‘The Nature and Purpose of Research’.

This post shows my understanding of various research techniques used in industry to connect and target the audience. I found this work so essential in allowing me to understand how a consumer can connect with different media outlets. This has made me want to further this reach to see how a brand can reach a consumer with a marketing strategy.

I will be discussing the different research techniques the media industry uses to be able to create and target their productions. There are four main types of research they use. These are; quantitative research, qualitative research, primary research and secondary research

Quantitative research is the collection of data in a systematic way and produces a mathematical response. Examples of this is data being displayed in graphs or as percentages. The media industry will want to use quantitative research to be able to see actual figures, so ratings from critics and number of viewer, to see what has been a success. An example of this is on a website called rotten tomato were critics have scored the Netflix production, Breaking bad. The critics rated on average the show 95%. This is then showing the producers that the show has been a success as 95% on average is a high a rating. They may also be able to see what the 5% didn’t like but that is more likely to be done through, qualitative research as the responses will be more literal and not based on numbers.

Qualitative research is a more literal collection of data which collects people concerns and behaviours through descriptions and explanations. Therefore this requires more in depth research compared to quantitative but does allow a more personal response and more contrasts of data is able to be collected. The media industry will want to use qualitative research to be able to see what people’s opinions are on the productions, what they liked and didn’t like and if something was appropriate to a viewer. The response will be detailed and enable a broad over view of a viewer’s opinion whereas with quantitative they are just getting numerical data. This is mainly done in the media industry for TV programmes. As it enables the producers to get a demographic profile for their audience. An example of this is on rotten tomatoes again and is from critics reviews. This is a written response in mostly the critic’s opinion. An example of a critic’s response on Breaking Bad, Season 2 is “again breaking bad promises to be quite a ride”. This shows the producers that the season is something the critic is confident in and will continue to watch the series. This can be seen through the language the critic used. ‘Promise’ is a strong word and gives connotations to a reader of a word of honour, trust, belief and faith. This would make them more inclined to watch it. The word ‘ride’ also makes a reader more include to watch it as it is ‘promising’ not to be boring but a journey you will stick with. This just shows how valuable critic’s opinions are for the media industry as they enable a reader an insight into something which is coming from a trusted source. When positive this can bring the source in the media industry a higher rating, more viewers and a higher profit, this however is the visa versa for a negative response. Both qualitative research and quantitative research fall into the bracket of primary and secondary research.

Primary research is research that is carried out by the person collecting and using the data personally. This is done by new data being collected by the researcher that has not been used before. An example of how a researcher can collect primary research is a questionnaire from a set number of people. The media industry will use primary research a lot when wanting feedback on their own productions. This is because what they have created is new and feedback on it has most properly not be created yet. This also allows researchers who have created a similar source in the media industry to look at this primary research and use it as secondary research for targeting their audience, market research and discovering what worked and didn’t. This type of research will be collected in both a quantitative and qualitative way as it will enable the researcher to form in depth answers that are from both a literal and numerical view point. The primary research will mostly be on the audience’s response. An example of this is from Channel 4 when they set up a campaign called UK Tribes for their TV programmes. This was set up to retrieve target research on young people so they were able to see what they could do to entice more young people on to their channel. This was carried out by questionnaires being put to numerous of young people. This was therefore done in the format of research. I think this was done in this format to enable more results to be collected enabling a wider spread result. When collected by Channel 4 they then put them into 5 different categories (tribes) to almost create a character profile on a young person to see what they would watch from their personality.

Below is a picture taken from Channel 4 website displaying the different categories;

Secondary research is something a researcher uses in their research that already exists and has been carried out by someone else. Examples of secondary research is research that is collected of the internet, documentaries, other people’s findings from primary research and reports. Secondary research as is not done primarily and normally includes a wider ranger than primary of quantitative research and qualitative research. This is because more primary research limits a person from their sources to their finances etc; whereas secondary research doesn’t require anything apart from your time to collect the resources. The media industry use secondary research massively. It allows the media productions to be able to establish stainable research, statics for numerous of different factors that would influence them when creating a production. Two areas secondary research is beneficial to the media industry is for the productions audience research and production research. It also enables the two research further things they could in cooperate to make the source more enticing for the target audience. For example the target audience could be white females aged 17 to 30 but through secondary research they have discovered that other people of other origins would be interested in the plot but would be put off with the white cast. The production after this secondary research the cooperated more races. An example of how secondary research is beneficial to a production company who are making a TV programme is, audience research. This because the team are able to research similar genre programmes and see what response they have got. This enables them to establish a clear picture of what types of people will be interested in the programme and what they could do to make it more targeted to the target audience.

