Assignment 2 - undertake research

In this assignment, i will be having to undertake research which will confirm the groups suggested target audience and what visuals will appeal to them for our music video.

In order to do this we will have to construct a questionnaire or get together a focus group which are classed as primary research to gather opinions on some sort of valuable data that'll be easy when preparing to film. If we were to create a questionnaire, possible questions that'd be on there would be for example, "what type of visuals do you think suits the theme of this song? (theme will be given)  This means we will receive opinionated questions and will be open. The more response, the better. However, it is time consuming and may be hard to come to an overall answer to our question. Similarly, in a focus group, our aim would be to collect a group of people who are between the ages 16-25 (our target audience) who possibly may be asked the same open question and that'll allow relevant opinions .

Also, we will have to continue beachcombing to  see if the music conventions we have stated in our pitch such as narrative will be successful. For example, Pop music artists similar to Young Summer's (our artist) such as Ellie Goulding tend to have non-narrative music videos but endless fun shown in a non-linear structure. This means we could try construct a music video which follows conceptual or surreal motives.

In order to support or question data collected from primary research, we could consider undertaking secondary research. Reading Youtube video comments of the related artist music video could be helpful as it is possible we could find criticism on the video and solutions. As well as criticism, we can also look at the appraisals and why it was good.

Source of audience information

Research technique

In this assignment i will be analysing and evaluating research techniques for music videos.

Research is compulsory in media firms as it allows businesses to collate data in which audiences prefer or to know which is least liked or to develop ideas to a substantial level. For music videos, research is vital in the pre-production stage as it helps with better understanding of the genre as well as audience preferences (consumer behaviour), social media is very helpful in doing this. Also, comparing and exploring contents that are similar to e.g. an artists new music will narrate what changes need to be made and the sense of a "gap-in-the-market" in order to compete . Hence why qualitative and quantitative research is required in media industries.

Quantitative research is numerical and gives data in a collective form or google's definition "Quantitative methods emphasise objective measurements and the statistical, mathematical, or numerical analysis of data collected through polls, questionnaires, and surveys, or by manipulating pre-existing statistical data using computational techniques."
Examples of quantitate research in media could be tv programme ratings, hits on a website, sales of CDs (applies directly to music videos) and DVDs etc. Quantitative research benefits institutions such as the music industry in terms of researching quantity of viewers on a music video as this hints which type of music or genre people prefer. For example, Beyonce's Listen music video hit up to over 15 million views since it's release which either means people like the artists, the genre, the lyrics, the beat or simply as a taster. This can be classed as a disadvantage as this type of reach doesn't pin point the exact reason for Beyonce's success. However, other record labels will still try to incorporate Beyonce's ideas and themes from her music video to theirs as inspiration and to also increase their productivity. 

However, figures are not always accurate or reliable as i said above some people may have viewed it as a taster or because it was recommended which means it's not their preference. Also, website such as 'Tubidy' are illegal and the views may not be reliable. Therefore, quantitative research doesn't give specific opinions of audiences which may lead to misinterpretation. Although, in this case Beyonce's Listen views may have been correct as Beyonce is an icon. 


Qualitative research is more 'wordy' and is actually data in forms of words, googles definition, "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." Examples of qualitative research in media involves looking at film reviews, attitudes to media products, responses to news coverage or fanzine websites which is directed to what music video producers will actually look at. Qualitative research allows in depth analysis in terms of personal opinions which sometimes comes from professionals but websites like Youtube allows literally anyone to comment or leave their opinion which allows unserious commentary and won't be useful for record labels. Another advantage of qualitative research is that producers such as Jay Z can see social interactions (use of gratification) and allows majority purpose of actually liking the music video of artists who belong to his Roc-a-fella record label such as 'Sugababes' or Kanye West or even it's competitors which is very useful. However, doing this type of in depth research can be more time consuming than collecting quantitative research and you can also come across really biased opinions. 
Realistically, producers will know when a comment or forum are being biased. 

Research can either be collected from a primary source or secondary source in which can be collected quantitatively or qualitatively. 

Primary research is research personally taken or by googles definition "Primary research is new research, carried out to answer specific issues or questions. It can involve questionnaires, surveys or interviews with individuals or small groups." As already mentioned primary research normally involves questionnaires/surveys which can be useful in media firms as to also recognise consumer preferences which is a key factor before and after media productions are made. Examples of direct primary research in media are interviews, audience panels, online forums, Focus groups, an organisation which collects primary research BARB and even feedback from own production. Collecting data from a group of people allows a wide range of opinions which may be useful in terms of knowing e.g. what people think of a new tv show like Googlebox on a forum but it'll be difficult coming to a overall conclusion as forums online allows anonymity which can be good as it may allow honest opinions that cam be brutal yet useful. In the same way focus groups can be useful but they normally hold the same opinions which can be very biased/subjective, this also applies to getting feedback from your own work, people may 'sugarcoat' their actual opinion which will lead to misinterpretation and failure to know consumer choice. Organisations such as BARB can be classed as primary research as you get a total of how many people have watched the latest programmes. This can be trustworthy as it is precise measures of views; however the use of gratification is unclear!
It is arguable that this is an example of secondary research as individuals can't keep accounts of how many people can watch a tv show. It is time consuming and unrealistic.

This leads me on to my next type of research; Secondary research is second hand research or by google's definition, "Secondary research (also known as desk research) involves the summary, collation and/or synthesis of existing research rather than primary research, in which data are collected from, for example, research subjects or experiments." Using data or information from research that is not yours decreases chances of it being reliable with likelihood of the data being out of date which is not useful. For examples, search taken from archives are definitely out of date and will not be useful to find out what type of music videos audience find appealing at this current moment. Other examples of sources that secondary research can be found for media purposes are textbooks, the internet, Radio, circulation figures, government stats, ratings and books in general. Professional sources such as government stats which for the UK can be found on the UKGOV pages online can be reliable as the government have to be accurate or close, also information are well updated or the filter feature allows latest information which is useful. Unlike textbooks. There are certain online sources that can be reliable but using websites such as youtube or fan sites which are unreliable as i've said previously as there are different type of commentators, serious and unserious people making it difficult to gather overall judgment of how people feel about a music video. Checking ratings and circulation figures as it relates to my previous points that there are chances of unclear representations due to lack of reasons for gratifications (this applies mostly to newspaper firms as the number of prints doesn't depict number of people who have/will read it), however these are easy to collect and cheap when it comes to costs.