presentation about defining an audience & what things are used to identify what type of audience media producers have.

1. Creating An Audience Profile

2. Why do media producers classify their
audience?
It is important for Media Producers to classify their audience. If they are going to release a new product, start a new business or generate
sales on existing products, they need to know what their audience is for that product. Not knowing their audience’s interests can affect sales,
or make a product not be popular for who they are targeting.
Media Producers use different methods to classify their audience. Depending on what product they are creating, they will use more of the
same methods than others. They do this to gain an insight on what their audience is. They will want to know what the audience likes to help
create their product. They will also want to know about them as individuals as well, by looking at Demographics, such as age, gender,
employment status & location, as well as Psychographics, such as personality, values, attitudes, interests & lifestyles. This is to generate their
audience to know where they stand when creating a product, & to bend that product to meet the aims of the audience. They will gain this
information about their audience through Quantitative research, which will consist of structured data, statistical analysis, objective
conclusions & surveys/experiments. This research is the bulk research giving you hard statistics & numbers. They will also use some pieces of
Qualitative research, which would consist of a summary of their audience, subjective conclusions, unstructured data & interviews,
observations or focus groups. This research allows you to gain an understanding of what your audience is, and what they like.
The reason Media Producers do this is to classify their audience, & bunch together who they will need to target. If a company was to create a
sport magazine, they wouldn’t make the magazine appeal to people who may not participate in sports, enjoy sports or not interested in
sports, as it would make sales plummet & then there would be no profit. When classifying audiences, they learn about the specific attributes
that they need for the product they have or are making. To gain this information they will most likely use methods which would gather a large
amount of responses, to help push their target audience to one side, so they know what to do to generate sales. This would most likely be
surveys or questionnaires as these methods would gather a large amount of responses, as well as keeping the information that they need to
know in there.
Classifying audiences is very useful for Media Producers as it will allow them to create a product for that specific group. This means they can
include content which is going to appeal for this audience, which will make more sales & generate more profit. If their product makes enough
revenue, then they can produce more products like this one to create more profit which can then be used for more product making or even
advertisement. They would mainly look at specific attributes to see if they need to create a product which would appeal to only one gender or
to both, and employment/social status, to make the availability to their audience easy. It is VERY important for Media Producers to classify
audiences, otherwise they have no market. Without a market they have no company itself. Making sure that their products meets the aims of
their audience, and they know what to include, allows the companies to be successful when making current products or new products,
allowing their company lifetime to continue & reach out to bigger audiences, generating more sales.

3. Quantitative research is important for Media Producers when creating a new product. Gathering statistical
information on their audience allows them to look at how big their audience is. The information is varied on
what factors you use, such as questions asked & locations used to gain your information.
There are 2 major companies who currently do Quantitative research in the UK for the print media industry.
The NRS (National Readership Survey), one of the major companies, provides estimated circulation figures &
readership. They also create socio-economic breakdowns of audiences, which is based on income, education
& occupation.
The other major company is called ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations), which are an industry body for media
measurement. They product figures on audience numbers for both Digital & print formats. This company
would be used to gain data on how large their audiences are, which would allow Media Producers to create
a product which would appeal to this audience group.
Quantitative research will usually come in forms of graphs & other statistical measurements. This is to give
specific data to Media Producers about their audiences, which can then be used to affect how they make
their products. Since Quantitative research is more logical & statistical, this research is used to gather large
amounts of data so it can easily be organised & manipulated into reports for analysis. This means using
methods such as using surveys, which would rely on same questions being asked in the same way to a large
number of people, Observations, which may involve counting how many times a particular phenomenon
occurs or how often a word is used into interviews, or coding observational data to translate it into numbers;
& Secondary Data, such as company accounts. This research method would be used if a company are
creating a product & need specific data which concludes how large their audience is.
Quantitative Research

