Audience Information
Relationship between Audience and Media Product
A media audience is the group of people who purchase a media product. It is a group that the producers are aiming their magazine or TV shot at. They are important because without an audience a media product would not sell and so would not make money.
Audience
An individual or collective group of people who read or consume any media texts. For example: Radio Listeners, Television viewers, Newspapers and magazine readers, Web traffic on web sites.
Why are audiences important?
Audiences are important because without an audience there would be no media. Media organization produce media texts to make profit- no audience = no profit. The mass media is becoming more competitive than ever to attract more and more audience in different ways and stay profitable
New Technologies had bought impact on Audiences.
Old media such as TV, Print and Ratio, which used to have a high numbers of audiences must now work harder to maintain audience numbers. Digital technology has also led to an increasing uncertainty over how we define an audience, with the general agreement that a large group of people reading the same thing at the same time is outdated and that audiences are now 'fragmented'.
Fragmented audience:
The division of audiences into smaller groups due to the variety of media outlets. For example: With newspapers and magazines- you can now view hard copy and online version that are sometimes free. The aim is to hit as many people as possible/sell more copies/generate a larger audience. But measuring audience becomes hard! You can have people who only looks online, some read the hard copy or some do both!
Audiences can be divided into categories based on social class/grade.
Psychographics
Every advertisers wants to target a particular type of audience. Therefore, media companies produce texts that target a particular 'type' of audiences. In terms of commercial media, much of their funding is generated by advertising revenue. Their product needs to appeal to a specific type of audience so that advertisers will pay to promote their product. Most media products can be define their 'typical' audience member, often with a psychographics profile.
This is the study of personality, values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. This is because this area of research focuses on:
Geodemographics
Geodemographics segmentation is based on two simple principles:
BARB
BARB is an acronym for Broadcaster's Audience Research Board. BARB was set up in 1981 to provide the industry standard television audience measurement service for broadcasters and the advertising industry. BARB is owned by BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, BSkyB and the IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) and is a not for profit company limited by guarantee
Currently, BARB have approximately 5,100 homes (equating to approximately 11,500 individuals) participating in the panel. The box records exactly what programmes they watch, and the panellists indicate who is the room watching by pressing a button on a remote control handset. The data are then collected overnight and published as overnight ratings at around 9:30 the following morning for use by TV stations and the advertising industry.
The following week, final figures are released which are a combination of the overnight figures with 'time-shift' figures (people recording a programme and watching it within a week). This means that with a total UK population of 58,789,194, according to the 2001 census, each viewer with a BARB reporting box represents over 5,000 people.
The age groups the BARB agency reported are all individuals aged 4+ are measured and reported by BARB. Within this, a user ay look at any age group they wish.
The minimum amount of viewing that can contribute to rating with BARB is the viewing is reported by clock minuted. Each clock minute is attributed to the channel that is viewed the longest within the clock minuted subject to there being at least 30 seconds of viewing.
Measuring the number of viewers and listeners is a complex business. The reason for this s that, generally, an audience search agency (e.g. BARB) will select sample of the population and monitor their viewing and listening habits for over the space of 7 days (The Panel).
What I mean by that is that and agency such as BARB will pick a random person from the population who will then they will monitor to see what that person likes to watch and listens to. This will be on going for 7 days. And if that chosen person likes to watch Eastenders for example, then the agency will estimate that this is how much viewers watch this programme and listen to this as they can base it all to that person's age, sex, gender, and where that person lives.
The data gained is then extrapolated to cover the whole population, based on the percentage sample. It is by no means an accurate science. The numbers obtained are known as the viewing figures or ratings.
This is the study of personality, values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. This is because this area of research focuses on:
- Interest,
- Activities
- Opinions
Hence psychographic factors are also called IAO variables
Geodemographics
Geodemographics segmentation is based on two simple principles:
- People who live in the same neighborhood are more likely to have a similar characteristics than are two people chosen at random.
- Neighborhood can be categorized in terms of the characteristics of the population which they contain. Any two neighborhoods can be placed in the same category, i.e., they contain similar types of people, even though they are widely separated.
Audience demographics (statistical data)
Once they know: income bracket/status, age, gender, location etc. of their potential audience media producers can be begin to shape their text to appeal to a target audience with known reading/viewing/listening habits.
Where to place your advert:
Once you have produced your TV advert, it is important to make sure your target audience see it.
You will want as any relevant people as possible to see your advert. Therefore, it is important you know 'who' and 'how many' people watch different television programmes.
The more viewers a programme has, the more expensive it is to buy an advertising slot. NB Advertisers particularly like programmes that young people with disposable income watch.
BARB
BARB is an acronym for Broadcaster's Audience Research Board. BARB was set up in 1981 to provide the industry standard television audience measurement service for broadcasters and the advertising industry. BARB is owned by BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, BSkyB and the IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) and is a not for profit company limited by guarantee
Currently, BARB have approximately 5,100 homes (equating to approximately 11,500 individuals) participating in the panel. The box records exactly what programmes they watch, and the panellists indicate who is the room watching by pressing a button on a remote control handset. The data are then collected overnight and published as overnight ratings at around 9:30 the following morning for use by TV stations and the advertising industry.
The following week, final figures are released which are a combination of the overnight figures with 'time-shift' figures (people recording a programme and watching it within a week). This means that with a total UK population of 58,789,194, according to the 2001 census, each viewer with a BARB reporting box represents over 5,000 people.
The age groups the BARB agency reported are all individuals aged 4+ are measured and reported by BARB. Within this, a user ay look at any age group they wish.
The minimum amount of viewing that can contribute to rating with BARB is the viewing is reported by clock minuted. Each clock minute is attributed to the channel that is viewed the longest within the clock minuted subject to there being at least 30 seconds of viewing.
Measuring the number of viewers and listeners is a complex business. The reason for this s that, generally, an audience search agency (e.g. BARB) will select sample of the population and monitor their viewing and listening habits for over the space of 7 days (The Panel).
What I mean by that is that and agency such as BARB will pick a random person from the population who will then they will monitor to see what that person likes to watch and listens to. This will be on going for 7 days. And if that chosen person likes to watch Eastenders for example, then the agency will estimate that this is how much viewers watch this programme and listen to this as they can base it all to that person's age, sex, gender, and where that person lives.
The data gained is then extrapolated to cover the whole population, based on the percentage sample. It is by no means an accurate science. The numbers obtained are known as the viewing figures or ratings.