Question 3 - What have you learned from your audience feedback?

At the begging of the whole process, we decided on who our target audience actually were, so that we had a clear idea of what we need to achieve, in order to appeal to our target market, we came up with a detailed description, as shown below.

The piece of music that we have used is an acoustic track called 'Over Night.' Because of this, we have looked into various other artists with a similar genre such as Ed Sheeran  ..I found that his main audience is quite young, between the ages of 15-25, with him being 20 years old, this is around a similar age as our artist. Because of this we imagine our audience would be of a similar age, and so we have placed our target audience in the 16-19 or 20-26 category. We have decided that our audience will be hedonists or aspirer's, as they are quite young and so are care-free and up for a good time, and so we assume they will enjoy listening to chart music, and the mainstream top 40; however as the track we are using is quite unique, we also think it may attract individualists and non-conformists because acoustic music wasn't typically in the public eye as much as other genres of music; although this is changing in today's society, and so that is why we felt that our target audience could come from a variety of different groups of people. We have decided that our audience will be both female and male, however due to the fact the artist is a young, good-looking male, we are assuming the main audience will be from young females. They will be decision pending or 
career committed in the life staging groupings, and so again this may be quite varied. We are aiming mainly at middle class people, at B, C1 or C2 on the Jignar scale, however this doesn't cancel out upper or lower class people, as the acoustic, soft music will be attractive for most audiences, including the mainstream audience. As seen in the mood board, our audience are likely to be quite laid back, they are likely to like a drink in their local pub, they will enjoy quiet, relaxing nights in however they will also like a night out every know and again. They may use quite nice make-up and concentrate on looking quite nice from day to day. They will be quite friendly and may spend quite a lot of time with their friend, playing pool or in a sports group like Netball, or in any social situations.

As this is our selected target audience, I have focussed on asking people who fit into this category, to give me constructive criticism for my marketing package. Therefore, I have put together a selection of qualitative questions, to gain more detailed and valid feedback from my target audience. A short video is shown below:




I have specifically looked into the hypodermic needle model, which is based on the message being directly received, and accepted by the receiver.  
For example, with the narrative of the music video; (linking to the Narratology, and the theorist Todorov, "the study of narrative and narrative structure, and the way in which this affects our perception").  in my own words, the perception I wanted to achieve by my music video was the following:

"A boy breaks up with his girlfriend, and later regrets this after finding out she has taken kindly to the news."

I then looked at what other people received from the narrative: 

As you can see by these emails, both Gaz and Phebi thought that the narrative was very similar to what I intended; "I understand the narrative, it's of a boy that finishes things with a girl, and then she goes out and has a good time, and he regrets it" "I'm guessing that the guy and the girl fall out, she maybe goes of the rails slightly?? Gets with another lad."

With this in mind, I have decided that I have a collected a preferred reading from my target audience, as most people thought what I intended for them to think. (thus linking to the cultural studies approach). 

As you can see by the 2 emails, the feedback from my focus group was very similar to that of my spoken interviews with people, from the emails I have received, as well as the questions that I have asked my target audience,  I have concluded a few bullet points:

• I gained a preferred reading in regards to the narrative of my music video
• The pace,edits and performance of the music video fit with the conventions of an acoustic genre
• The 'sky' theme worked throughout, making a coherent feel through the whole marketing package. 

Where there any negatives??

• Add more content of the 'balcony scenes' (as shown in the photographs) - as this was only introduced near to the end of the music video, and it was a popular, professional section.
• The colour theme throughout was orange/dark, however blue/green was introduced towards the end of the video.

I have taken the constructive criticism on board, and therefore hypothetically, if I was to alter my work, I would add more of the balcony scene into the music video as this proved to be a popular shot, favoured by a lot of my target audience; I also feel this repetition through the video would me it more coherent throughout, linking to Steve Neale's theory; "instances of repetition and difference"

I then wanted to focus a bit more on what people thought about the marketing package as a whole, and to do this I uploaded a photograph of my Digipak and my Advert to Facebook, a social networking site, to see what my friends thought about them both, as well as sending them to my focus group, via Googlemail:

As shown in the screen prints, I received another preferred reading, as people seemed to like my DigiPak and Advert, commenting things such as "very professional" and "looks wicked". Therefore I think my target audience liked my designs. 
I also received phrases like "wooooow," and because of this I think that it shows that the DigiPak and Advert is quite pleasurable to look at, and that people feel quite revitalised once reading the texts - with a "feel good factor" Possibly linking to Ferguson (2007). Overall, this is what I wanted to achieve out of the work.
I also received some detailed descriptive feedback:

• The software used was noticed, suggesting a very professional effect was created.
• The structure is original and unique, with a horizontal layout. 
• The contrast between the dark background and the bright print makes the writing look effective.
• Facial expression and posture looks calm, a coherent effect throughout the video.
• A lot of the features reflect the acoustic genre well.
• The 'sky' theme was favoured.

With the audience feedback I received from the DigiPak and Advert, it was directly correspondent with the audience feedback I received from the Music Video, and so I think that I have done a very good job at making the 3 pieces of work coherent throughout. 
I also think that with my feedback, I have learnt that the idea of using a 'sky' theme throughout the 3 pieces of my marketing package was a very beneficial idea, and I think the sky connotes peace, and relaxation, as well as the calm, relaxed performer throughout both the texts, and the music video, I think that this created a coherent effect throughout which I think corresponds nicely with the acoustic conventions and style. I think all of my focus group and target audience enjoyed all pieces, and I am extremely happy with the audience feedback I received, resulting in very little which I would change in the future. However my audience feedback has helped me a lot throughout this process, as I am not a big fan of acoustic music myself, and so I knew little about the conventions of the acoustic genre, and therefore by asking qualitative questions throughout the task, (which can be seen in my blog with the title 'AUDIENCE RESEARCH') I feel I have been able to produce a good marketing package which will appeal to my exact target market - thus making my focus group, and my audience feedback extremely useful, and helpful.