If you haven't seen the great movie Inception, go see it right now.  No, really.  Go see it now!  Not only because of it's incredible story, amazing visual FX, stunning soundtrack and emotional landscapes, but also for the fact that this post may spoil some things... 

That's right, SPOILER ALERT!

I want to talk about something that most people, when creating a corporate video, leave till the end of the process as if it were an afterthought, and it shows.  The music.  In the movie Inception, The characters are plunged down into dreams within dreams and are (most of the time) completely aware of the fact that they are sleeping.  Despite being alert in the dream, the characters cannot wake themselves up from it.  Someone on the outside of the dream needs to do that for them in the form of a "kick".  In the film, a kick is simply something you would do to wake someone up.  A slap on the face or pushing them off of a chair usually does the trick.  As you can imagine, this type of scenario can get a bit confusing.  Also, it would be difficult to synchronize when you would be woken up unless you had some type of signal.  This problem is solved in the movie by use of musical cues.  Simply put headphones on and time the kick to correspond with the end of the song.  Simple, right?

Well for all of you who believe Leonardo DiCaprio's Character, Mr. Cobb is awake at the end of the film, check this out:

Adobe Flash Player not installed or older than 9.0.115!

You see?  They used music to tell a story that most people would just overlook.  The same can be done (or not done) in corporate videos.  Sometimes individuals in my industry fail to remember that the best way to connect with the audience and capture their attention is to tell them a story.  Music is an emotional connection with the soul, and we use it everyday to tell stories.  We can convey all sorts of emotions and even garner specific reactions with the types of music we choose.  It really isn't as simple as picking some generic "corporate" royalty free music track.  So in your next corporate, training or sales video, make sure you let your producer or director know that you expect music to be a central part of your project.