The film industry conducts test screenings of films for invited audiences to determine their target demographic and refine their marketing strategies. Feedback from these test audiences allows filmmakers to identify if any changes need to be made to better appeal to their target group. Considerable money and resources are spent on market research like screenings and surveys to ensure the film's message is effectively reaching its intended audience.

2. Certain film companies decide to trial their films to invited audience to narrow down their
target audience and focus their marketing strategies surrounding the film. This then allows the
audience to give feedback on the film and whether they need to change any parts of it to appeal
to their target audience.
The film industry decide to establish their target audience I many different ways, for example
by premiering/screening their films to a specific group of people to discover their
demographic/target audience. They do this so they are able to direct their film at their target
audience in the most effective way possible. This therefore establishes that their target audience
likes whatever genre of film they are displaying. They will spend money on marketing
strategies and research to ensure they establish their target audience and attract their target
demographic. After discovering their target audience through these marketing research
strategies and screenings their already spent money will have paid off as the film will appeal to
their chosen demographic in the most direct and effective form, meaning they are able to turn
all their focus to the needs and interest of their target audience and whether what their film is
that, and if no how they can adapt it to be more effective/suitable. It takes lot of money to
effectively market a film and discover a films specific target audience. This could include
different technological confirms of communications, screenings, questionnaires etc. therefore
becoming more expensive, however, ensuring their results are reliable and effective when
moving forward with the marketing of their film.
Why does the film industry spend so much time and money test
screening films to invited audiences and finding out what audiences
like through market research?

3. After collecting primary and secondary information surrounding the choice of target audiences
we decided that our specific demographic would be aimed at both males and females as both the
main characters are male and female meaning they would relate to them and feel a sense of
connection and intrigue into the narrative of the film. Due to this film being a psychological
thriller some scenes could be disturbing or difficult to understand for younger viewers and so we
decided to aim it at 16 year olds upwards (and to be more specific 16-36 year olds). The
characters within the film are also around this age which again creates a feeling of relatability
and connection between the audience and characters which therefore makes it more likely for
them to come and watch the film. Within our film there are scenes that may be confusing or
psychologically hard to keep up with, by aiming it at an older more intellectual group of people
this will therefore mean they can appreciate the film more as they understand the narrative as it
progresses. Our film includes psychologically manipulative scenes much like most films of this
genre and so we have assume our audience will have an interest/passion for psychological
thrillers and so enjoy the gripping psychological scenes which leave people feeling intrigued.
Establish who your audience are. Justify this with
reference to your audience research?

4. Primary Audience Research
When carrying out my primary and secondary audience research I decided to create a
questionnaire on “Survey Monkey” as a form of primary information which enabled me to base
our target audience off of my findings. I found this method of collecting results/feedback to be
very useful as I was able to narrow our target audience down more effectively and was also able to
find out the interest of the audience members which if we incorporated in our work could entice
a mainstream demographic of people. I ensured I asked more than ten people to ensure it was
reliable. I also ensured the participants weren't all the same age and gender to ensure my results
were not biased or unbalanced. After receiving this information through from a questionnaire I
had created I then use the results to improve our research when developing our own target
audience. I found this to be very useful as I developed an insight into the minds of people
currently as this questionnaire was created not long ago. This therefore displays the results of a
relevant and effective survey which could help our film due to how current it is. The feedback I
received covered a lot of areas which enabled me to adjust and improve our research when
finding our specific target audience.

5. Primary Information:
For my Primary Research I decided to create a questionnaire on "Survey
monkey". I received 13 replies on which 11 were female and 2 were male. 9
recipients were 10-17 years old, 3 were 18-24 years old and 1 was 25-34 years
old. This meant my feedback would be mainly based off of a younger female
target audience/demographic. I asked how many films they watched a
month, on which 5 people said 1-2 times, 4 people said 3-5 times and 4
people said 6-8 times a month. This is a good collection of information as
this demographic watch films frequently or at least once a month.
I then asked what genre of film they liked the most, of which 5 people said
thriller which is good as our film is a psychological thriller and so displays a
large percentage of an audience enjoy our genre of film. 0 people said drama,
action and crime films, 1 person said horror films, 5 people said comedy and
2 people said romance. In the explanation box I asked them why they had
chosen this specific genre of film, of which the people that answered thriller
said "Because they are usually most tense" and "They are gripping.". This
therefore enables me to see what features within a thriller film entices and
interests this demographic of people.

6. I then asked what the participants top five favourite films were. I got a lot of
feedback from this question, I found that a large percentage of people named
psychological thriller or thriller films as their favourite films, such as "Gone
Girl", "Inception", "Happy Death Day" "Don't Breathe" etc. This means that
your psychological thriller film will appeal to a large demographic/target
audience which is based around 16- 30's roughly, both males and females. Next
I asked whether they liked psychological thrillers (the genre of our teaser
trailer). 11 people said yes and 2 people said no. This is a successful result
displaying a wide target audience for the genre of our film.
I then followed up that question by asking whether they would consider
watching a psychological thriller film, of which 13/13 people said yes. This is an
extremely successful and useful result to have received as it supports our target
audience research and enables us to acknowledge that a large amount of
people would be interested in viewing our teaser trailer. In the explanation box
I asked why, of which people said "Because I enjoy them" and "They interest
me". This feedback is very useful as it enables me to see our target audience's
viewpoint on our genre of film and displays an almost guarantee that people
are likely to go watch a film/teaser trailer of the same genre as ours.

