The document discusses various ways to define an audience, including through research methods, demographics, and psychographics. There are two main types of research - quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative research uses numbers and statistics from surveys, while qualitative research seeks to understand opinions through interviews and open-ended questions. Important audience dimensions to define include age, gender, social grade, geographic location, and psychographic profiles that describe personality types. Together, researching these factors helps precisely target an audience for a product or message.

1. How to define an audience…
Grace Kennedy

2. You can define an audience with
research…
There are two main types of research:
quantitative and qualitative.

3. Quantitative research
Quantitative research is displayed as numbers, percentages and fractions,
usually in graphs and pie charts. This type of research is usually taken in the
form of surveys. This type of data is structured because this type of research
is objective; the audience may have to choose an answer as a matter of
multiple choice, which the surveyor has already listed. This means the
surveyor will not know the exact response they will receive but they know it
will be one of the options they listed. Quantitative research is conducted with
closed questions so the audience answers often one word, like yes or no. This
type of research doesn’t require the audience to expand on their answer.
Examples of companies who use this type of research are National Readership
Survey and ABC (audit bureau of circulations).
This type of research allows you to define your audience quickly as you can
ask them their age, gender etc and you can see what appeals more to your
audience.

4. National readership survey and ABC
National readership survey
displays percentages of which
people consume. For example in
the magazine section, the ‘30%
of gb adults 15+ conume
womens weekly magazines
across print and online’
http://www.nrs.co.uk/latest-results/facts-and-figures/magazines-factsfigs/
This website shows the circulation
figures of pubications. For example
, this chart shows the circulation
figures for different languages. For
English language, the circulation
was 1,19,05,521 during july-
December 2015.
http://www.auditbureau.org/about-what-is-
abc.html

5. Quantitative-advantages and
disadvantages
There are a couple of advantages and disadvantages to quantitative
research.
One of the advantages is that quantitative research is fast and easy;
the questions are already planned and so are the answers as the
audience usually pick from a list. However, this creates a disadvantage
in the process because quantitative could potentially be seen as biased
in the sense your picking from a list that has already been written for
you. Also the fact the questions are closed means that the audience
don’t have a chance to give reasoning for their answer.
Another disadvantage of quantitative research is that the research
usually has to be converted into bar charts, pie charts and graphs etc,
which may take time. Despite this there are websites to help you out
with this, like survey monkey, as they will put the information you
collect in a type of chart for you.

6. Qualitative research
Qualitative research is research which helps you to
understand your audience as you will get to find out their
opinions. This type of research is usually conducted with
interviews and focus groups for example, also can be
conducted with questionnaires and surveys. This type of
research is conducted with open questions so it requires
the audience to expand on their answer, unlike
quantitative research. This means you can find out your
audiences interests, dislikes and personality.
This type of research can help you define an audience in
more detail by finding out what interests them, what
grabs their attention and their opinion.

7. Qualitative research-advantages and
disadvantages.
There are also advantages and disadvantages that come with qualitative
research.
One advantage with this type of research is that you can find out a lot more
than you probably would using quantitative research, as it requires the
audience to expand on their answer, therefore giving a more detailed
response.
One disadvantage is that it may take a while to conduct an interview for
example; you would need to put together a set of relevant questions to ask,
you need to find the right people to ask and conducting the interview may
take a while. It may be hard finding the right people to ask, especially if your
audience is niche. There is also a chance that this type of research could be a
bit biased as the interviewer could be persuasive to get the answer they
want.

8. Mainstream and niche
Mainstream is the name given is products that appeal to wide audience whereas a niche product for a
smaller, more specific audience.
Mainstream includes ‘all popular culture and media culture’ and it referred to as ‘mass media’. Mainstream
products are likely to appeal to a wider audience so it will make more money. They are designed to make
money as they will hopefully be popular with a lot of people. Main stream products are usually made by large
providers, like Disney/PIXAR. A good example of a mainstream product would be ‘Frozen', a film released by
Walt Disney. This film was released near the end of November, so it was marketed at a popular time, just
before Christmas. This film will appeal to many families, children being the product primary audience and
adults being their secondary audience, as they would be taking their children to the cinema. This film
became the highest grossing animated film to date, with $1.287 billion in sales worldwide.
Niche is opposite to mainstream. Niche marketing, also known as micro-marketing, targets specific needs. It
targets a much smaller audience than mainstream marketing. Niche products focus on fulfilling needs which
may be overlooked or unfulfilled by mainstream products. Usually niche products will be made by smaller
provider. An example of a small provider is Black Rock Spirits, a company started by three friends. An example
a niche released by them is ‘Bakon Vodka’. This is a niche product because it will not be suited to everyone's
taste. However is does mix together two completely different things together, which are popular on their
own. The drink is used to make bloody marys.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstr
eam
http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition
/niche-marketing.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niche_market

9. Age categories
Age categories could be
split into these categories:
0-15
16-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
55-64
65-74
75+
When defining your audience you will need to appeal to a
specific age range, or you could try appeal to a bigger
audience. Usually it is easier to target your product at a
smaller age range because it be more specific to their interests
.For example, if you are appealing to older consumers you
wouldn’t use the same visuals or concept that you would to
appeal to younger consumers as they are likely have different
needs and interests.
It is likely your product will not appeal to everyone because it
may be seen as unsuitable to certain groups of people. For
example movies certified at 18 and over by the BBFC will only
appeal to people aged 18 and over like fifty shades of grey.
Even though it for 18 and over, this movie is likely to appeal to
people older because of its mature content.

