The Ad Council announced Thursday morning that it is expanding the scope of its Sound It Out campaign as part of a collaborative effort with Amazon.
The two organizations are introducing When You Can’t Say It, Play It, an interactive digital experience for parents and caregivers to tap into their teen’s emotional wellbeing through music.
By visiting Amazon.com/SoundItOut, parents can type in an emotion and the tool will search through the Amazon Music library to curate songs that reflect that feeling.
Utilizing Amazon’s Alexa service, which can be accessed through an Amazon Echo device or the Alexa mobile app, they can then request the song to be sent to their teen, who can listen on any Alexa-enabled device. The digital experience is available in both English and Spanish.
This marks yet another collaboration between Amazon and the Ad Council following the launch of the “Alexa, what is love?” partnership last year. The effort was well received, earning industry recognition at Cannes Lions International Festival for Creativity and The One Show.
“The Ad Council’s initiative to create open, accepting, and proactive discussions around mental health resonates with our goals to do better and be better for our customers, employees, and communities,” said Alan Moss, VP of global advertising sales at Amazon, in a statement. “Music has always been a vehicle for connection, and ‘Sound It Out: When You Can’t Say It, Play It’ provides parents and caregivers with another tool to check in with their teens.”
The two companies added that several musicians will be supporting the campaign, including Ambar Lucid, Nico Craig, JJ Hairston and Carla Morrison.
“We know parents and caregivers everywhere have experienced hitting the ‘I’m fine’ barrier. Through this interactive feature, we can provide them with the tools — like sharing a beautiful song — to break through and normalize checking in on their teen’s emotional well-being,” Heidi Arthur, chief campaign development officer at the Ad Council, said in a statement.
Music continues to play an important role in medical marketing campaigns and has been incorporated by a number of notable organizations in the past year.
Over the summer, Nicorette teamed up with the Berklee Music and Health Institute to create SmokeLess Break Beats, a music therapy program.
Months later, Walgreens Find Care announced a partnership with Music Health, a music therapy company, to provide people living with dementia with an app that gives them a “personalized soundtrack” aimed at triggering long-lost memories.
