Target Audience Results - Miss Miller

Research was carried out in order to retrieve preferences and information, that would satisfy the target audience successfully. Carrying out a questionnaire meant that we could obtain a mixture of qualitative and quantitative data that would be from a primary, reliable source. Having 3 closed questions retrieved simple quantitative data providing general information such as knowing the audiences age and gender. Whereas, the open questions provided a more elaborated answer resulting in more qualitative, detailed data to analyse. Carrying out research also allowed us to see any trends in characteristics that are generally favoured in soul genre music videos. It also allowed us to see how the audience felt about our chosen artist, Adele, giving us an idea of how well our song would go down with the target audience. The sample size of the research carried out was 40 people. We decided to ask 40 people as it allowed us to reach out to all types of audience. This makes our results more reliable and increases the accuracy as the results that are retrieved are from all types of audience making it more representative, covering all diversities of audience. The results we have managed to get from the research we have carried out will be used when creating our music video as we will take into account what kind of features the audience want and expect to be included. It will also allow us to notice preferences from a wider, mass audience, ensuring that our video will appeal to more than just the target audience. The questionnaire that we carried out is shown below:

The data that was retrieved was stored and presented through the use of pie charts. Using pie charts to story the data allowed the data to be recognised and analysed in an easy and clear way. 

The first question that was asked was a closed question - 'what is your age group?'. This allowed us to see what aged audience we were carrying out the research on. As Adele's audience tends to situate between from 16 - 30 years old, a more precise target audience would be 19 - 21 years old. This is because Adele wrote her music around this age range which makes her more relatable to the target audience. The way that the number of 19 - 21 year olds who took part in our research was roughly a third of the 40 people we asked, ensures that the results we got were representable to the target audience. The least amount of people we surveyed were from the age group of 27 - 30 years old. This is appropriate for our research as this is not the main target audience, however, still gives us opinion and data to help satisfy other audiences for example, in this case, the older generation. Therefore, this strengths the satisfaction of our audience as a whole and attracts more people to the video that may not be considered as the 'target' audience. The age will be considered when creating our video as we will take on board the results that we retrieve as a whole from the audience. 

The questioned that followed was also another closed question which was 'what is your gender?'. This allowed us to see how the balance worked out between how many male and female took the questionnaire. The majority of the audience were female but only slightly more so than male. Adele's target audience in terms of gender does tend to drift towards female. This is because most of the topics of her material links to love and heartbreak, caused by a man. This is more related to women as they feel they can empathise and relate to Adele a lot more easily. The answers that we get as a result from the research makes us ensure that the audience will be satisfied as we will have retrieved results from all audiences. 

The third question that was asked happened to be the first open question of the questionnaire - 'what is your preferred style of music video?'. The pie chart clearly shows how the majority of the audience prefer narrative style, followed by performance. The concept style didn't receive as many people opting for it due to the way in which it could be seen as over-complicating a video - especially for a soul genre music video which could be viewed as being fairly simplistic. This enables us to experiment with the music video as we can use both narrative and performance style to satisfy the audience and meet the majority of the audience's needs. We can still include a subtle concept to ensure that the whole audience is satisfied. This makes sure that the video appeals to all types of audience. A narrative will definitely be included in our video from the results that we have received. This may be the main, primary style that we will use due to its high demands of half of the audience who took the questionnaire opting for it. Most people reasoned this option for it being possibly relatable which makes it 'raw' and 'unique' to the audience - this is shown clearly in one of my vox pops that follow the analysis of the pie charts. Performance will also be a main style used in the video due to it receiving roughly a third of the audience opting for it. Performance and narrative style music videos are conventional to the soul genre as it allows the audience to witness the expressions from the artist, however, still manage to seek a difference within the video with the narrative that could include the artist or not. Therefore, the way that the audience have collectively chosen that they prefer narrative and performance style music videos strengthens our video's conventionality to the genre of soul which is something we want to achieve. 

Question number four was an open question also - 'What is your favourite editing style, and why?'. Slow-paced editing is clearly the favourite, receiving around a third of the audience opting for it as their favourite editing style. Some audience members thought that the slow-pace editing used could make it more 'emotional', conveying emotions of particular characters or the artist across effectively. About a quarter of people who took part in the questionnaire opted for filters as being their favourite style of editing. This is likely because filters can be used to create a particular mood, for example, a black and white filter could suggest a past event or a sombre tone on the atmosphere of the scene. 'Other' editing styles which the audience have opted for were roughly the same amount as who said jump cut being their favourite. The results shown in this pie chart suggest that sticking strongly to the conventionality of the soul genre is a good option to go for as the research demonstrates how the conventions of the soul genre have been opted for. jump cuts and fast-paced editing are not very conventional to the genre of soul, as they do not illustrate the intended emotion in the same way as slow-pace editing and filters do. Filters and slow-pace editing will be used in our music video as they are not only conventional to the genre of soul, but also appeal to the target audience, ensuring success of the video to proceed. We will most likely use a black and white filter throughout the video to ensure that the sombre tone of the video is maintained throughout. Slow-pace editing will be used on particular parts of the video that we want to demonstrate emphasis on for example, the artist with her friends having a good time.