10. Gender
In audience is usually split into two categories male and female, however there can other categories like
transgender etc.
Normally products either have target female audience or target males audience as in theory they like
different things. Some product may decide to aim their product both gender to broaden their audience
,resulting in more revenue. If you are deciding to appeal to one audience or the other you need to make
sure that your product appeal to that audience.
This is ratatouille, a kids movie
released in 2007. despite the look of
the front cover, I feel that this
product is gender neutral. This in
blue in the front cover which is more
appeal to males more than females.
The main character of the film is a
rat so any gender can identify with
an animal.
This is a beasty and the beast movie, from
Disney. I would say this product appeal to
girls. The colors on the cover are mainly
yellow and purple so I would identify these
as more feminine colours. Also the main
character of this movie is female so the
females watching will be able to identify
with more her easily than a male would.
This is cars, a kids movie from 2006.
The front cover features a range
different colours. Due to the films
content of car racing, the filming will
appear more to young male than
younger females. Also the voices use
for most of the characters are male so
boys will relate to characters easier
than a girl would.

11. Psychographic profiles
You would need to define which psychographic the audience of your product
would fall into. This will help you find out what type things your audience like
and their personality. The question you would ask yourself is ‘what TYPE of
people would buy my product?’
The table on the left states a few psychographic profiles. Its mentions
mainstreamers, aspirers, succeeders, resigned,explorers,
strugglers and reformers. I will explain some of profiles and what products that
group may be interested in.
Aspirers:
This group aspires to be like a succeeder but is not a succeeder. This type of
person will look for products which will improve their image and make them
appeal to the opposite sex. For example this group may like the brand Nike. Nike
is a sport brand so buying a product may make the aspirer look sporty but they
may not do any sport.
A company using celebrity endorsements will appeal to an aspirer. Cristiano
Ronaldo is he is a famous football player, who endorses Nike. Seeing him in Nikes
products will make an aspirer want what he is wearing because he is successful;
this will make them feel successful just like Cristiano.
Mainstreamers:
This groups will follow trends and want what is popular. This group like
products which are good value for money and family oriented. This group
make a large percent of the population. Mainstreamers are likely to watch
Disney movies because they appeal to families and are aimed at mass
audiences. Mainstreamers are likely to drink Coka Cola because this brand is
good value for money. Coka cola is marketed at Christmas which is a family
time.

12. Social status
You would need to define which social status your audience would fall into. The
social statuses of the population are classified into 6 categories -A,B,C1,C2,D and E,
the categories are produced by the UK office of national statistics (ONS). Social
grade are based on your household income. When defining an audience the people
are normally group abc1 or c2de.
This table shows the 6 categories of
social grade. A being the group with
the highest income and E being the
group with the lowest income, on the
chart.

13. https://www.ipsos-
mori.com/DownloadPublication/1285_MediaCT_thoug
htpiece_Social_Grade_July09_V3_WEB.pdf
http://www.nrs.co.uk/nrs-
print/lifestyle-and-classification-
data/social-grade/
This is a diagram of the estimated
percentages of the population
which fall into each category in
2008. Most people are in the c1
category with 29% of the uk
population falling into this group.
This also is a diagram of the same
groups ,however it this is more up
to date (2015) estimated incomes
percentages for the population.
Most of the population are still in
the C1 category but the
percentage has dropped by 2%
since 2008. The 2% has fallen into
the lower social status-D and E.

14. Social grades
It is important to think about the social grade of your audience because different social
grades have different needs. When taking into account the prices points of your product
and the appeal of the product.
For example:
Here are two different brands of womens magazine- take a break on the left and look on the
right. The magazines differ in price and the contents significantly differ. The price of take a
break is about 90p whereas look retails for an average of £2; there is not a massive difference
but take a break is cheaper. The biggest difference in the magazines comes from their content.
Take a break contains real life stories and chances to win prizes. Look features celebrity stories
and fashion. 90p and £2 isn’t a huge amount of money so most social grades will be able to
buy it. Looking at the prices and content of take a break, it will be aimed at c2de. C2de will not
want to spend loads of money on a magazine and they will be able to relate more to the real
people in the magazine than celebrity. Look will appeal to abc1 social grades because they can
easily pay £2 for a magazine. Also look’s content will appeal to the abc1 audience because they
will be interested by celebrities and will have money to buy the fashion products featured in
the magazine.

15. Geodemographics
Geo-demographics is ‘classifying and characterizing neighborhoods
or localities based on the principal that residents living near each
other are likely to have similar demographic, socio-economic and
lifestyle characteristics’. For example it will assume most people
living in the same area, e.g York have similar characteristics and
interests to everyone living in that area.
http://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/1
0.1007%2F978-0-387-35973-1_456