Audience research tips from the examiner

Audience research is more productive if it addresses the following:

· What do real audiences consume?

· Who are the specific audiences for particular products?

· How do media industries target those audiences?

Those questions require research of a different kind to the local questionnaire method; initial research online looking for data about the industry students are dealing with, such as circulation figures for magazines would be a good starting point. Part of research involves looking for examples of how marketing works across a range of media.

    Later audience research should be considered in a series of stages, each involving formative qualitative feedback. So, for example:

· Pitching the product to the rest of the group and taking feedback, noting the responses from this and deciding how to act as a result.

· Showing early drafts of the work (such as an animatic of the storyboard or a mock up front cover) and asking some carefully framed questions about them to get a sense of the audience’s understanding of the product rather than just a measure of whether the audience liked it.

· Taking peer feedback at later stages and then again on the finished product; asking things like “can you tell me what happened in that sequence, what the relationship between the characters is and what do you think will happen in the rest of the film?” to look for audience readings of the work. ‘

These approaches can be presented in a variety of ways- video extracts with framing commentary from the makers; audio, written.