Target Audience Research

Within the industry it is always I good idea to find out what is already popular through both qualitative and quantitative data using surveys, questionnaires etc. because there is no point in doing something you know won’t work or refraining from doing something that is very popular. Although being original is still a necessity within the industry (and people often condemn videos and songs that are too similar) its also a good idea taking influences and inspiration from current ideas and coming up with a new and improved variation of already realised ideas. It is for this reason I am conducting a survey on what I can do in order to give the people what they want as well as being inspired to create my own ideas.

In addition to finding out what I want to make I need to find out who I am aiming for my audience to be; based on what I’m planning to do, the song, the type of video and the editorial effects of the video. To do this I am going to breakdown my ideal audience through this questionnaire and write it in a way that it’s easy for both you to see and for me to refer back to whenever I’m making my video to assure that appealing to my audience at all times.

This is an image of on of the printed off surveys and a set of example answers I have written. 

Target audience research results

After receiving back the completed questionnaires I compiled them into an easy to read document which allows me to easily look back and compare results for each answer.
Each candidate remained anonymous beyond their age and sex.

Target audience research answers:

Questions:

1)      Age/ Gender:

Candidate 1: 18/ male

Candidate 2: 17/ Male

Candidate 3: 17/ Male

Candidate 4: 17/ Female

Candidate 5: 17/ Male

Candidate 6: 17/ Female

Candidate 7: 17/ Female

Candidate 8: 17/ Male

Candidate 9: 18/ Male

2)      Do you regularly watch music videos? (If so how often?)

Candidate 1:  Yes (Once a week)

Candidate 2: Yes (Once a day)

Candidate 3: Yes (Daily)

Candidate 4: Yes (Every other day)

Candidate 5: Yes (most days)

Candidate 6: Yes (Every other day)

Candidate 7: Yes (Everyday)

Candidate 8: No

Candidate 9: No

3)      Are you more likely to listen to music if it has a good music video?

Candidate 1: No, probably not

Candidate 2: Yes, of course as it is interesting

Candidate 3: Yes

Candidate 4: Yes

Candidate 5: Maybe

Candidate 6: Maybe, if someone has asked if I’ve seen a music video for a certain reason, then I will. Otherwise I minimise it on YouTube.

Candidate 7: Yes

Candidate 8: Probably

Candidate 9: Yes

4)      What do you look for when watching a music video?

Candidate 1: Good music, maybe a good storyline

Candidate 2: It depends on the music, for example if it’s high pace then it should be action but if it’s mellow I’d expect the video to match it

Candidate 3: Funny/ Story

Candidate 4: The artist and interesting visuals 

Candidate 5: VFX, edits, colourful settings and characters and a story

Candidate 6: A strong narrative that relates to the lyrics. I also like watching a character overcome something.

Candidate 7: The artist and excitement

Candidate 8: Storyline/ narrative

Candidate 9: No clue, entertainment

5)      What typical features do you expect/ like to see in an alternative music video?

Candidate 1: Mosh pits, the band playing their instruments

Candidate 2: I would like to see something relative to the music so maybe people getting excited by the music

Candidate 3: A story relating to lyrics

Candidate 4: Either main focus on band performance or strange concept

Candidate 5: Something you wouldn’t expect in a mainstream video, so no massive dance numbers etc.

Candidate 6: Tends to have a weird concept and have other characters in it.

Candidate 7: N/A

Candidate 8: A lot of action, has to be something to do with the lyrics

Candidate 9: I honestly couldn’t tell you

6)      Do you prefer watching videos with a concept, narrative or performance theme? (Explain what you find appealing about this type of music video)

Candidate 1: Concept (It’s just nice following a story, make the viewer interested)

Candidate 2: Performance (Its emotionally stimulating)

Candidate 3: Concept (The sexual appeal)

Candidate 4: Narrative (I like the connection of the lyrics and the story in a video)

Candidate 5: Performance (See how the person sees he world)

Candidate 6: Narrative (It relates to music video and an artist is less likely to be revealing.

Candidate 7: Narrative (often explains meaning behind song)

Candidate 8: Narrative (Correlates to the lyrics)

Candidate 9: Performance (Just do)

7)      What type of video do you feel best suits an alternative genre?

Candidate 1: Narrative

Candidate 2: A Mellow one which develops into something more upbeat.

Candidate 3: Sexual

Candidate 4:  Conceptual

Candidate 5: Performance

Candidate 6: Narrative

Candidate 7: Concept

Candidate 8: Narrative/ performance

Candidate 9: Performance

Analysis of a music video;

Applications of Barthes codes:

Chet Faker: Gold

Semic/ Symbolic code: 

The setting of the roads is a classic metaphor for someone’s journey; a long, straight and seemingly endless journey (whether it’s bad or not so is up to you). The use of the town in the background suggests that by moving away you are furthering yourself/ himself from the community. The only way you can tell it’s a town is by a few lights coming from windows and light posts by the side of the road. This can mean he has gone through a breakup or whichever topic issue which would apply to a situation, a lack of love in his life. This leading to the car crash after having driven himself from society. The combination of stereotypes accumulating to an answer.

The use of the deer besides the car may indicate a symbolism of an ironic “deer in the headlights” in the sense that the deer wasn’t even slightly fazed by the oncoming car whilst he speed out of control and crashed.

Proairetic/ Hermeneutic:

The use of both performance and narrative based may leave the audience confused and wonder why both were used when neither coincide; an overall confusing video in terms of the proairetic code but mostly the image of the car crash which would leave the audience wanting a resolution of narrative; why is this car here? Why has it crashed? How does it link to the girls? How does it link to their actions? How does it link to the lyrics? All of these questions haven’t been answered and so refer to further narrative action which goes beyond what the video applies and so leaves the audience analysing every piece of info they have at hand. This would keep the audience intrigued, and wanting to listen to the song again and this means the video will again views, popularity and publicity. 

Richard Dyer: Star Theory (applied to Taylor Swift)

Richard Dyer; Star Theory

Digipak analysis

Music Video Treamtement