Guido Heffels

101 Great Minds on Music Brands and Behavior

Guido Heffels, Ex-Founder, Chief Creative Officer at Heimat Berlin

After graduating from the University of Applied Sciences in Düsseldorf with a degree in visual communications, Heffels started working at Hesse, a design agency in Düsseldorf, followed by jobs at Baader, Lang, Behnken and Springer & Jacoby in Hamburg. In 1999, Heffels founded Heimat Berlin, together with three partners. The agency won a newcomer award in its second year, is now running a second office in Hamburg and has remained independent until today. Heffels has collected numerous awards and honors, including the Lead Agency’s “Creative Leader of the Year” title in 2011. Heimat and Heffels are in charge of a client roster including brands like Adidas, CNN, Hornbach, Audi, Burger King, and many more.

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“If I was your client and you gave me an ad that was visually perfect but didn’t sound good, I’d only pay half the fee”

— GUIDO HEFFELS, EX-FOUNDER, CHIEF CREATIVE OFFICER AT HEIMAT BERLIN

Uli Reese: How does a songwriter know when they’ve recorded a number one hit? And, similarly, how do you as a creative executive know when you’ve had an unbelievable idea?

Guido Heffels: I often speak about my role at 3M as one-third brand builder and two-thirds design leader. A third of my job is managing 3M’s brand reputation and building trust, relevance, and familiarity with our key stakeholders around the world. I have a team that manages our marketing initiatives as it relates to the 3M corporate brand and its activation globally. That includes everything from brand positioning to purpose to creating our corporate advertising. The other two-thirds is managing our global design capability, including product, package, brand and graphic design, UX design, material design, design research, strategy, and design operations for all the business groups we support for the enterprise. There’s an intimate connection between brand and design at 3M, and it’s great to work in both areas.

Reese: Do good ideas feel different? When you came up with the Hornbach campaign, did it say to you, “I’m special”?

Heffels: When these ideas turn up it’s not the end – it’s just a good beginning. Then we meet the right people to turn our basic idea into something great. Nobody in this business can ever say “I did that”. It’s always a group effort. Creative people can sometimes be egotistical, but when you have a good idea, you should talk to people and learn to listen.

Reese: The Hornbach audio logo is one of the most recognized audio logo in Germany. What’s your relationship to audio, to music? What’s your process? Maybe you can talk about Hornbach first…

Heffels: Well, the brief was to create the feeling of people who love DIY. It could be a shout, a cry, whatever…something that woke people up and made them want to be part of the DIY movement. We worked with some audio engineers and musicians and they came up with some ideas. We said “OK, it’s a good start”. Then we had more discussions, we talked to a studio called NHB, and they talked to some singers in Hawaii. They mixed a very old cowboy feeling with a traditional German song – and suddenly it was there.

Reese: How did you know that was the one?

Heffels: We had the feeling that it was wrong! Then we listened to it again and again, and it was different than everything we’d ever heard before. Normally brands want a simple jingle that goes “bing bing bing.” Conversely, we wanted an audio signature that would represent the brand and get stuck in the client’s mind. We felt it was so strange that it would work.

Reese: How did the client feel?

Heffels: It was part of the original pitch presentation, and at first they thought it was a joke. But the funny thing about this is, the more you listen to it, the more you fall in love with it. One day they turned around and said: “Actually, I think it’s right.”

Reese: So they had to sit with it a while?

Heffels: I think that’s always the process. You cannot expect a client to instantly accept your idea. You have to give people time. The catchiest tunes are not always the right ones. It’s not just about audio – we try to be different in whatever we do. That’s our business: We have to make consumers part of the creative process. In order to do that, you have to be entertaining. You want consumers to sit up in front of the TV and say: “What is that?!”

Reese: Is there a return on investment on this audio logo? Does Hornbach believe they have created an asset that is worth something to the company because of this high recognition factor?

Heffels: Well, they love it. Is there a return on investment? I think it’s one element of their brand.

A brand is like a puzzle: the visual side, how we show people what they do, the insights into their lives, all that combined with the audio logo makes consumers feel that this is the right brand for them.