The next question was an open one - 'describe the setting that you would normally see in a soul music video?'. The city, a bar/pub and in an isolated setting tended to receive the same amount of people opting for them. However, the majority of the people who took part in the questionnaire opted for a stage being the setting that they feel they would expect to see in a soul music video. This is most likely because on a stage the artist is in their natural environment which makes their performance a lot more genuine and raw. Soul genre songs can hold a lot of emotion that can be expressed in different unique ways which the artist is able to put their own twist on and their personal feelings on. I think we would use a stage in our video if it looked professional, however, if it looked fake or 'tacky', I don't think that the same effect would be created as it wouldn't look as genuine as it would intend to look. If we are able to create a realistic looking, professional stage, we will use this as a setting in our music video. However, we don't want it to look amateur, so we will not include it if we think that an amateur look would be created. Because the topic of our chosen song 'Hometown Glory' is based around the artist's childhood and the way she mentions the city, this may be a possible setting that we will include as it was still appeal to the audience due to the amount of people who chose to describe the setting they would usually see in a soul genre music video in this way.

Question number six was an open one - 'Explain what sort of theme you would feel you would like to see in a soul music video?'. The majority of the participants chose love and heartbreak (which could be put under the theme of love) when looked at together. However, the pie chart shows that family is the most popular option. This could be because soul music can relate to family and love which could cross into family. Showing this theme in the music video makes it relatable to the target audience as all of the target audience would be able to associate themselves with a family. Having this theme ensures that pretty much all of the audience would appeal to it, making our video more successful. The song we have chosen for our music video isn't really about love or heartbreak and so, having this theme shown in our video maybe wouldn't be appropriate. However, because the song portrays the artist reminiscing about being in their hometown, the theme of family could be shown throughout the video, or even love through the passion she feels for her roots. This would appeal to the target audience as this would cross over two popular themes that the audience want to see in a soul genre music video.

The following open question was 'what is it about Adele that you like?'. As presented i the pie chart, a lot of people answered that her voice was the main aspect of her that they liked - which you would hope as this is her career. Though, slightly more people liked Adele for her relatable nature. This is very conventional to the soul genre as the content of soul songs tend to be based on personal experiences. Therefore, if an artist writes a song about something that an audience member can relate to, it increases the relationship between them and the artist, as well as how likeable the artist becomes. The results from this question will be taken on board when creating our music video as it is a clear convention to ensure that the artist is shown to be relatable. By doing this, we can further ensure that the audience are satisfied and that the video will be conventional to the genre of soul.

The eighth question was an open one too - 'what camera angles do you find most effective in the soul genre music videos and why?'. Although most people said more than one angle, we tried to store the data in a fair and representable way. The most favoured type of shot were close ups. Most people who opted for this gave the reason being that it helped to illustrate the artist's emotions in more intricate detail and also aided to connect the audience and artist a lot better. Close ups are conventional to the soul genre for this reason, as artists often like to show the emotion of the song they are performing clearly so that the audience can familiarise themselves with the emotion intended. This abundantly manages to achieve positive effects on the audience from the way that most of the people who took part in the questionnaire opted for close ups being the most effective. Long shots and mid shots were also very popular within the people's answers. Most stated that this was because of the fact that most soul artists are quite quirky or unique and so, costume can demonstrate this from the particular clothing that they choose to wear. A lot of people see clothing as being symbolistic for a person's personality and that you can tell a lot about someone from what they wear. These type of shots allow this element of mise-en-scene to be shown, as well as another element such as body language and facial expressions. If an artist is performing a song and makes frequent hand gestures or movements that could portray emotion for example, a leg stamp could express anger, this is able to be captured through the use of a long or mid shot and therefore could supply further reason as to why some people opted for these certain shots. We will include these types of shots to please the audience and supply them with content that they find effective and expect to see. 