4. Qualitative Research
Qualitative research is also important for media producers when they are creating a new product. Gathering
in-depth information on their audience allows them to gain an insight & understand who their audience are,
what they like & don’t like, & their opinions/viewpoints on certain things.
There are multiple methods you can use to gain access to this information, but the main 3 what most
companies would use are Focus groups, where a group of people would be asked about certain things such
as their perceptions, opinions, beliefs & attitudes towards a/the product which is or has been produced.
Questionnaires are also a form of Qualitative research, in which people would answer a bunch of questions
to gather information from the respondents. This information gathered could then be transformed into
useful data. The last method which would be used are Face-to-Face interviews, which is used to gather an
understanding to the meaning of what the interviewees say. It is a technique which is used to understand
experiences of others.
Qualitative research would be useful to use when companies are trying to get opinions on certain things
which could be used in their next product. If creating a new magazine, they may want to know what their
audience would like to see included so that they don’t make any mistakes on their product & make it not
appeal to their audience. This research would be used every time a company choose to make a new product,
as it gives them a larger amount of data to work with when choosing what to include or not include in their
new product. This research is more aimed ‘for’ the audience since it is gathering opinions & viewpoints
instead of gathering data which tells them ‘how many’ or a statistical answer.

5. AudienceAudience is the key part to a successful media company, as this is the group of people who are buying their products. One definition of
‘Audience’ are a regular public that manifests interests, support, enthusiasm or the liking to something. In this case, the audience are the
group of people who are interested in your products.
Audience is one of the most important things for a media company as this is what makes the company run. They are extremely important as
these people are the consumers of your product. They buy your product, which means you gain revenue & income to keep your business
running. If your audience wasn’t there, your products would not be bought, which means you would have no reason to create these products
as they would not sell & you would eventually go bankrupt from not making any profit.
Media producers want to know about their audience so that they can create a product which is just right & fit for them. This means the will
want to know what the audience likes, their interests & what they enjoy to look/read about. They would like to know about their hobbies &
other activities they might follow like sports so they can gain a better insight on their audience as a whole. Doing this allows them to be able
to gain knowledge of their audience, which lets them understand what would work in a product & what wouldn’t, so they would be able to
create a product which is going to appeal to their audience & generate profit. Also knowing about their audience, will let them be able to
create and product a product which would best suit their audience. Things which are key for a company to know about would be;
• Age – This is so that media companies know what age range they should be aiming for when creating their product. It also allows them
to know what maturity their audience is, what kind of topics they can cover in their magazine & what type of adverts they caninclude
inside.
• Gender – This is to allow media companies to know what male to female ratios there are in their audience. This will then let them
produce a product aiming either specific at one gender or appealing to both.
• Socio – economic Status – This lets media companies gather information to define their audience based on income, education and
occupation. This allows them to make a product which will fit around their income for pricing, and where to distribute theseproducts.
• Social class – This allows media producers to be able to determine what social class their audience are. This links in with Socio Economic
Status, but it will allow media producers be able to define their audience into a social class, which will then let them be able to
distribute and price their products in the correct areas.
• Geo – Demographics – This allows media companies to target specific audiences. This method is mainly used by direct mail and similar
marketing companies, instead of mass media producers. This method allows the advertisers to target a specific audience, as people
living in the same postcode have similar lifestyle and spending tendencies.
• Lifestyle/Psychographics – This method allows media products be able to learn & study personality, values, attitudes, interests &
lifestyle. This is to understand what your audience is buying, so that you can keep the audience happy.
• Mainstream or Niche – This allows media producers be able to further profile their audience. Products which are aimed at mainstream,
will try to capture and appeal to a large audience. This like this would be a blockbuster film or music in the charts. They are something
that most people will be aware of. Niche audiences are small, and have specific interests. As such, media producers may target a niche
market with the hope of capturing a large share of it.

6. Age
• Age is very important category when media producers want to create a
new product.
• This technique will be used to define what age ranges they have in their
audience. The ones which have a larger amount will affect who the
media producers target their products at.
• Age also determines what kind of product they will try to produce as
certain age ranges will have different preferences & interests.
• Age also shows the maturity of their audience, allowing them to realise
what content they can include in their product.

7. Gender
• Gender is very important as it defines who the product
is aimed at.
• Finding out an audience’s gender can help make a
product more appealing to that gender.
• Men & Women both often have very different
interests, which will make them want different things
from media products.
• Products which are aimed heavily at one gender can
often push away the other.
• When products are produced, they are portrayed in
different ways to the other, e.g a men’s magazine
targeted at men will have tend to have heavy use of
block letters & consists of male celebrities in the
magazine which would be for inspiration. In a woman’s
magazine, the woman celebrities will be their for
inspiration to make the women think they would want
to look like her, & the text tends to not only be block
letters but consists of hand written information too.

