Audience Research

Demographics:


One common and traditional method of gaining knowledge of the audience is to research what is known as demographics. This method breaks up the audience into six groups based on what work they do. A letter code describes the income and status of being a member of the group. Quantitative data is used to classify an audience using anything that is able to be charted such as graphs to find out age, gender and their socio economic (profession class/income). These demographics are based on the National Readership Survey's socio-economic grades which are used by the publishing industry. Finding out these statistics is key to a producer in giving them an idea on how to shape a text or product to suit it's labelled groups so it will sell. Although this is important, it is not giving a complete in depth picture of the market as producers would like but gives them a rough idea. Things such as how these categorised people spend their money isn't shown or how often they spend money on the music industry. For example, someone in the C1 category could earn more than someone in A but they won't spend their money on the same things to reflect on this chart. The only other downfall is that these categories are based on the top earner in the house not everyone which could mean missing out a student who spend a lot more on music than the top earner in the house.

S.E.G:


These sections are as follows with their share in the market-
A- High management , administrative and professional jobs (3%)
B- Intermediate management, administrative or professional (15%)
C1- Supervisory or clerical position, junior management, administrative or professional (23%)
C2- Semi-skilled manual workers (18%)
D- Semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers (18%)
E- Casual labourers, unemployed and state pensioners (13%)


 Psychographs:

Psychographics are used for measuring consumers beliefs, interests and opinions and gathers psychological information called IAO variables which stands for interests, attitudes and opinions. These groups can be classified by things such as values, personality, lifestyles, interests and attitudes. This is a way of describing an audience from behaviour and personality traits of the people within it. It labels what type of person someone is and makes an assessment about their consuming habits. 

VALS (Value Life Styles System):

Psychographic research carried out many years ago led to audience members being categorised and split into four main groups which are divided into nine lifestyles. This information was collected from questionaires carried out based around questions on psychological characteristics. These main categories were:

Groups driven by needs- These are people described as sustainers and survivors who are so limited in resources (mainly financial) that their lives are directed more by need than by choice. Evidence shows that these are the furthest from cultural mainstream and are least aware of what's going on and are most succeptable to become depressed and withdrawn from society. Values of this category are based around survival, safety, and security. These people tend to find it hard to trust and depend on people and live with no real planning. Most live with no focus or vision for what could of been in their lives or what they could become. 



Survivors- (4% of the population aged 18 and over in 1981) are the most disadvantaged in society because of their extreme poverty, poor education. They are people who rely and depend upon tradition but are marked by unhappiness and failures. Many once lived lifestyles associated with higher levels of the VALS hierarchy.Sustainers- (7% of population) are a group struggling in poverty. They are better off and younger than survivors and most haven't given up hope and their values are different from the survivors. The sustainer's have advanced from depression and hopelessness expected of survivors to show anger at the system they see as stopping them and have developed a street-wise mindset to get ahead and many operate in the underground economy.

Groups who are outer-directed- This is a large and diverse category named to reflect the characteristic's of the people within it. The outer-directed live their lives in response to signals from others. They do what they think everyone lese will and follow consumption patterns and help to create the mainstream audience. These VALS is split into three types of outer-directed people: Belongers, emulators, and achievers.


Belongers- (39% of population) The middle-class group of people who are the main stabilizers of society. Belongers tend to be conservative, conventional and conforming. Their key is to fit in and to belong but not to stand out. Family, church, and tradition play an important role. Belongers are people who know what is right, and they follow the rules. They are not much aren't interested in anything technical or too advanced and are happy to be oblivious to events happening around them all the time.

Emulators- (8% of population) They live in a different world from belongers. Emulators try to break into the upper levels of the system and try to 'make it big'. The object of their existence is the achiever lifestyle. They are ambitious, status conscious and competitive. Emulators tend not to be open  with their feelings due to fear of cutting out those of higher authority who they depend to get ahead in life. Psychologically, emulators are a step ahead of belongers because they ask more of themselves and the system and have got greater personal responsibility for getting ahead in life instead of 'going with the flow'.

Achievers- (20% of population) These people include the leaders in business, their professions, and the government. Competent and self relient. Achievers are usually materialistic, hard-working, fixed on fame and success. Achievers are one of the best adjusted, being well satisfied with their place in the system. Only 5% of achievers come from minority backgrounds.Achievers have a greater sense of value and trust people a lot more then emulators. Achievers support technology and are open to progress, but they don't like big changes.

Groups who are inner-directed- i-am-me, experimentals and societally conscious


What is "in here" instead of what is "out there." matters more to these people. Inner-directed people are more individualistic, person-centered and complex. One implication is that inner- directed people tend not to come from need-driven or inner-directed families. Some measure of satiation with the pleasures of external things seems to be required before a person can believe in or enjoy the less visible, incorporeal pleasures of Inner-Direction. This means not that the pleasures of the outer world disappear (for the VALS typology is a nested model), but that inner needs become more imperative than outer needs.

