with Sunfly Karaoke to distribute its content in digital format. Sunfly – driven by the passion of its founder John West - has a reputation for creating quality Karaoke tracks and clips, using world class musicians and producers. During the past few years Sunfly have added a lot of Australian repertoire to their extensive classic catalogue, meaning their programs have even more relevance in this market. SBA has the right to exclusively supply Sunfly Digital Karaoke to a suite of juke boxes which meet it’s secure content management criteria, including RDR, AVI, Hankin, Rhythm House, Rowe & Sound Leisure, plus of course our own music Management systems. A series of library & program update packages are available. For more information contact Gary Correia here at SBA on 02 8586 8277 or garyc@sbamusic.com.au


Customers . . . If we are not clear where they sit in terms of our service proposition, we can start to let them down badly.
There’s an interesting email doing the rounds at the moment about how our NSW State Roads & Traffic Authority (RTA) are going to use their “point to point” technology to determine the exact time of a vehicle entering and exiting two of our main tollways – the M7 and the M5.
Now, anyone who travels the M5 at peak times regularly (as I do), and who is subject to 5km/h speeds and frequent stopping because it was not designed properly to cater for traffic travelling to one of the states fastest growing areas, has plenty of time to think that maybe . . . just maybe, this type of technology could be used for good and not evil.
Perhaps the RTA could spread the traffic flow by offering toll discounts to people who travel outside of peak times? Perhaps they could harness this fabulous technology to link the journey time with the toll - after all, why should we pay the full price of a toll for a service so poorly delivered? Perhaps they could even produce statistics on the success or otherwise of traffic flow? All of these usage features would improve the service in the immediate and long term, because businesses should be “rewarded” for their ability to deliver value, and resources allocated accordingly to fix the issues.

But what does the email suggest the good ol’ RTA will do? (real or not, the email is believable).  It declares, proudly, that they have a foolproof way of automatically fining a vehicle which is measured at greater then an average of 101km/h . . . and this time there is no way the driver will be able to dispute the fine. Great!

Why does this happen? Simple. The prevailing question at this organization has become something like “how do we raise more money?”, and not, as it should be for long term success “how are we delivering value to our customers?”. The day any organisation stops maintaining a customer-focused discipline is the day its business starts to deteriorate, as an inward-looking culture sets in. We’ve at times fallen into the same trap here at SBA (likewise, we’ve seen some of our clients do the same) and the above example is a great reminder of why it is so important to continually re-visit - in consultation with customers - the value of your service.

I can’t wait to vote at the next state election . . .

 


Wayne Hall
Director

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