Question 3: What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

We conducted audience feedback sessions not only with our core target audience, but also with our secondary and tertiary audiences, in order to be able to decipher how our video satisfies the uses and gratifications of each demographic in particular. From these various methods of feedback, we received both positive comments and constructive criticisms.

Audience Profiles

 Initially, we had planned to make women older than 25 our tertiary target audience, because during the research and planning stages, we felt that our satirical stance and myriad of popular culture references would fulfil their media consumption needs more than those of 8 to 15 year old girls. However, during and after production, we realised that the aesthetic value and fun atmosphere of our music video was much stronger than our satire, and therefore we decided to swap the secondary and tertiary audiences.


Using Blumler and Katz's Uses and Gratifications theory (1974), I analysed the way in which we planned to appeal to each of our target audiences in turn in the Prezi below.

We conducted audience feedback sessions after all the artefacts had been produced, and used a variety of methods to do so, including video interviews, audio interviews, questionnaires and online surveys, all of which gave us varied feedback about our media products, from different target audiences, including those who we did not think we had an appeal to.

 Primary Audience - Female, 15 - 24 years of age
We received feedback from our core target audience through interviews, online surveys and questionnaires that we handed out at our music video's premiere/ screening. 

Above is a short video of girls within our primary target audience who we interviewed about our music video. We were happy to find, above all, that Ava was considered to be an aspirational and relatable artist, and thus our audience members were able to immerse themselves within the world of Ava. 

We were also glad to discover that our message about feminism and the empowerment of women had been successfully conveyed to the core target audience, as many of them recognised Ava's intentional challenge to the stereotype of sexualising women in music videos. Here are some quotes from the online survey and questionnaires to support my conclusion:

"In charge of her life"   

 "... wasn't about to put up with any of the boy's rubbish..." 

"unlike female artists in the music industry, she isn't sexualised..."

Alongside the above positive points, which are about Ava as a commercially viable brand and artist, I also paraphrased some of the comments we received from our core target audience anonymously. These were more to do with the music video itself, including technicalities, narrative and style. 
The comments were largely positive, and people in our core target audience were able to appreciate the technicalities of the one-shot, as well as how we used the props and sets to illustrate and amplify the lyrics.

Created with Padlet

To respond to some of the criticisms of our music video:

• With reference to the choreography and fluidity of the transitions, we strongly feel that although we did rehearse quite a lot prior to the shoots, we could have done with more rehearsals with the whole cast rather than only with our lead/ backing dancers.
• I completely agree with the point on lighting; we ended up having to use floor lights on the final shoot in order to decrease the intensity of the shadows that were hitting the white curtains, but we were still unable to completely eliminate them.

Our album art was also quite a success with our core target audience. Here are some quotes from SurveyMonkey to demonstrate this:

"... the middle panels of Ava pulling faces are funny"

"I like the fonts, the way Ava's logo stands out and the handwriting font on the back cover"

However, one person felt that our album cover was "too pink", and my interpretation of this is that Ava's message of empowering women through conventional, traditional femininity was not conveyed well enough.

Secondary audience - Female, 8 - 14 years of age
Below is the audio for a short interview I did with a member of our secondary target audience. I found that many of the things that she said corresponded to the profiles we had drawn up prior to production, but some aspects were also pointed out that we hadn't considered previously.

• The satire was not successfully conveyed, and therefore she thought that Ava was going back to her lying, cheating boyfriend, when in fact, what we were trying to convey was that she was tired of his futile attempts to woo her. If we were to reshoot the video, we would have to consider heightening Ava's fed-up attitude, perhaps through body language.
• However, the constructed set and playful dancing were appealing points, which would be classed under the entertainment section of Blumler and Katz's Uses and Gratifications theory. 
• The polls on the website turned out to be a focal point for the younger audience; although they were initially there to provide an opportunity to interact with Ava, I now think it gives the younger consumer the power to make a choice and thus becomes an appealing feature.
• We did not include an About page/ Bio, but in hindsight I think this is an extremely important page, particularly for a debut artist who has a message/ideology to convey, as Ava does. 

Tertiary audience - Female, 25+
Here are some words that the tertiary audience associated with Ava and her music video. I am particularly intrigued by the word 'novelty' as it suggests that the music video and/or Ava's character are original and unconventional of the genre.

This is really positive feedback to receive from a tertiary audience member, as providing consumers with some new and unusual is the primary way in which a débutante such as Ava should aim to establish herself in the music industry. 

Male audience

Initially, we did not think that our video would be appealing to a male audience because it is so explicitly feminine in its style and the themes that it deals with. However, we ended up receiving an overwhelming amount of positive feedback from male viewers through interviews, online surveys and screening questionnaires. Here are some of the positive comments we received:

"... simple idea but worked brilliantly."

"I loved the style... the quick changes were really good." 

Had we known that the technicalities and one-shot style of our video was appealing to a male audience prior to production, I would've drawn up an audience profile so that we could target a male audience as a secondary or tertiary market. To the right is an animated version of what I'd expect our typical male audience member to be like.

That said, we also received some negative feedback regarding our characterisation and branding of Ava:

"She seems a little stereotypical..."

"Ava seems to be very selective..."

"... I just wasn't invested enough"

• We most likely did not fulfil the Personal Relationships aspect of Blumler and Katz's Uses and Gratifications theory for our male audience, as the video was female-fronted, and thus has decreased relatability for a male audience.
• Furthermore, we may also not have fulfilled the Personal Identity criterion because of the negative way in which we presented Matt, the boyfriend character. This is important because if a male character is portrayed in this manner, the male audience has very little to use as a basis for developing their own identities from positive sources.

In conclusion, I feel that we successfully appealed to our target audiences, but could have worked more on our appeal to the male audience, as they make up a substantial percentage of the general audience for music artists.