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WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNED FROM YOUR TARGET

AUDIENCE FEEDBACK?Emily Cowling A2 Media

Focus Groups and Questionnaires• In order to evaluate my work, I used a mixture of focus groups and questionnaires. I

believe that the most beneficial to me were the questionnaires, this is because it meant that we could get lots of data quickly and easily, as well as being able to ask specific questions for our target audience. Across the entire production of my music video, I managed to obtain feedback from 28 different people. This was across both the questionnaires and the focus groups.

• The main focus group we conducted was in November, and it was on our first drafted music video.

What did our focus group like about our music video?• At first draft, the people that we asked liked the performance shots of our star, they

thought that she was convincing, and she also looked voyeuristic, without having to wear lots of makeup and revealing clothes. We wanted this to occur in our video, we wanted Indya to appear natural- this is as it contradicted with the punk era and showed the differences between them.

• They also liked the balloon shot that we used towards the end of our music video. However, one person picked up on the fact that you could see the extras throwing the balloons within the background. Hence, I then decided that we needed to reshoot this shot at our next days filming at my Nanna’s house.

Continued …• Our focus group also liked the range of colours that we used within our filming, it

had happy connotations. This was also a feature that I wanted in our video- it made our star stand out from the extras and it created synergy across the music video. It would then mean that we could use the same orange colour within our promotional package.

• Finally, they also all agreed that they liked the football scene within our music video, I believe that this was mainly due to the use of found footage, it gave the impression that we were actually there and it created the idea of memories and nostalgia, this added to the post modern elements and intertextuality of our music video.

Did we gain any negative feedback?• One of the negative feedbacks that we received was the use of the extras within

the background of the balloon shot, As I noticed it, I felt that it made the music video look unprofessional. Hence, I decided that we needed to reshoot this shot, we chose to use a close up shot on the second shoot in order to resolve this idea.

• The second negative feedback was the obvious lack of shots which came with the deletion of our footage, this meant that we had lots of gaps within our music video that we needed to fill. I believe we were missing around a minutes worth of footage. Hence we had to do four more shoots in order to recover what we had lost before as we couldn’t get all the people back on set at one time.

Continued• We were also told that we had a lack of locations within our music video, which was

true as we had only filmed in one location so far. We needed to use lots of locations as it is a convention of music videos. We then tried to film in lots of different locations, the motorway, an abandoned building, fields, a football pitch, a graveyard, a garden, a conservatory, a school and many more- we wanted to create the variety of shots needed.

• Finally, we were also told that we needed to use a bigger variety of shots, at this point we had no close ups or high angle shots, once again, we needed to use this variety in order to be able to create a conventional music video. By using a bigger variation, it made the video more engaging.

Who did we send questionnaires to?• Overall, we asked

predominantly more females, this is as our target market was predominantly female, so with them being our main target, we felt that we should ask for more of their opinions.

32%

68%

The genders of people who answerred our questionnaires

malesfemales

The age of the people• Within our

questionnaires, we mainly interviewed 16 and 17 year olds as they are people we know. However, they are still part of our target market so their answers matter within our music video.

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The ages of the people who answered

Why use target audience feedback?

• We used target audience feedback in order to be able to gage an accurate response from our target market, we wanted to find out what their thoughts were and whether they liked or disliked the video, and what they would change. After all, we would need to promote our star in a way that would mean people would listen to her music and follow her career. Our target market was 13-17 year olds wo are predominantly female.

What did we use target audience feedback for?• The first thing we gained feedback on was our logo, I had come up with two

different logos on Photoshop, they were for “Mystique Records” and “DNA Records”. Both designs were completely different, and we couldn’t decide which we preferred so we took to Facebook for an answer. The majority response was for “Mystique Records”

We then went on to get feedback as we produced our music video, the first was a focus group.

• The first focus group was our Media class, we chose to use our class as they knew about the terminology and codes and conventions that came with creating a music video. Our media group is also made up of people that are our age (17 year olds) who were part of our target audience. This focus group was made up of 6 people.

Do you like the locations used within the music video?• Within our feedback, we gained 6

positive responses, everyone liked the feedback and they felt that it suited Indya and her connotations. However, we did have one response that they weren’t sure on the low angle shot of the boats. We used the boats in order to replicate the sense of journey and the idea of Indya finding herself. Upon reflection I feel that we could have made this idea more obvious so our audience were more certain on the idea.

Did you like the locations used?

yes no

Do you think we met our target audience (13-17)?

• For this we also received a positive response, everyone thought that it adhered to our target market due to the age of the extras and the colours that we used. One other reading we had was that it could reach an older audience, due to the use of found footage and the idea of them reminiscing about the genre.

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yes and older

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Do you think we met our target audience of 13-17 year olds?

Do you believe that Indya was a convincing star?• We then went on to ask if

Indya was a convincing star, we were delighted to find that all our focus group thought that she was a convincing star due to her facial expressions and her enthusiasm for the song. Creating a believable star is the most crucial aspect of a music video.

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Do you feel that Indya was a covincing star?