I-Am-Me- (3% of population) Usually, the I-am-me peope are young and fiercely individualistic. People at this stage are confused with emotions they do not understand which is why they often see themself better through their actions rather than their words. I-Am-Mes are dramatic and impulsive and are ready to try anything once.

Experientials- (6% of population)  Experientials are people who want direct experiences and lots of involvement. They are like the exotic, the strange and the natural. These people are the most inner-directed from this group.

The Societally Conscious- (11% of population) These people support causes like conservation, environmentalism, and consumerism because they feel respnosible for society to some extent. They tend to have a wide knowledgeable about the world around them and many are attracted to simple living and many do volunteer work.
Groups who are both outer and inner-directed- Integrated

Integrateds- (2% of population) These unique and rare people have put everything together and mould the values of outer-direction with that of inner-direction. They are mature in a psychological sense and able to see many sides of an issue and are willing to take a secondary role if that is needed in their eyes. These unusual people are the Lincolns, Einsteins and Hawkins of our world.

Lifestyle Trends In Hard Times-

The main question which occurs is: How will people respond to hard times in life and society? One theory is that we won't tolerate and show  offs or any kind of boasting while another suggests that the number of people taking up the belonger lifestyle tends to increase. There is evidence that in these times we look to familiarity and safety as of that from the belonger lifestyle. Another is that the amount of the societally conscious increase.
Despite the increasing numbers of stories we hear about poverty and times of hardship there aren't that many people turning into survivors and sustainer's. The amount of sustainer's becoming unemployed has rocketed. If hard times continue, the resilience of these groups may disappear and many who now see them self as being a belonger will begin to take on the psychic values and opinions of the need-driven's.

Maslow's heirachy of needs:

This pyramid reflects how in society we must fulfill the needs starting from bottom and work our way up towards the top to fulfill our needs and wishes. It outlines that we require a the physiological level which is the bare necessities (Food, water, shelter, warmth etc.) to get by and survive. The next step is to obtain safety in such things as a job in which you feel secure and happy in and to have friends to spend time with and socialise with to become satisfied enough to be able to move up a level to the Social section of the pyramid. This section says that in order to feel further fulfilled in ourselves we must belong to a group of friends within an acrtivity for example a football team or goign to church and feeling almost part of a community to some extent and feeling a sense of belonging. The even further level in the heirachy is esteem. This is said to be the point we reach when we feel satisfied within society and feel popular, well known and gain admiration from others around you, this breathes confidence into your life and boosts your levels of self esteem. The highest point in the pyramid is self actualisation which signals you have got to a level of confidence were you think you can then push on and become even better known and better all previous achievements in life to achieve everything you want and to become wealthy and have a lifestyle you have always wanted although many do not reach this level due a lackin of further down categories.

My song (Stereo Hearts):

This screenshot was taken from Youtube underneath the video for the song i chose. It shows what age range and gender mostly listen to this song which backs up my poll results showing that the vast majority of fans for this song genre are teenagers. The map also shows with the stronger green shades what countries most listen to this song. This shows clear geographic research into my song of what cultures listen to it nd enjoy it by the amount of likes it has recieveed from the viwing audience.

This screenshot is also from Youtube and relates to the information above as it's for the same song reflectin what cultures and types of people like this kind of song by the amount of likes compared to dislikes. 1 in 100 viewers roughly said this was their favourite song/video which shows the popularity of it within the teenage age bracket. Also, only 764 people from the 16,668,912 that watched this video choso to dislike it which shows what a minority group this is around the world.

After conducting a Poll on my Blog i got about 16 people to answer my questions i put up to help the direction of my music video and show me what people my age liked about a music video and what they though worked well. I purposely selected different gender and aged respondents to give my research more depth and to ensure the feedback related to everyone not just females or males.

'The first question was what is your age' which got 15 reply's but this is due to someone missing the question at the top of the page when they went on my blog. This allowed me a quick background on the range of ages i had responding to my poll, i chose mainly 16-19 year olds as they were my main targeted audience who consume this music illegally or legally.

Another question which i got a good response from and thankfully my audience like the settings and props and a good narrative. I will definitely use this useful information to construct a video to people voters and 16-19 year olds as a whole i hope. With narrative being 56% of the votes its clear that this is something i need to work on for it to be successful.

Another pleasing response to my question, again getting 16 votes. half of the voters like the narrative element so now this is obviously something i should look to include in my video for it to be successful.

This wasn't a very important question in terms of a direct affect on my video but helped me to refine this information to more of a genre favoured music taste to accompany my other background information on voters.

This poll shows that the vast majority (81%) of voters studying creative subjects which includes media. Their input is clearly going to be crucial in helping my research elements of planning. This also shows the wide range of students and adults i got to participate in the survey including myself.

This 50/50 split is helpful as it shows no bias towards any sex and reflects the ages as a whole rather than s specific sex.