By Michael Gomersall
Introduction
Research is a very important part of the creative media industry. Media is expensive to produce so it is important to do research to make sure that you are creating products that audiences want to see. Media developers need to make sure that their production costs don’t go over budget to make sure they will make a profit, so they need to plan as best as possible to produce products that will be successful.
There are different types and methods of research in the media depending on what you want to find out. I am going to look at these different types with examples.
Types of research
There are three main types of research. These are
1. Audience Research
2. Market Research
3. Production Research
Audience Research
Audience research is finding out who your audience is or deciding who your target audience will be. Knowing your audience is important and can include things like their age, gender, class, where they live, their interests, what their job is, what other programmes they like as well as lots of other things about them.
Market Research
Market research is about finding out about the environment you are working in, (called the market). A production has to compete with other programmes to get an audience and earn money. Market research will look at
· What is already out there (similar products/competitors)
· Audiences’ reactions and attitudes to a product
· Audience awareness of products
Production Research
Production research is about making sure you have found out what you need to know about the product. For example when I was researching about the hospice I looked at the internet to find out what to put in my social action project. I looked at what the hospice was, who it was for and what they did. When I went up to visit the hospice I found out a lot more about the work, the importance of the volunteers and how important fundraising was as well as lots of other things. It was important to visit the site, talk to people who use the hospice as well as those who work there to see what we could put in our social action film. Other production research might include production costs, locations, staffing etc. It is important to see look at the who, what , where, why and when's and make sure that costs are budgeted for and that the programme will be cost effective and look good and have the right team and all that.
So what are the methods of research?
Methods of Research
There are two methods of research- qualitative and quantitative research.
Quantitative research;
The definition for quantitative research is;
‘Quantitative research is about asking people for their opinions in a structured way so that you can produce hard facts and statistics to guide you. To get reliable statistical results, it's important to survey people in fairly large numbers and to make sure they are a representative sample of your target market.’ 1
Quantitative research is about getting numbers and facts (or quantities) about a product. It is something that can be measured and it can be shown in a chart form. Some common examples of quantitative research would be to show how well a product is performing e.g. audience ratings (how many people watched a programme), box office takings (how much money a film took in), circulation figures (how many newspapers or books were sold) or hits on a website. Quantitative research might also be about the percentage of the audience, how many women, what ages they are etc. Quantitative research can be used for audience and market research. Here is an example of a quantitative research graph.
Introduction
Research is a very important part of the creative media industry. Media is expensive to produce so it is important to do research to make sure that you are creating products that audiences want to see. Media developers need to make sure that their production costs don’t go over budget to make sure they will make a profit, so they need to plan as best as possible to produce products that will be successful.
There are different types and methods of research in the media depending on what you want to find out. I am going to look at these different types with examples.
Types of research
There are three main types of research. These are
1. Audience Research
2. Market Research
3. Production Research
Audience Research
Audience research is finding out who your audience is or deciding who your target audience will be. Knowing your audience is important and can include things like their age, gender, class, where they live, their interests, what their job is, what other programmes they like as well as lots of other things about them.
Market Research
Market research is about finding out about the environment you are working in, (called the market). A production has to compete with other programmes to get an audience and earn money. Market research will look at
· What is already out there (similar products/competitors)
· Audiences’ reactions and attitudes to a product
· Audience awareness of products
Production Research
Production research is about making sure you have found out what you need to know about the product. For example when I was researching about the hospice I looked at the internet to find out what to put in my social action project. I looked at what the hospice was, who it was for and what they did. When I went up to visit the hospice I found out a lot more about the work, the importance of the volunteers and how important fundraising was as well as lots of other things. It was important to visit the site, talk to people who use the hospice as well as those who work there to see what we could put in our social action film. Other production research might include production costs, locations, staffing etc. It is important to see look at the who, what , where, why and when's and make sure that costs are budgeted for and that the programme will be cost effective and look good and have the right team and all that.
So what are the methods of research?
Methods of Research
There are two methods of research- qualitative and quantitative research.
Quantitative research;
The definition for quantitative research is;
‘Quantitative research is about asking people for their opinions in a structured way so that you can produce hard facts and statistics to guide you. To get reliable statistical results, it's important to survey people in fairly large numbers and to make sure they are a representative sample of your target market.’ 1
Quantitative research is about getting numbers and facts (or quantities) about a product. It is something that can be measured and it can be shown in a chart form. Some common examples of quantitative research would be to show how well a product is performing e.g. audience ratings (how many people watched a programme), box office takings (how much money a film took in), circulation figures (how many newspapers or books were sold) or hits on a website. Quantitative research might also be about the percentage of the audience, how many women, what ages they are etc. Quantitative research can be used for audience and market research. Here is an example of a quantitative research graph.