In your opinion, do you think we used enough shots?• All of the participants from our

focus group said we used enough shots and they liked the range of shots that we included in our video . They were particularly keen on the different locations used within the video. However, some one said our performance shots could have been to similar. Upon reflection I feel that we could have worked more with varying the performance shots we used and possibly going against convention. yes no

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Do you think we used enough shots in our video?

What was your favourite shot within the video?• Of the focus group, one persons

favourite shot was the football match, one person wasn’t sure, two people liked the shot where the photograph came to life and two people liked the tracking vignette shot of Indya with the group behind her. Alongside this, these were also our favourite shots in our music video, we felt that they were really successful as we shot them and fit in well with the narrative and concept of our music video. They helped to create the idea of memories and Indya finding who she really is.

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Which shot was your favourite?

footballnot surephoto coming to lifetracking shot

Which transition did you prefer? Cuts or blurs?

• We found this was one of the more controversial answers from our questionnaire. Which we knew it would be as we broke convention by using blurs, however, the split decision suggests that it was a positive occurrence. The use of blurs was bound to make people question which idea they preferred.

Which transition did you prefe? cuts or blurs

cuts blurs

Was the makeup effective throughout the video?

• This decision was one that we felt some people wouldn’t understand, however we were lucky in the fact that only one person disagreed with our choice of makeup. We choice to use natural makeup as we felt that it most suited our star, we also used natural makeup as it suggested that she couldn’t be a punk rocker.

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Did you like our choice of makeup?

Doing mass audience feedback

• In total, we gained feedback of 28 different people in our target market age bracket. This included 6 people In a focus group, 14 people from an A2 media group and then 8 of the people who took part in the making of our music video. To thank the people who helped us make the video, I conducted an Oscars themed night, I handed out prizes and we also asked them to do questionnaires on the video. I then took the most interesting findings and put them in a graph.

Which shot was your favourite?

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Which Shot was your favourite?

football scenepull focustracking shotcoming to lifeballoonstime lapsenot suresat playing musicfound footage

From our research we found the most popular shots were the photo coming to life, the football match and the tracking shot. We feel that these were the strongest shots within our music video and had the most impact, hence our target audience agreeing with this meant that the video was successful. It was good to found out which other shots people preferred though as well. In particular we didn’t feel that the pull focus shot would be as popular as it is.

Which did you prefer, cuts or blurs?

cuts blurs both0

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10Which transitions did you prefer, cuts or

blurs?Within our music video, we knew that the idea to use blurs over cuts would break convention and cause controversy. However, when it came to our overall research we found that cuts were the more popular, which shows that people preferred convention. However, the closeness of the answers shows that it did cause split decisions, this means that we were partially successful in the decision to use blurs. Upon reflection, I feel that we could have used more of the blurs to make this idea more prominent, although we tried to use cuts and blurs to match the beat of the song.

Did we reach our demographic?• Of the people who came to the premier, I asked

them who they thought would be the audience for the video. The majority said we reached our target market meaning the video was successful. I can understand why parents would watch the video due to the idea of nostalgia. I can also understand the idea of white teenagers, there is little racial diversity in our area hence the people in the video are white. It would have been difficult to find people of other ethnicities to use. I feel the idea of the country singers is a bit of an obscure answer though!

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Who do you think would watch this video?

teenagerscountry singerslate teens parentswhite teenagers

How did our target audience feedback influence our target market?

• Over the course of our music video, I feel that the market that our video attracted altered, this was due to our feedback from our audience.

• - A more rural audience: Throughout the production of our music video, it became apparent that we were attracting more of a rural audience. This stemmed from the feedback on needing a bigger range of shots and locations. Coming from Lincolnshire, the area around us is mainly rural. So it would have been difficult to obtain lots of urban locations. By doing this, we met more of a rural target audience.

Reaching a westernised target audience?• Our music video features lots of post modern elements and ideas about feminism-

this mainly appeals to a strong westernised audience, and I don’t feel that our video would have attracted an audience from a southern culture because of this.

• This was also mainly due to the feedback we got within our questionnaires and focus groups. We come from a westernised world, where we are an active audience, we want more from what we watch than just entertainment, it needs to have a message within it. Our music video was mainly about women’s empowerment through this, Indya is able to make her own decisions and become who she wants to be.

• Our music video now has a strong, westernised target market, it wouldn’t appeal to a southern culture.

Reaching working to middle class• Once again, the majority of the people that we interviewed come from a working to

middle class background, and by listening to their feedback, our video entered more into this idea as well.

• I believe the main reason we appeal to working to middle class people is due to the content of our shots, none of them are in busy urban areas and show anything along the lines of violence, drugs etc.- which would be more common in a rap music video. None of our shots show poverty.

A mainly female audience• Throughout the production aspect of our music video and gaining target audience

feedback, we mainly received feedback of females due to the gender of people in the media groups, and the majority female production of our music video. In fact 68 % of the people we received feedback from were female. Hence, by following what they wanted from a music video, we mainly reached a female audience.

• However, we did still try to cater to males aswell, we used an attractive female star and used a mixture of males and females throughout our music video, this was in order to show a typical friendship group of the modern era.