7. Finally I asked what it is they look for in a good teaser trailer. 3 people said
a well explained narrative, 6 people said the character, 1 person said quick
shots and 3 people said dramatic lighting. This feedback was very useful
when considering the production of our teaser trailer, both the filming and
the editing. This feedback allows me to reflect on our target audience's
viewpoint as it is one of the most important opinions in our production as
it is the people that will hopefully be watching our teaser trailer.
Here is a link to the survey and the
results I received to see the questions
and results in more detail with
graphs and percentages etc.:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/an
alyze/d5WRUwfA8jZRZZwQ7ezBJ2_
2F5Zpk1ZXOr485I9up8ido_3D

10. When researching secondary sources for our audience research I decided to use different
online applications such as “Box Office Mojo” to collect information about specific
psychological thriller films and their target audiences. This then gave me an idea of who
existing, conventional films aim their film at and whether we feel that demographic would fit
for our own production. I decided to look at psychological thrillers throughout different time
periods, some newer and some older ones to compare their change in target audiences etc. I
looked at films with similar narrative themes and character types as ours to ensure the
information collected was useful and relevant to our own production. I researched films such
as “Silence Of The Lambs”, “Panic Room”, “Black Swan”, “The Shining”, “Inception” and “Gone
Girl”. By researching several psychological thrillers I was able to ensure the information
collected was reliable and useful when applying this towards our own film.
I also researched three psychological films in depth to show the different target audience for
each film in detail. This enabled me to acknowledge the target audience for successful
psychological films that would give me an indication as to what demographic we should be
considering to target for this genre of film. I learnt that we should also be considering the
specific character type/representation, narrative themes etc. within our film and whether
that will effect our choice of target audience.
I accessed this information on different online sources, one being “Box Office Mojo” which
enabled me to focus on specific psychological thriller films to compare our work to. This was
very useful when gaining an insight into the film industry and specific films similar to our
own in different ways.

12. Pitch Presentation
After presenting our pitch presentation to the class we received both positive feedback and
constructive criticism that would help us to improve our production. The class said they would
watch the film as they were enticed by the idea of having a timer running out and not knowing
what is going to happen to the female character (protagonist). This is important and useful
feedback as our class member are in the same age range as our target audience which allows us to
know that our film would appeal to the target audience we decided to aim it at. We were told by
other class members about some useful films that could help the development of our
production. These included the film "Saw" which was suggested due to the idea of having a
limited amount of time to escape an eerie and confined space/environment. Also due to its
psychological thriller elements which link to our films genre. Also the film "Silence Of The
Lambs" was also a suggested film as it links to the idea of having an undercover agent entering
an extremely dangerous house, however, in our case it is a reporter who is interviewing local
people in that neighbourhood and consequently enters a house which turns out to be a very
dangerous place to be.
This feedback we received was very useful when moving forward with our film as we gained a
persona insight into the minds of our target audience in an communicatively effective way. We
gained a lot of positive and constructive feedback which helped our development within our
research. It not only told us what we were doing well but also what they would change if possible
which was good when considering any improvements we could add to make it the best it can be.
Overall the feedback we received form the class was very successful when considering our
marketing campaign as we have created a product which entices our target audience, something
the audience said they would definitely be interested in watching.

14. After making our rough cut teaser trailer, magazine cover and film poster we then
presented our work so far to the class and handed out sheets of which they
answered in response to our work. The sheets covered a wide range of questions that
gave us feedback on all three products in depth , this includes the film poster,
magazine cover and teaser trailer. We received the feedback through the comments
left on the sheets and then adapted our work to appeal to our target audience more
effectively. I found this to be a very useful way of communicating the audience’s
opinions with us and also because we received multiple feedback sheets which
ensured the information we collected was reliable enough to use in the development
of our research and production. We were able to change/improve any elements of
the products that had been commented on as well as being able to keep the features
the audience liked. After receiving positive feedback along with constructive advice
we decided to add more to our products, for example by adding more cover lines to
the magazine cover, adding more intriguing effects, a billing block and more text to
the film poster and finally adding better, layered sound both diegetic and non-
diegetic. In response to the feedback we also improved the teaser trailer by adding
more effects such add transitions and colour grading to make it appear all the more
realistic yet abstract and conventional for this genre of film. I found this form of
feedback very useful and successful as we received positive comments saying that
they established the genre of the film, the narrative themes and also the use of the
same character throughout the three products displaying the use of synergy
between products.

16. For our final screening we posted our teaser trailer on our YouTube accounts.
We then played them in front of the class. They gave us feedback on our work
by commenting under the YouTube video.
I found this to be a very useful way for the audience to communicate their
ideas and opinions. All of the comments were positive and complimentary of
our work, they commented on the narrative and its psychological effect,
linking to the genre of the film. We also received feedback on the use of
editing, sound to create tension and extreme, abstract camera shots, for
example the first shot used and the point of view shots used to create a sense
of perspective for the audience.
We used this feedback constructively when considering any final
improvements to make, however, we did not change anything significant as
the feedback was successful and we felt we had created the best version of our
three products. This final feedback was very successful and so displays the
effectiveness of our marketing campaign in relation to our target audience as
the class we presented it to is within our target audience, and so received
positive feedback from our target audience/demographic that we aimed to do.