Task 1 - Audience Research

Media Producers use many different ways to identify and target their audience, by doing this they can see who reads/watches their magazine/show and so how to market to them particular people.

The first way to identify an audience is through Demographics, this defines the age, gender, social class and race of the public. Using this, media producers can find out what age bracket watches their show, this gives them an indication of which direction the show should go as well as what advertisements to place. Also gender, you can identify a genre of a film or show by who is the main audience, and so what conventions it should hold e.g. an action film will appeal more to males than to females. An example of the use of demographics is the advertisements during day time television, these tend to be products for elderly people, children or house wives, this is because these are the people who would most likely be watching and so the product is more successfully advertised than late at night. Another example is Closer magazine, they can identify that their readers are predominately female and so this is who they want to target. Ways they could find out who they were selling to could come from looking at statistics, giving out a survey, through social media or purchases, advertisers can look at this also to see what adverts would be most successful, after identifying the target audience they can shape the content around this, e.g. fashion pages, gossip, celebrity interviews, weight loss help etc.

Another way to identify an audience is through psychographics, this identifies what the audience’s interests are, their lifestyle, attitudes, beliefs or their personality. This is useful particularly in marketing and advertising campaigns because they can shape it around the lifestyle of the targeted audience, for example the main consumer of energy sport drinks are people who love to exercise and are fit, in the advertisement they could have an athletic celebrity sponsor or someone running. Another example is high-top trainers, these are aimed at teenage boys/ young adults and so with research they could make a campaign with a sport orientated lifestyle such as someone playing football in them or at the skate park as a sport lifestyle is stereotypically male. We can categorise audiences and put them into Mainstream, Explorer, Reformer, Aspirer, laggers etc. through Cross Cultural Consumer Characterisation. We can see statistics on BARB that show us what programme is most popular on each channel, showing us the amount of viewers, what day and time it was shown; this helps us identify the demographics and psychographics of a programme. We can see on BARB how many viewers, an example is on BBC1, 'Call The Midwife' was the most viewed programme on this channel in the last week of January, with 10.83 million viewers. It was shown on a Sunday at 8pm, this tells us exactly who the viewers are, it is a programme targeted at women primarily but is a drama, the producers know that women will be home on a Sunday evening, as well as their families to settle down and watch this programme. The second highest viewed show on this channel is 'The Voice UK' which shows on a Saturday night at 7pm, it had 8.86 million viewers; this show is targeted at families, women and children, this time is perfectly timed as younger children will be able to watch, as well as families will be in on a Saturday night, it's a reality show and so indulgent. Although teenagers are apart of the target audience they are less focused on as it is more likely that they will be out and not in to watch the show; BBC1 is more family and adult orientated and this shows in the ratings, as it is more popular to a mass audience. On the other hand, Channel 4's highest viewing on the same week was 'Benefits Street' shown on a Monday at 9pm, it got a total of 5.56 million viewers, half of that of the highest viewed programme on the BBC, this is because this channel is aimed more at teenagers and young adults, rather than families. 'Benefits Street' was a funny documentary of a life on a street in Birmingham where most of the residents are on Benefits; it does not portray these people in a good light where we should feel sympathetic for them, instead they're doing themselves no favours and portraying themselves as the stereotypical people we perceive are on benefits. As Channel 4 have not shown them in a good light they would most likely lose these people and others on benefits as viewers, these people are put under the 'struggler' on demographic tendencies (Cross Cultural Consumer Characterisation), and so are the smallest sector, so Channel 4 can afford to lose this audience (to entertain the mass audience). The audience for 'Benefits Street' are teenagers, put into the Explorer category, this means they're adventurous and have a lot of freedom, not afraid of change and so watching Benefits it is almost entertaining to see people who are not apart of that same group etc. Using the Cross Cultural Consumer Characterisation, we can identify what certain groups of people in certain situations are most likely to feel and think and want to watch e.g. Mainstream and Succeeders are more likely to opt for security and to be well resourced whereas Explorers and Strugglers are more for freedom but are less resourced; also Mainstream are more likely to resist change and like it how it is however Explorers will be the first to except change and we can see this through young people, how they change and 'go with the flow', learn new things constantly rather than the older generations who are resistant and slower to follow. Using demographics does help identify what age, gender or race the audience is, using psychographics you can segregate these categories further and so target a smaller, niche audience for your product rather than a general advert to target a mass audience.