2.(From http://creativemediaproductionjs.blogspot.co.uk/)
.
Qualitative Research
The definition for qualitative research is,
‘Qualitative Research is primarily exploratory research. It is used to gain an understanding of underlying reasons, opinions, and motivations. It provides insights into the problem or helps to develop ideas or hypotheses for potential quantitative research.’1
So qualitative research is more about how people think and feel. What they like or don’t like. It can’t really be measured but it does have an influence. Examples of qualitative research could be what the critics say. You could look up fan sites. For example after episodes of Doctor Who fans are making comments about the programme and picking it to pieces. Sometimes adverts can go viral because people like them so much. So in qualitative research responses are personal.
Qualitative research can be used to find out what audiences like and why they like it or why they turn off.
Some qualtitative research I did for my Social Action on the Foyle Hospice was whenever I was talking to Donal, the CEO of a company in a meeting, and I asked for his opinion on what he thought would work and I discussed the things that I thought would work and we came to agreements on what we would think would attract a younger audience
Sources of Research
There are two sources of research, primary research and secondary research.
Primary Research
Primary research is finding out original data. Primary research is going directly to the source to find out information Examples are; meeting people and asking them questions or going and looking round somewhere. A focus group to find out what people think of a new product is primary research and so is getting people to complete a survey. In my project the primary research was visiting the hospice, looking around and asking questions.
Here is an example of using a focus group. I did a trailer for the hospice and I got some reactions from people in my group as well as from tutors and my parents. The older group were not sure if it was sensitive enough as the hospice supports people who are dying and their families. The younger group liked it and found it interesting and it held their attention. I was aiming it at a younger audience but I also want to make sure that it is sensitive and represents the hospice. I could have gone into more detail and got people to fill in a questionnaire letting us know what they thought, but we didn't have time. I also used a lot of open questions to different people on the hospice to gather information as well as to get good footage for our film.
There are 2 data gathering agencies in the UK, the Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB) and the Radio Joint Audience Reasearch Limited (Rajar) which provide a lot of Primary Research. They gather data by means of technical and physical surveillance equipment as well as by interviews.
Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB)
BARB get companies to collect data about people's viewing habitsin the UK. This is because each year over £7 million pounds are invested in programmes and advertising campaigns and it is important to know if these are successful. Barb can give their clients, broadcasters and advertisers information on who they reached and how they performed. BARB uses a panel of about 5100 households in the UK and they can find out who is watching and what they are watching and on what they are watching. This information is vital to broadcasters and advertisers.
Radio Joint Audience Reasearch Limited (Rajar)
Rajar is the data collecting agency for radio and it measures information about radio audiences. It is non profit making and helps planners and advertisers as they both have the same facts about who listens to what and when and this means advertisers can target and pay appropriately for advertisers and radio stations know who their audience is and so what advertisers might be interested. For example if the audience is young they radio owner might promote clubs or a classic music station might advertise to concerts. Programmes can be developed or cut as the owner knows what the audience is listening to (or not). Rajar covers about 300 radio stations in the UK.
Secondary Research
Secondary Research is data that has been searched by someone else. For example a newspaper article written in the time that you are researching. Every week the TV viewing figures are complied and used by lots of different companies. This would be an example of secondary research. If someone uses secondary research it is always good to refer to where you got it from and use it as an example. In my project I looked at the Foyle Hospice website. There was a video up there which I looked at. There was also a newspaper that came round the doors about the hospice so that was kind of current and what they were wanting to put across to the community. This fitted in with our project.
There are many different types of secondary sources and the internet is a great resource. You could also check photo libraries, books, journals and there are lots of other things too like directories or old programmes or old magazines and newspapers.
Purposes of Research
People spend a lot of money on research. The reason people spend so much money on research is because making something in the media is like a gamble, you don’t know if people are going to like it or not. Producers, and people who are making the media product want to make sure that they are going to make money on the product, so they will research as much as they can so they make sure that they will have a audience and also make products that the audience will like. Broadcasters often have partnerships with advertisers. This could include product placement. Here are some examples of product placement.
Advertisers know who likes their products and who they are marketing their products for and if they know who is watching a programme or listening to a radio programme then they can target their advert to the right market. Age, gender, geography, class, whether people have children or not, all this information is like gold to advertisers as they want to make sure that they target their product in a way that has the best impact and is most cost effective. They need to know that we buy more strawberries and sun cream in the summer, book holidays and give things up in the new year and to market toys in children's programmes and health insurance for older people in programmes in the afternoon.