The second-to-last question was a closed question which said - 'what is your favourite Adele song?'. Asking this question enabled us to see whether the song we chose was a good option which it did prove to be. The most favoured song was 'Hometown Glory' narrowly followed by 'Someone Like You'. Using 'Hometown Glory' for our video has given us confidence from the results shown in the pie chart as it is clear that the audience generally like the song. This could be inferably because it was Adele's first song that she ever wrote and one that she wrote at only the age of 16. To the audience, this shows how naturally talented she is from such a young age being able to make such a successful, meaningful single. This song is a little different from the stereotypical love and heartbreak between a relationship which normally acts as the base for nearly every soul genre song. However, the song is still conventional to the genre of soul as, it does refer to the theme of love relating to her hometown and infers that she wants to go back to the way it was. 'Someone Like You' is based around a broken relationship where a man has left the artist and is now married to another woman. The song expresses how the artist feels about the past lover and that she wants to find someone else like him as she can't have him. This could be relatable to some of the people who took part in the questionnaire as breakups occur all the time between many people. The way that Adele has written this song could display distinctly how a person feels which makes them appeal to Adele as it reinforces the fact that she is a normal, ordinary person that experiences the same as every other normal person does. 

The final question in the questionnaire was an open one which was 'why do you think Adele is conventional to the soul genre?'. Most people thought that the reason for her being so conventional to the soul genre is from the topics that she sings about. Her topics mostly work across love, heartbreak and family - three generically conventional codes of the soul genre. Other people thought that the way she has many close ups featured in her videos makes her conventional. This is true as it helps to display her emotions and own interpretation of the song, that the audience are able to witness and recognise. Another convention that the participants recognised in relation to Adele was the minimalist instrumentation featured throughout her work. Most of her songs include acoustic instruments such as piano or guitar which allows the listener to pay more attention solely on the artist's voice. This is a convention of the genre of soul as it helps to demonstrate real and raw emotion primarily from the artist's voice. We will ensure that our video reinforces the topic Adele is singing about and also that close ups will be used frequently throughout the video. Furthermore, by including the artist playing the minimalist instrument in the video emphasises the lack of other instruments within the song. 

The theory that I have chosen to apply to my questionnaire and music video is Grant McCracken. He believes that the postmodern world is full of diversity, dynamism and creativity. McCracken also says that we look at the array of values and ideologies then we can't say all subcultures come from one culture. This applies to our questionnaire as it shows how different people have different ideas and different opinions on answers. It shows that not everyone thinks the same and that each person has their own individual identity through the way that the vox pops especially show the different elaborated idea of each individual. This will be incorporated within our music video as we will ensure that it is creative by making the video slightly diverse as it will not be showing the typical love/relationship features that a typical soul genre music video would do, instead we will be focusing on friendship issues and the idea of isolation which links in with diverse experiences within society. 

Vox Pops

Along with the questionnaire, vox pops were carried out showing 5 people answering the questionnaire that was created for our group:

The purpose for doing this was to make sure that our music video would be more audience considered and that the decisions we make in reference to what is included in the video will be satisfying for the audience. Most of the questions in the questionnaire are open ones and so, the vox pops help to recognise the type of elaborated answers that the participants supply. There is also the enabling of storing qualitative data easily through vox pops as it still stores the lengthy answers the participants would have answered with and also is visual evidence of them answering the questions. Moreover, vox pops also prove that I as an individual retrieved the information in the vox pops as you can hear the questions being asked by myself. Vox pops tend to also retrieve more accurate and genuine results as they feel the need to be honest whilst on camera and in-front of someone, whilst if the participants were to fill out their answers onto paper, they may not feel that as much effort is needed. The vox pops are beneficial as it helps us as a group recognise what the general ideas for the music video should be. They show the individual ideas that each participant suggest and helps to create links between other participants that would have answered similarly. This allows us to see what answers were most common and which ideas should be implemented into music in order for it to achieve as much success as possible.

In conclusion, I found that carrying out the questionnaire was highly useful within my research. This is because the questionnaire allowed us to explore different aspects of the music video and retrieve the best options favoured by the audience. For example, we were able to note the best uses of editing in which we can use in the video that would fully satisfy the target audience. It also allowed us to strengthen our confidence in our song and artist by asking the participants what their favourite song of Adele's was and what they liked about Adele. The way that the results displayed that 'Hometown Glory' was the most favoured, gives us more confidence in using this song for our video as it is clearly liked already. Likewise with the way that the participants positively spoke about what they like about Adele, it reassured us that Adele was a good artist to opt for, especially as one question also referred to her being conventional which was answered in favour of this. The answers retrieved from each question will be taken into account, as, the options the majority of the audience answered with will most likely be included in our music video, for example, being narrative and performance in style. If I was to carry out the research again, I think that I would ask more people the questionnaire so, use a larger sample size. This would increase the repeatability and representativeness of my results giving me more accurate data across a mass audience. I would also include more questions. I would do this because I would be able to find out other aspects of the video that may be needed an audience opinion on, for example, what iconography would they expect to see in a soul genre music video. It would also allow me to find out more detailed and in-depth information by asking more questions for example, asking them to explain a good narrative that would conventionally fit in a music video from the genre of soul. Overall, I believe that the questionnaire and vox pops have had a positive influence on my research as they will aid to ensure that my music video is successful.