Reese: I think it tells us the brand has a sense of humor. It’s honest – it doesn’t try to be something it’s not. Claiming a sonic space for a brand is one of the most difficult things to do – and you’ve done it perfectly with this example. In terms of finding music for commercials, do you have a briefing process?

Heffels: Our brief is “let’s talk about the brand and how we see it”. Then we ask the composers: “Can you translate this into sound?”

Reese: You say exactly that?

Heffels: Yes, more or less exactly that. With all the people we work with, we always talk more about the brand than the actual fi lm. Because when you understand the brand, you understand what we are trying to do with the film. In our business there’s a temptation to follow rules, but musicians are creative people with very wide horizons. So we try to give them that space.

Reese: Elvis Costello once said that talking about music is like dancing about architecture. Most creative people seem to struggle with it. Is communicating music really that easy for you?

Heffels: The good thing is that a lot of the composers we work with were born in the ‘60s, so they grew up with a musical revolution. My own roots are in the punk rock scene. I grew up with that scene in the 1970s and it was my personal musical education. It taught me anything was possible. There was no fixed definition of music anymore.

Reese: And you wanted to be a rock star?

Heffels: (Laughing) No, no. I learned to play the guitar, but it didn’t work out for me. I felt the conceptual part of my brain worked better than the musical part.

Reese: But you have a very deep relationship to music.That must make it easier to talk about it?

Heffels: Especially in the independent music scene there’s a lot of work that touches our campaigns.We’ve worked with Einstürzende Neubauten and Palais Schaumburg. These guys – they know what we’re talking about.Note: The interview took place in New York on the 25th of October 2021.

Reese: Do you believe in testing and measuring?

Heffels: When it comes to music? Definitely not.Because people tend to hate what’s new. Of course, most of ads have to be tested. So you have to use a few tricks: don’t make the music part of the discussion, use music that works but isn’t what you intend to use in the end. In general, I prefer to “release the beast” and take people by storm. Let them discuss it, listen to it, and fall in love with it.

Reese: What about ’soundalikes‘? Which happens all the time. You know – let’s get something that sounds like the Stones.

Heffels: I don’t like that. It sounds cheap. Also, let’s say you have an ad that’s based on a very popular track: Coldplay or something like that. The ad will work in tests because they already like the music. But I would prefer people to fall in love with the idea behind the commercial.em discuss it, listen to it, and fall in love with it.

Reese: Brands with a strong audio identity – like McDonald’s or Intel – tend to have a greater brand value than brands you can’t “listen to”. Do you believe you should be able to listen to a brand?

Heffels: Yes, of course. If I was a client and you gave me an ad that was visually perfect but didn't sound good, I’d only pay half the fee.

Reese: Most clients don't have an audio style guide. Why is that?

Heffels: There are brands that try to make, let’s say, audio tool boxes. You can choose these sounds when it comes to our cars, or this particular type of music. But I think you have to keep the gate open. Give a direction, but don’t cut off the testicles of the people who still have them.

Reese: That’s the best quote so far! If music is half of the effectiveness of the ad, and will influence the buying decision, are we devoting enough time to it?

Heffels: Typically you spend weeks in conference calls with directors, you travel, you shoot, you edit, post-production – all this takes two months. But when it comes to music, you give the musician three or four days, which is not fair. However, the more people use the power of music for their brand, the better sound design we will see on television, because everyone wants to achieve the best for their brand.

Reese: Really, you think so?

Heffels: The danger is that if we devote fifty percent of our time and money to the music, the core idea might get lost. But we should certainly give more time to musicians and sound designers. Consider it an art, not a craft. Music can turn an idea that is “OK” into something great. We also need to make clients aware of what music can achieve for their brands. Just because you listen to the radio doesn’t mean you can decide what’s right or wrong for the client’s brand. Clients tend to say “I like this”, or “I don’t like this”. But that’s not the right answer. The right answer is “That’s interesting. I’ve never heard something like that before. Let’s go for it.”

Note: The interview took place in Berlin on the 4th of March 2011.

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