8. Socio-Economic Status
• Socio-Economic Status, is important for media producers to know what kind of education, occupation & income their
audience receives. This will then let them determine how much to set prices on their product so it is affordable for their
audience.
• The National Readership Survey use 6 different categories to define readers of magazines and newspapers in the UK. There
are;
• Grade A – Upper middle class: These people are higher managerial, administrative or professionals & are at the top of
everyone else.
• Grade B – Middle Class: These people are intermediate managerial, administrative or professionals & are just underneath of
the people who are at the top.
• Grade C1 – Lower middle class: These people are in the middle of the population’s income occupation. They are supervisory or
clerical & junior managerial, administrative or professionals which are higher up than their opposites.
• Grade C2 – Skilled working class: These people are skilled manual workers who are in the middle of the ladder. Their opposites
tend to be higher up a group & are more respected than themselves.
• Grade D – Working class: These people are semi & unskilled manual workers. They are near the bottom of the ladder & tend to
earn enough for themselves with the jobs they can find.
• Grade E – Those at the lowest levels of subsistence: These people are casual or lowest grade workers, pensioners or others
who depend on the welfare state. This means their income is given to them by their state, and these people don’t work. They
are provided for by other means than self work.
• Socio-Economic Status will allow media producers to be able to target their products in the right areas for the right prices
which will allow them to be more successful.

9. Geo-Demographics
• Demographics uses information on where people living
around the same area/postcode & live similar lifestyles to
allow advertisers & media producers to target specific
audience types.
• It will also determine what kind of people are living in that
area e.g families will live around the same areas rather than
having young professionals or retired couples living in the
same areas.
• This method is used for mail & marketing companies rather
than other mass media producers, & it is of interest to us
but Demographics is less important than other elements.
• There is a system called ‘Acorn’ which is used to map
wealth across cities. Using certain information

10. Psychographics
• Psychographics is a study to find out the unique values
of an audience. These consist of personality, values,
attitudes, interests & lifestyles.
• The main idea is that by understanding what type of
person is going to buy your product, you will be more
able to keep these people happy.
• There are multiple versions of Psychographic tests &
different organisations which use their own categories
to define respondents.
• Demographics & Psychographics are similar as they are
used to define the audience as a whole, & the majority
of the demographics will tie into the psychographics
depending on what social status they have.

11. Psychographics
• There is a programme which Young & Rubican founded, which is the Cross Cultural Consumer
Characterisation (the 4 C’s). There are 7 different groups;
• Resigned – They have rigid, strict authoritarian & chauvinist values, are oriented t the past and
resigned roles. Their brand choice stresses safety, familiarity and economy.
• Struggler – Alienated, struggler who can be disorganised. With few resources apart from
physical/mechanical skills. Heavy consumers of alcohol, junk food and lotteries & trainers Brand
choice involves impact and sensation.
• Mainstreamer – A mainstreamer is domestic, conformist, conventional, sentimental, passive &
habitual. Part of the mass, they favour big and well known value for money ‘family’ brands. Almost
invariably the largest group in the 4 C’s.
• Aspirer – Materialistic, acquisitive, affiliative, oriented to extrinsics, image, appearance, charisma,
persona & fashion. Attractive packaging is more important than the quality of the contents. (young
clerical/sales type)
• Succeeder – Succeeders have a strong goal orientation, good confidence, work ethic, organisation,
support status quo, & stability. Brand choice is based on rewards, or prestige – the very best. Also
attracted to caring and protective brands such as stress relief.
• Explorer – energy- autonomy, experience, challenge, new frontiers. Their brand choice highlights
difference, sensation, adventure, indulgence & instant effect. They are the first to try new brans.
(younger – mainly students)
• Reformer – Freedom from restriction, personal growth, social awareness, value for time,
independent judgement, tolerance of complexity, anti – materialistic, but intolerant of bad taste.
Curious and enquiring, support growth of new product categories. Select brands for intrinsic
quality, favouring natural simplicity, small is beautiful. (higher education)

12. Mainstream & Niche
• Any audience can be further profiled into a mainstream
audience or a niche audience. Products that are aimed at
the mainstream audience are trying to capture a large
audience. This would tend to include things like big
blockbuster films, chart music & other popular things. All of
the things would be something that the majority of people
would be aware of.
• Whereas, niche audience are the complete opposite and
they are a much smaller audience with very specific
interests. As such, some media producers will most likely
aim to target a niche market with the intentions of
capturing a large share of the audience. Since the niche
audiences have very specific interests, depending on what
they like will depend on how the media producers tries to
appeal to them.