Conclusion
Research is a vital part of programme planning on different levels. This task was really interesting to do, and has made me realise how much research I have to do to make something successful, and how much research I have done in my previous projects, and haven’t even realised! It is good to know why researching is so important, and it is good to know the different types of research and the various different reasons. I am glad that I did this assignment now, instead of the start of the year, as now I have examples of things that I have done.
I have researched in all of my tasks. I did a lot of research in my social action movie. I got a newspaper from the Hospice and read through it a few times, and pulled some bits of information out of it, to get some ideas of what to add into the documentary. I also had meetings with my crew, and the staff from the Hospice, to research what they thought was best, and what they thought would be good to add in, this is finding out what people would like to watch, so i have a better clue of what the public will like, and because i had the opinions of people who worked in the hospice, and people that knew very little about it, it evened out well.
I provided a study of my hero I provided all my planning work for my social action project I provided production paperwork and a film. I did 'My Hero' task on a girl i know called Noleen that lives in Mayo, as i did not fully understand that we would be making a documentary about them, but once i found this out i changed it to the Foyle hospice, as they were closer than the 4 hour drive to Mayo. I got my class to review all my work on the hospuce, and asked them if they would give me feedback on my fourm, to tell me any improvements that i needed, or anything that they thought would make it work better.
In my research assignment part 1 i have evidence of having used power points, and I gave examples of charts and diagrams. I explain what all the types of research are, and how I have used them in my own work.
I used Moodle to find my assignment briefs and find out what i had to do. I would always read through the brief 2/3 times, to always make sure that i fully understood it, and understood what the task was, and what I had to do before I started to research for the task. Research is vital for every task, no matter what the job. People have to conduct research before making a TV show to find out if they will make profit, and to find out if people will like it or not. A lot of the time people pay others to conduct the research for them.
Examples
.
Qualitative Research
The definition for qualitative research is,
‘Qualitative Research is primarily exploratory research. It is used to gain an understanding of underlying reasons, opinions, and motivations. It provides insights into the problem or helps to develop ideas or hypotheses for potential quantitative research.’1
So qualitative research is more about how people think and feel. What they like or don’t like. It can’t really be measured but it does have an influence. Examples of qualitative research could be what the critics say. You could look up fan sites. For example after episodes of Doctor Who fans are making comments about the programme and picking it to pieces. Sometimes adverts can go viral because people like them so much. So in qualitative research responses are personal.
Qualitative research can be used to find out what audiences like and why they like it or why they turn off.
Some qualtitative research I did for my Social Action on the Foyle Hospice was whenever I was talking to Donal, the CEO of a company in a meeting, and I asked for his opinion on what he thought would work and I discussed the things that I thought would work and we came to agreements on what we would think would attract a younger audience
Sources of Research
There are two sources of research, primary research and secondary research.
Primary Research
Primary research is finding out original data. Primary research is going directly to the source to find out information Examples are; meeting people and asking them questions or going and looking round somewhere. A focus group to find out what people think of a new product is primary research and so is getting people to complete a survey. In my project the primary research was visiting the hospice, looking around and asking questions.
Here is an example of using a focus group. I did a trailer for the hospice and I got some reactions from people in my group as well as from tutors and my parents. The older group were not sure if it was sensitive enough as the hospice supports people who are dying and their families. The younger group liked it and found it interesting and it held their attention. I was aiming it at a younger audience but I also want to make sure that it is sensitive and represents the hospice. I could have gone into more detail and got people to fill in a questionnaire letting us know what they thought, but we didn't have time. I also used a lot of open questions to different people on the hospice to gather information as well as to get good footage for our film.
There are 2 data gathering agencies in the UK, the Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB) and the Radio Joint Audience Reasearch Limited (Rajar) which provide a lot of Primary Research. They gather data by means of technical and physical surveillance equipment as well as by interviews.
Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB)
BARB get companies to collect data about people's viewing habitsin the UK. This is because each year over £7 million pounds are invested in programmes and advertising campaigns and it is important to know if these are successful. Barb can give their clients, broadcasters and advertisers information on who they reached and how they performed. BARB uses a panel of about 5100 households in the UK and they can find out who is watching and what they are watching and on what they are watching. This information is vital to broadcasters and advertisers.
