Audience Research- Why and How?

In today's lesson we discussed why audience research is important and how we can carry out our research. We also looked at some examples that I think will be important to share.

First, why?

Audience research is important to carry out so that a creator can make something that people will want to see. A media piece that is tailor made to the audience is undoubtedly more likely to be a success. Therefore you cannot deny that there is a commercial side to audience research. Major media pieces, such as films, spend thousands on audience research in order to make their films so successful because they are made to please the masses and will therefore make more money than a project that has a smaller niche or no market at all. This leads on to another purpose which is to find your target market and therefore you can adjust your piece to suit the market. For example you can find out the age and gender of your probable audience, which will lead to a better project as you have more information to go on.

Second, how?
We talked about many different types of gathering audience research, with the first and probably most obvious being to do a survey or questionnaire asking key questions. For example, for me as I'm doing a music video, I might ask question such as, "Do you think a music video has to have relevance to the song?" or, "Do you like to watch music videos or are they not important?" By asking all of these questions I would hopefully be able to develop my idea to create a better project.

Exit polls are also a great way to get research, it is were you ask people questions immediately after they have done something. For example I could gather a group of people and make them watch a music video of a similar genre to one I was thinking of creating and ask them key questions in order to gather more information. This would be a really good way to get research first hand. Secondary research can also be helpful as you can find stats and polls which you can help form your target audience. An example of an exit poll is available on the British Film Institute website (BFI) where they do exits polls after showing a film to a large audience. Here's a link to their list of exit polls -http://www.bfi.org.uk/film-industry/lottery-funding-distribution/insight-reports-case-studies-audience-research/exit-polls

Focus Groups can be really good way to get specific information from target consumers. A practical way for me to conduct a focus group is to gather people and watch several music video's from the genre of the song I've chosen and ask them what they liked/disliked about it. It would be really useful to me do this with my own production as I go along as it would help me with development.

So to sum up, research is to help a product please/interest/excite the biggest audience it can :)