Task 2: Be able to create a report in a media production context

Audience Research

The audience is important because the content creator has to know what select group of people he is trying to advertise to. The audience has a big impact on whether the media product will be a success or a failure, as ultimately they are the ones who will either like or dislike the product. This has an effect on sales for the company and artist and can make the person a popular celebrity if they attract a large audience. Without an audience there is no clear indication as to the type of people that is being attracted. This means that while it might attract people of all types it will not be concentrated on a group like males or females, and so overall there will be a small audience that it will aspire to.
The term mass audience is used to describe the audience which is not specific in any way. This can be used to describe an audience of a product such as television soap or a mobile phone like the iPhone. They do not require a specific audience as they are advertised for everyone and anyone to use. A new program would also have a mass audience as they do not need a specific group like only males to watch their show, but is aimed for everyone.
The term niche audience is when Niche is a fraction of a total market or an audience. A segment of the market or the audience with highly specific needs which cannot generally be satisfied by many service providers or marketers. An example of this would be and audience of 20-30 year olds who drive Ferrari's as this would be a small audience compared to 20-30 year olds who drive a Ford vehicle, as this would be a large group of people.
The media shapes the audiences perception of the world because it the audience who are viewing the media. Since this is the case, the media has control over what the audience can or cannot view. This means that a lot of negativity can be shown towards a certain group of people, which can create a stereotype against them. It can also glorify negative things such as violence in games and movies which is what a lot of people these days are in to. This can affect the behaviour of people and turn the audience towards a select opinion or viewpoint. An example of this is when a celebrity has plastic surgery done, and end ups fixing something which they did not like in their appearance. This would be a major headline, which would be viewed by a lot of people, and so it would make others change their views against plastic surgery, as it would seem okay if an idol of theirs has done the same.
The media is very powerful in influencing the audience’s ideas and behaviour. An example of this is when there was news about shortage in petrol and the increase in its price. This caused panic and meant that a lot of people were quickly going out to stock up on petrol so that they would keep it in storage and use it for them. The media created this influence on people as it was seen as a big problem when there was a lot of news surrounding the topic. This was unnecessary and it caused many problems of people storing petrol when they didn't need to. Another example of this is violence being portrayed in the media, as movies continually increase the violence in their scenes. This has affected many cases of real life violence where it has an effect on the criminal and caused them to commit a crime when they may not have done, without such violent movies.

Marketing

There are professional music video distribution and promotion companies such as Hip Video Promo (www.hipvideopromo.com), Rive Video (www.rivevideo.com), and Trendsetter (www.trendsettermarketing.net). All of these companies have major artists as well as indies on their rosters. They can basically prepare and format our video for television’s sometimes stringent requirements, promote the final product to the MTV network, Fuse, BET, MuchMusic, Pitchfork TV, California Music Channel and a host of others, not to mention retail pools, clubs, video-on-demand and popular music video websites that tend to be somewhat inaccessible from the outside. Each company has different capabilities and pricing is typically similar to what you’d pay for a music promotion company to promote an album.

Posting our video to YouTube (www.youtube.com) is another great way to show off our video and also include behind the scenes features and clips to get people involved and talking about our video.
We can show a slideshow of the group photos along with the song. It can be invaluable to become familiar with YouTube as an independent artist. We can use stock footage, footage of political figures or current events, something artistic or eye catching like a billboard to advertise this in itself and  anything that represents the mood of your music or will potentially get people talking. Along with this we can use relevant keywords to attract people to your video and so that if a keyword is searched on YouTube or Google, our video will show up first.

Another great way to advertise and promote our video is to enter it into competitions for example why not enter it in some significant competitions such as the Independent Music Awards (www.independentmusicawards.com) or the International BBC Music Video Festival (http://bbcmusicvideofestival.tumblr.com/). These will get our video out there into the open and may be able to be recognised by some big names.