I will next be discussing the function of BARB in research in the media industry. BARB stands for the Broadcast Audience Research Board. This means BARB delivers the UKs official television audience figures. This is done through BARB getting commissioned companies; MORI, Kantar Media, IPOSOS and RSMB to collect data from their 26 million customers. This is done through the customers having a box connected to all TV in their household and data on who is watch and what they are watching is collected. The data from the customer’s household is retrieved from 2:00am and collected. The data is then viewed, matched, calculated, scrutinised and then realised to industries and broadcasted by 9:30am on an analytic programme. This happens every day of the year. The nature of the research that is provided by BARB varied. This is because it goes through almost a process. BARBs research is and doesn’t change as being quantitative data. This is because it is numerical data that is collected and displayed in tables or graphs. This is beneficial to the media industry as they have set figured the can work from and see without complications of qualitative research but as the figured are delivered daily the research would be too time consuming to collect. When BARB collects the data the nature of the research is primary as BARB are collecting it however this changes when BARB releases and broadcasts their data as the people receiving it or using it are using BARBs data. This therefore means that the nature of the research has changed to secondary research. An example of how BARB releases their data is shown below;

This is presenting a weekly top 10 audience response for Channel 4. This shows that The Great British Bake off brought in a very large amount of people of 8026 and are in first. In comparison to second place; Gogglebox who had 2954 people tune in. As there is such a vast amount between first and second this quantitative data could show to producers that the Great British Bake Off could be there most liked show on their channel. They then would be able to look at making similar shows, carrying on the GBBO and advertise programmes that had a similar target audience to GBBO. This also could be researched through primary research and secondary research for reasons why the show has been successful.

In this last part of my assignment I will be discussing the purpose of production research and audience research. Production research is the act of a production team taking into consideration certain elements when planning a production. Elements they many consider are; commercial viability, completed plan to ensure production runs smoothly, gathering content and finances. Production research is normally conducted from secondary research but contains both qualitative and quantitative research. An example of this is IBSIS World. This is a company that provides up to date production research reports on industry statistics and trends to allow producers to establish what products and customers are ‘driving revenue growth and profitability’. An example of how this can help in the media industry is by a production company being able to establish things they could use in their production to keep it up to date a relevant. This would be done through production research and would allow a production team to reach things like; health and safety, finding cast a crew, post production facilities and locations. This will enable research on commercial viability to be known, content that should be in the production, materials that would be needed and a plan to be produced to ensure the production runs smoothly. Below is an example of how the data is displayed;

Audience research is research that is done on different people to create a target audience for the production. This enables a production to be targeted properly and for it to be established who would be interested in the production (in the media industry the production is likely to be a film, TV series, music). This is based on certain qualities of a person and this is normally based on a person’s age, gender, interest and ethnicity. A researcher in the media industry will carry this out through profiling audiences. The profiling is split into two categories; demographics and psychographics. Demographics is the identification of an audience’s age, gender, location, ethnicity or social grade (tastes or interests). This allows a production team when carrying out this data to determine their key consumers and integrate this data with their production research to allow a more narrowly targeted audience for their primary audience. Psychographic is the identification of an audience’s lifestyle habit, values, interests, environment opinions and attitudes. This allows a media production company to understand their audience on a more emotional level. If done correctly this allows the audience to be more involved in the production making a long lasting relationship with the production and enabling the production to be more of a success. An example of this is in a Netflix original series; Orange is the New Black. The target audience have stayed with the series throughout as the series psychographic research was used to make the show relatable in elements to the audience and followed their interests and values. The target audience for OISTNB is females ages 19 to 44. The demographic research carried out allowed ORITNB to include women of all races as all cultures are displayed well all having equal groups and air time etc. this can be seen in the demographic data as all the audience consisted of different cultures. The success of the show can be seen in its viewing figures for season 4. This was 6.7 million US viewers for episode 1 and then 5.9 million returned to watch the second episode on the day it was released.

An example of how audience research can determine a production in the media industry is BBC 3. BBC 3 was a linear TV channel that was on in the evenings. They had a target audience of young people ages 17 to around 25. Once conducting audience research; demographic and psychographics they discovered that their target audience was watching more online, streaming programmes than they were watching linear TV. The production company then made a big decision that there channel would be more successful as a steaming channel online so disposed of BBC 3 as a linear channel. This shows that how powerful this kind of research can be and how it can lead to something being a success or what is best for the production. It also shows the demographic data importance of research in the media industry as it could not only save a production but improve its format and the way it reached its audience.

In completing this assignment I have come to the conclusion that no production in the media industry is not only not worth being carried out but has its success determined on completing all natures of research. This is because I feel a production would not have its vital data, statics and understanding unless research is carried out. I also feel that audience research is of a high importance as a production needs to have and audience to target to be as successful as it can be.