It is useful for advertisers to study audiences because they are a very important concept throughout media studies. Every time and advert is made there has been an audience in mind i.e. a group of people who will see it and make some sort of sense out of it. Generally the producers make some sort of money out of the targeted audience.
When adverts are being made the producers tend to divide and label the audience by a number of ways. The first way the audience is divided is by Standard Occupational Classification (also known as Social Grade by advertising companies). This method of dividing and labelling consists of using letter codes to show their income bracket; A - Top management, bankers, lawyers, doctors, and other highly salaried professionals, B - middle management, teachers, many 'creatives' e.g. graphic designers, C - office supervisors, junior managers, nurses, specialist clerical staff, D - skilled workers, tradespersons (white collar), E - semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers (blue collar) and finally F - unemployed, students, pensioners, casual workers.
The next method of dividing and labelling is by examining the Psychographics, the common attitudes within the audience. This is the study of personality, values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. This area of study focuses of Interests, Activities and Opinions, therefore psychographic factors are also called IAO Variables. The producers also look at the age and gender as that helps them to decide how they will get the advert across.
Geodemographics is also another way to get a clearer target audience. Geodemographics is when the producer focuses on where the required audience live, it is based on two principles. Firstly, they know that people who live in the same neighbourhood are more likely to have similar characteristics then two people chosen at random. Secondly, neighbourhoods can be categorised in terms of the characteristics of the population which they contain. Any two neighbourhoods can be placed in the same category i.e. they contain similar types of people, even though they are widely separated. Once the producers know all of this information; Income bracket/status, age, gender, race and location of their potential audience media producers can begin to shape their text to appeal to a target audience with known reading/viewing/listening habits.
It is important to be able to identify certain sections of the audience when carrying out market research as it enables the television advertiser to determine the types of incentives and barriers that the audience perceive to exist with the product. Being able to divide the research into things such as psychographics is helpful because it means that you are doing extensive research on smaller groups so you can really understand what they like and their interests.
Once you have made your advert, it is helpful to know where to place it and then how many people actually tune in to watch it. The more viewers a programme has, the more expensive it is to place an advert in that slot, so advertising companies tend to carefully place their advert within programmes that a lot of young people, with disposable income watch. Generally an audience research agency, such as BARB will select a sample of the population and monitor their viewing and listening habits over the space of seven days (The Panel). The data gained from this is then extrapolated to cover the whole population, based on the percentage sample. The numbers obtained are known as the viewing figures or ratings. BARB stands for Broadcasters' Audience Research Board and it was set up in 1981to provide the industry standard television audience measurement service for broadcasters and the advertising industry. BARB is owned by BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, British Sky Broadcasting and the IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) and is a not for profit company limited by guarantee. BARB have approximately 5100 homes participating in the panel, the box records exactly what programmes they watch and the panellists indicate who is in the room by pressing a button on a remote control handset, all individuals aged 4+ are measured by BARB. To be able to measure the viewings, the panellists must watch the programme for more than 30 seconds for the rating to count. Programme audiences are calculated by averaging the audience of all the minutes covered by the programme transmission, from the start-time to the end-time of the programme, this calculation excludes any embedded commercial breaks and promotions. BARB numbers are extremely important to commercial television stations that rely on advertising. The advertising agency will pay the television station a certain amount of money based on the number of people watching a show. Higher BARB numbers usually mean more advertising revenue for the television station. Each person in the panel represents a number of people in 'the universe', this is the total number of people in a particular country or area. The market requires that the panel is 'weighted' to reflect the universe for age and gender.
When adverts are being made the producers tend to divide and label the audience by a number of ways. The first way the audience is divided is by Standard Occupational Classification (also known as Social Grade by advertising companies). This method of dividing and labelling consists of using letter codes to show their income bracket; A - Top management, bankers, lawyers, doctors, and other highly salaried professionals, B - middle management, teachers, many 'creatives' e.g. graphic designers, C - office supervisors, junior managers, nurses, specialist clerical staff, D - skilled workers, tradespersons (white collar), E - semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers (blue collar) and finally F - unemployed, students, pensioners, casual workers.
The next method of dividing and labelling is by examining the Psychographics, the common attitudes within the audience. This is the study of personality, values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. This area of study focuses of Interests, Activities and Opinions, therefore psychographic factors are also called IAO Variables. The producers also look at the age and gender as that helps them to decide how they will get the advert across.
Geodemographics is also another way to get a clearer target audience. Geodemographics is when the producer focuses on where the required audience live, it is based on two principles. Firstly, they know that people who live in the same neighbourhood are more likely to have similar characteristics then two people chosen at random. Secondly, neighbourhoods can be categorised in terms of the characteristics of the population which they contain. Any two neighbourhoods can be placed in the same category i.e. they contain similar types of people, even though they are widely separated. Once the producers know all of this information; Income bracket/status, age, gender, race and location of their potential audience media producers can begin to shape their text to appeal to a target audience with known reading/viewing/listening habits.
It is important to be able to identify certain sections of the audience when carrying out market research as it enables the television advertiser to determine the types of incentives and barriers that the audience perceive to exist with the product. Being able to divide the research into things such as psychographics is helpful because it means that you are doing extensive research on smaller groups so you can really understand what they like and their interests.
Once you have made your advert, it is helpful to know where to place it and then how many people actually tune in to watch it. The more viewers a programme has, the more expensive it is to place an advert in that slot, so advertising companies tend to carefully place their advert within programmes that a lot of young people, with disposable income watch. Generally an audience research agency, such as BARB will select a sample of the population and monitor their viewing and listening habits over the space of seven days (The Panel). The data gained from this is then extrapolated to cover the whole population, based on the percentage sample. The numbers obtained are known as the viewing figures or ratings. BARB stands for Broadcasters' Audience Research Board and it was set up in 1981to provide the industry standard television audience measurement service for broadcasters and the advertising industry. BARB is owned by BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, British Sky Broadcasting and the IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) and is a not for profit company limited by guarantee. BARB have approximately 5100 homes participating in the panel, the box records exactly what programmes they watch and the panellists indicate who is in the room by pressing a button on a remote control handset, all individuals aged 4+ are measured by BARB. To be able to measure the viewings, the panellists must watch the programme for more than 30 seconds for the rating to count. Programme audiences are calculated by averaging the audience of all the minutes covered by the programme transmission, from the start-time to the end-time of the programme, this calculation excludes any embedded commercial breaks and promotions. BARB numbers are extremely important to commercial television stations that rely on advertising. The advertising agency will pay the television station a certain amount of money based on the number of people watching a show. Higher BARB numbers usually mean more advertising revenue for the television station. Each person in the panel represents a number of people in 'the universe', this is the total number of people in a particular country or area. The market requires that the panel is 'weighted' to reflect the universe for age and gender.
I look forward to reading your Blog on this interesting (and at times controversial) topic sarah,
ReplyDeleteMr Williamson
Well done, detailed and thorough.
ReplyDeleteMr Williamson