Audiences and Products

1. Audiences and Products How the magazine industry researches it’s audience Creative Media Production 2011

2. Audience There are lots of different ways that magazine publishers find out about who reads their magazine. All organisations that produce media do this kind of research to help them understand their audience better. Today we will look at: Classification of audiences – How magazine producers define their audience Audience research – How magazine producers find out about their audience Creative Media Production 2011

3. Audience classification Age: Age is important when classifying audiences. People of different ages often have different interests and expectation from a media product. People of similar ages often have similar likes and dislikes. For example, teenagers want different TV programmes to middle aged people. Creative Media Production 2011

4. Audience classification Gender: Gender is quite a simple way of classifying your audience as they are only two main categories. Finding out about your audiences gender can help you make a product more appealing to them. Men and Women often have different interests and values and therefore want different things from their media products. Products that are aimed very clearly at one gender can often push away the other. Creative Media Production 2011

5. Audience classification Sexuality: Whilst most people would identify themselves as heterosexual there is a significant group which does not. A recent survey showed that 95% of respondents said they were heterosexual, 1% gay or lesbian, 0.5% bisexual, 0.5% other, and the remaining 3% either did not know or did not answer Media products exploit this market that the mainstream media can often overlook. Targeting a small percentage of the population is called niche marketing. Knowing the sexuality of your audience could be important in decided on the content of your media product. Creative Media Production 2011

6. Audience classification NRS social grades: The NRS social grades were developed by the National Readership Survey to classify magazine and newspaper readers. Now they are used by many other organisations and have become a standard for market research. Social grade is that it is based on occupation. The grades are often grouped into ABC1 and C2DE and these are taken to equate to middle class and working class respectively Creative Media Production 2011

7. Audience classification Creative Media Production 2011

8. Audience classification • Lifestyle or psychographics: • Psychographics is the study of personality, values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. The information is usually gather through a questionnaire. • There are 7 categories: • Belonger • Achiever • Emulator/Wanna be • Socially conscious type A • Socially conscious type B • Balanced/Totally integrated • Needs driven • Each category is for a different type of person. The idea is that by understanding what they are like will help you make products that they want. Creative Media Production 2011

9. Audience classification Postcode or geodemographics: This method uses demographic information from national census information. The idea is that people living in similar places generally have similar lifestyle and spending tendencies. This enables advertisers in particular to make sure they are targeting the right kind of people when advertising their product. Some important information can be found using this data such as how rich or poor the people in that area are likely to be. What stage of life are they likely to be at? Are they young singles, young families, older families, families with children who have left home (empty nesters), seniors, etc. It may also give you information on any distinctive features that people in the area have. Creative Media Production 2011

10. Audience Research ABC: ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations) is the industry body for media measurement It measures audience numbers across a range of media It measures audience engagement with media products It measures audience loyalty to media products Its figures are used by magazine companies to help them understand their audience. Creative Media Production 2011

11. Audience Research National Readership Survey: The National Readership Survey provides audience research for print advertising trading in the UK. The survey covers over 250 of Britain's major newspapers and magazines. It shows the size and type of the audiences they each one attracts. They use a variety of methods including interviews and questionnaires to find out about their audiences. They can provide demographic and social group information as well as readership and circulation figures. Creative Media Production 2011

12. Task 1 Task 1: Working in pairs, research the different kinds of information that you can find out about your audience. You should look at: NRS Social Grades, lifestyle of psychographics, postcode or geodemographics, age, gender and sexual orientation. You should explain what each type of information will tell you about your audience. You should then explain how the information could help you better understand your audience. Creative Media Production 2011

13. Task 2 L.O To develop an understanding of obtaining information abut a particular audience. Task 2: Outline some different methods that can be used to get information about an audience. You should look at focus groups, questionnaires and audience measurement panels (ABC and NRS). Explain what they are and how they get information. Creative Media Production 2011

14. Task 3 Task 3: Produce a presentation on what you will do to get information on your readers which you can use to improve your magazine and to attract more advertisers. You should explain the types of information you will find out and how you will get this information. This work will be presented to the group. A PowerPoint is a good way to do this. Creative Media Production 2011