Radio Joint Audience Reasearch Limited (Rajar)
Rajar is the data collecting agency for radio and it measures information about radio audiences. It is non profit making and helps planners and advertisers as they both have the same facts about who listens to what and when and this means advertisers can target and pay appropriately for advertisers and radio stations know who their audience is and so what advertisers might be interested. For example if the audience is young they radio owner might promote clubs or a classic music station might advertise to concerts. Programmes can be developed or cut as the owner knows what the audience is listening to (or not). Rajar covers about 300 radio stations in the UK.
Secondary Research
Secondary Research is data that has been searched by someone else. For example a newspaper article written in the time that you are researching. Every week the TV viewing figures are complied and used by lots of different companies. This would be an example of secondary research. If someone uses secondary research it is always good to refer to where you got it from and use it as an example. In my project I looked at the Foyle Hospice website. There was a video up there which I looked at. There was also a newspaper that came round the doors about the hospice so that was kind of current and what they were wanting to put across to the community. This fitted in with our project.
There are many different types of secondary sources and the internet is a great resource. You could also check photo libraries, books, journals and there are lots of other things too like directories or old programmes or old magazines and newspapers.
Purposes of Research
People spend a lot of money on research. The reason people spend so much money on research is because making something in the media is like a gamble, you don’t know if people are going to like it or not. Producers, and people who are making the media product want to make sure that they are going to make money on the product, so they will research as much as they can so they make sure that they will have a audience and also make products that the audience will like. Broadcasters often have partnerships with advertisers. This could include product placement. Here are some examples of product placement.
Advertisers know who likes their products and who they are marketing their products for and if they know who is watching a programme or listening to a radio programme then they can target their advert to the right market. Age, gender, geography, class, whether people have children or not, all this information is like gold to advertisers as they want to make sure that they target their product in a way that has the best impact and is most cost effective. They need to know that we buy more strawberries and sun cream in the summer, book holidays and give things up in the new year and to market toys in children's programmes and health insurance for older people in programmes in the afternoon.
Conclusion
Research is a vital part of programme planning on different levels. This task was really interesting to do, and has made me realise how much research I have to do to make something successful, and how much research I have done in my previous projects, and haven’t even realised! It is good to know why researching is so important, and it is good to know the different types of research and the various different reasons. I am glad that I did this assignment now, instead of the start of the year, as now I have examples of things that I have done.
I have researched in all of my tasks. I did a lot of research in my social action movie. I got a newspaper from the Hospice and read through it a few times, and pulled some bits of information out of it, to get some ideas of what to add into the documentary. I also had meetings with my crew, and the staff from the Hospice, to research what they thought was best, and what they thought would be good to add in, this is finding out what people would like to watch, so i have a better clue of what the public will like, and because i had the opinions of people who worked in the hospice, and people that knew very little about it, it evened out well.
I provided a study of my hero I provided all my planning work for my social action project I provided production paperwork and a film. I did 'My Hero' task on a girl i know called Noleen that lives in Mayo, as i did not fully understand that we would be making a documentary about them, but once i found this out i changed it to the Foyle hospice, as they were closer than the 4 hour drive to Mayo. I got my class to review all my work on the hospuce, and asked them if they would give me feedback on my fourm, to tell me any improvements that i needed, or anything that they thought would make it work better.
In my research assignment part 1 i have evidence of having used power points, and I gave examples of charts and diagrams. I explain what all the types of research are, and how I have used them in my own work.
I used Moodle to find my assignment briefs and find out what i had to do. I would always read through the brief 2/3 times, to always make sure that i fully understood it, and understood what the task was, and what I had to do before I started to research for the task. Research is vital for every task, no matter what the job. People have to conduct research before making a TV show to find out if they will make profit, and to find out if people will like it or not. A lot of the time people pay others to conduct the research for them.
Examples
Appendix
References
1. www.marketingdonut.co.uk
2. http://creativemediaproductionjs.blogspot.co.uk/
http://www.slideshare.net/mroper/research-techniques-in-the-media-industry
http://www.slideshare.net/robertclackmedia/research-methods-14634302?related=1
http://www.slideshare.net/robertclackmedia/research-methods-14634160?related=7
http://www.slideshare.net/robertclackmedia/research-methods-14634302?related=6
http://www.slideshare.net/SarahInnes/importance-of-research-11702607?next_slideshow=1
http://www.slideshare.net/SarahInnes/importance-of-research-11702607?next_slideshow=1
http://www.slideshare.net/bubblybubbly/understand-the-nature-and-purposes-of-research
http://www.barb.co.uk/resources/barb-facts/how-we-do-what-we-do?_s=4
http://www.rajar.co.uk/content.php?page=about_key_facts