Next is Geodemographics, this identifies the audience through region and location, this is a more uncommon way of researching your audience for most companies although it can be good to research which region most enjoys the product and so helps with where to place more/less advertising and products (e.g. a specific, niche television show could have double the viewers In the north over the south, they could either advertise it more in the south to get more viewers or focus their attention primarily on the north). It is particularly useful for newspapers, it varies between regions what is published and what are the main topics discussed are as well as the dialect used. Obviously local newspapers report completely different new, The Northern Echo reports for the North-East, the news reported is not reported in the south, so we get different news however the Northern Echo’s headlines are mainly on crimes, police, court or sport as well as stories on local schools and businesses, these are big stories and create drama and something to talk about however The London Evening Standard’s stories are mainly focused on estate, legal issues as well as politics – I think this is because a lot of business people work in the city or commute and so want to know what is going on in the financial and business world as well as knowing what is happening in the capital rather than stories of local people or schools. They are advertising to different audiences, the main readers of The Northern Echo would be local people, families, local businesses, the elderly whereas The London Evening Standard are aimed at the young – middle aged business people, predominantly male. This is also reflected in the language used, The London Standard uses very well-spoken, formal language whereas The Northern Echo is more laid back. On television, specifically the news, the country is segregated by regions, such as London, The South, Midlands, Yorkshire etc. Each have their own news for their own region after the National news, this is where you can find out information specific for your area and so not showing news stories that aren't relevant to you. One example is the South Today News on BBC, the first 15 minutes is the whole of the South region, as the capital of the South region, and all the main cities and towns are along the South Coast, this means this is where the main audience is and so where the South Regional News is based, with stories about the weather, sea and local towns. Because Oxford is the north of this region, it is not very relevant to us, therefore we have a dedicated news for 15 minutes after the 15 minutes of South Today News (will go on for half an hour if you live on the south coast), here we get relevant stories to our location, and they tend to be small stories, such as a teacher walking out of a school because disruptive students or the success of a local boy. In comparison, the news in London was taken over by the story of tube strikes, this is because the tubes are a huge part of the life of commuters, business men and tourists and so it has had a major effect on the city and transport, other regular stories on the news are about murders, violence etc. you hear about this less on the news in other parts of the country, this is because there is a lot more people in London than anywhere else therefore it is more likely to happen and so isn't headline news, unlike if it were to happen in Oxford for example. On BBC's Look North news in the North East and Cumbria, the main headline on the local news was about a new sports facility which is going to be built in Middlesbrough, which will help the local community etc. The next story was about a missing woman and how a body has been found, then about improvements that need to be done to the schools, to then talk about Chinese New Year Celebrations in Newcastle - these stories would not go near to reach national news as they're not big stories and so aren't relevant to the majority of the country however to that region, it is important because it is local - the stories are captivating and make you feel sympathetic, they are small stories that lots of people like to follow as it means a lot to them.

Lastly there is socio-economics, this is where people are put in 6 groups depending on their job title/earnings, and these are:

·         A – High managerial in a company (chief executive etc.), professional (surgeon, GP)

·         B – Intermediate managerial (bank manager), professional (teacher)

·         C1 – Junior manager, supervisor, clerks – bank clerk, sales advisor, a supervisor

·         C2 – Skilled manual workers – builders, plumbers, electricians, brick layers

·         D – unskilled or half skilled manual workers – messengers, assembly line worker

·         E – unemployed, pensioners – living off benefits or pensioner not on private pension

These are helpful for companies to know, if they can identify which category their main target audience is then they know the money they should have to spend on the products, what interests or lifestyle they could possibly have or seeing who they need to target and what advertisements can fit with this information. For example Waitrose, they sell food that is more expensive than supermarkets such as Morrison’s or Aldi and have special ranges, through research it has been found that people in groups ABC1 are more likely to buy food from more expensive supermarkets unlike those in groups C2DE who would not be willing to pay more. Companies can find out information through The National Statistics website and through the census as well as on BARB universe, this is based on television homes and who is in that household, surveys are sent round often and this keeps data up to date and this is where you can find demographic information also. Through finding out who their target audience are, they can presume the socio-economic group their audience is most likely to be from, e.g. the channel BBC4 shows dramas, documentaries, foreign shows or films as well as current affairs and original programmes as is said to be “an alternative to programmes on the mainstream channels” their target audience for their programmes is primarily those of middle age to the elderly rather than the young generation, so that helps them identify what kind of socio-economic group they are in, what products should be in the advertisements etc. Although this classes people by what they earn, doesn't mean the people who work in C2 etc. earn less than those in A or B,  because in fact they earn just as much, being self-employed, however their income is not stable and so that is why they are classed lower. The trouble with using socio-economic as a way of defining an audience is that it doesn't show you what any of personalities, likes and dislikes are, it is simply based on what job role/amount earned and although this can give a slight idea of interests (a builder might like a show about houses and a chef, a programme about food), so it is not as useful as other audience research techniques.

Some of the issues with companies defining their audiences through these categories are that not every person who watches or reads the programme or magazine is part of the category, it depends on the person and so defining their target audience and only focusing on that audience could restrict the people who could or want to view that product or miss them out completely through advertising and so they are only appealing to certain people which could have an effect on the popularity of the product. Also just because people fall into a certain category it does not mean they all like the same thing, for example an action film will make it appealing for men to watch through advertising (pretty women, car chases, fights etc.) however some girls will enjoy those types of films over romantic comedies which the majority of women enjoy and vice versa with men and magazines targeted at women, there’s nothing to say men won’t want to read it to but making the product look like a woman only product it sets up prejudices for men if they want to read it. Although these ways of finding who is interested in a show or magazine and sets up a guideline for who to target, it doesn’t mean these are the only people you can target, you can appeal to a larger audience and not leave out possible audiences.