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

Our Target Audience

Primary Audience - Fans of Pop/R&B and skewed towards females
Our band is a pop/R&B band, and these genres are very popular and mainstream, therefore,  we would hope to attract a large audience. It is not that we think that males would not listen to our music, we just think there would be a higher number of girls and so this is who we have targeted. Females who like the pop genre often like other female artists and bands. This is partly because many pop artists tend to be female.

'Pop artists' search on Google - female artists are the most common

Furthermore, female artists often promote female empowerment, which can be inspirational for girls.

Strong, successful female artists&bands 

Lady Gaga quote

Secondary Audience - Young people (16-25) and urban/street fans
As D4MES' members are young (18/19) this means we are young people ourselves, which is likely to make us more relatable to young audiences. Furthermore, as we are a young and fresh band, it makes us modern which is often what young people seek - the latest and most current music.We also target urban/street music fans - essentially British people who like this sound/style. This is because we are from London and there is a certain street culture that are band represents in a way. This is reflected in our outfits.

We have a street/urban style which may appeal to these fans 

The ways in which our audiences consume their music 

Popular music streaming services 

Survey from The Guardian - YouTube is the most popular platform for young
people in America 

Listening to CDs and the radio is becoming increasingly unpopular for young people. Instead of using these methods, they prefer to stream music online, particularly on sites such as YouTube, Spotify and Vevo.

From the BT website - survey by BBC Radio One - 80% of young British people
use YouTube to consume music and only 20% used paid subscription services

Illegal methods of downloading are fairly common for young people, as they prefer to consume it freely than at a cost (as can be seen in the image above.) Despite Spotify being extremely popular, the article above also indicates that YouTube remains unbeaten in the number of consumers.

Uses and Gratifications

In order to make sure that we appealed to our target audience, we used Blumer and Katz's 'Uses and Gratifications Theory' as a reference for our video. We ultimately wanted to gain fans out creating our three products, and as a result encourage them to buy D4MES merchandise, music and tickets. Therefore, intriguing them was crucial. 

1) Diversion - this is the idea that media is used for entertainment, as a means of escaping the stresses everyday life and relaxing by entering into the world of that product. Music videos often have the effect of engaging audiences, due to the exciting discontinuous editing and captivating performances often displayed by the artist. 

Fast paced, discontinuous editing

Our music video has incorporated this concept as there is faced paced, discontinuous editing throughout that gives a really upbeat vibe to the video and gives the audience lots to see. It also has the effect of building up audience anticipation.

Choreography 

Furthermore, we dance for our audience - and dancing is a fun way to engage them. They may even want to try and learn the routine for themselves. It also shows our versatility as a band - we can dance as well as sing.

Energetic atmosphere 

Verses such as my rap were shot with energetic stobe lighting giving the effect of flashes. Furthermore I make very animated gestures, making it exciting and upbeat for viewers. This is done throughout the video, giving it an energetic feel.

Various sets and backdrops 

The audience is able to fully escape into the worlds we have created for them through our different set ups. There is a lot of colour - the backdrops are very creative, giving them a real spectacle and full immersion. 

2)Personal Identity - this is the idea that people use media to seek information that could help them discover themselves more, as there are often aspects of stars' personas that we can relate to and see in ourselves. Audiences can see similarities. A trait of an artist's personality is likely to be displayed in a music video and this makes it more interesting for fans. 

Our music video has done this by showcasing the four different personalities of each band member, making the band more relatable as a whole to audiences, as there is the idea that everyone can identify with at least one member because we are all so different.

Gigi is the sassy one

Monigal is the sporty one 

For example, Gigi and Monigal have different personalities. Gigi is fierce, confident  and diva-like which can be seen by her hand being placed on her hip. Monigal, on the other hand, is sporty, bubbly and tough which can be seen through my oversized basketball t-shirt and my rapping gestures.

We dominate our male actors 

We also take on the identity of four strong, independent females who overpower the males. This would hopefully send out the message to our audience that women can take charge of a relationship too and not just give men the full control.

3) Personal Relationships - this is the idea that people use media to satisfy their need for companionship and their desire to be included in and form relationships with others. Across all platforms, record labels will ensure that the artist is presented in an accessible and interactive way. 

Our music video has used this concept which can be seen by the high level of interactivity on the website.

Our website has many features that are interactive with the audience

Furthermore, the video itself reveals the closeness of the band and our need for one another, which audiences likely relate to with people in their lives.

Body language: we are a close band 

We have each other's backs

4) Surveillance - this is the idea that the public has a desire for knowledge and information about what is going on in the world around them. As a result of the Web 2.0 taking off, it means that people can satisfy their needs.

We have incorporated this concept through our website. It allows the audience to get the information that they are seeking.

Facts and information our website 

Music Video Feedback

During the construction stage of the project, I thought it would be useful to interview some fellow Latymer students in my year, to see what they thought about the video we had created so far. It was near the end of the edit and so it was practically finished when they saw it. I asked them six questions about the video and their answers were extremely helpful.

The answers above showed that overall, the genre of the song is easily conveyed and this is the same for the themes; they understood that female dominance and desire were principle themes. It was great hearing positive feedback, especially the enthusiasm about the editing, which we had spent a long time on, as our intention was to make the video have really edgy and jumpy effects - this is central to our video. However, the majority of students said that the personalities did not all come through - Monigal and Gigi's were the only obvious ones. This was interesting to take on board, but unfortunately we couldn't change this. However, we were able to rectify some other general criticism, such as the fact that some areas were too jumpy and were therefore difficult to view clearly. The feedback was very useful as it showed that audiences understood the main concept of our video.

Changes to our album cover 

In terms our album cover, the feedback was mainly positive and people felt like it really represented what D4MES was about. However, a couple of suggestions were made, such as to use mid shots rather than a long shot for the front image and to make the font bolder, which we rectified. We think that these suggestions have made our front image and name stand out more which consequently promotes us more.

SurveyMonkey

In order to gather feedback in an efficient way, we decided to create an online survey using an online survey and questionnaire creator called 'SurveyMonkey.' It was very useful, as it indicated the strengths of our video as well as the weaknesses. It also enabled us to receive opinions on our website. The key data and responses extracted from the survey can be seen below.

Before they watched the video, we asked the audience some essential questions, which gave us important quantitative data. The intention was to see how many people were of our target audience. Considering I sent the survey out to family members, this was obviously not going to be the case for everyone.

Over three-quarters and thus a majority of people who took the survey were females and therefore they were of our primary target audience.

The majority of people were in the 17-25 age category and therefore also within our target audience.

When asked what music they listened to, most people said that their taste was varied and that they liked everything. The next two most popular categories were pop/mainstream  R&B/soul. Therefore, it is very likely that our song would be part of a genre that the majority of people listened to.

After watching the video, the audience were asked further questions and here is what we found out:

It was pleasing and reassuring to see that most people actually enjoyed our video. It demonstrates that we succeeded in the diversion part of the Uses and Gratifications theory.

The majority of people recognized that the genres of our music video were pop/R&B. A minority thought it was of other genres. This suggests that the video we have made clearly denotes the genre.

We also used qualitative methods to get feedback on our video, They were voluntarily asked to leave comments.

Positive feedback

Most of the comments about how believable and realistic our video was were positive. The main aspects of the video that people liked were the set design/background, the solo shots, the editing and the colours.

Constructive criticism 

The main area of criticism was to do with performance. Some people thought that our choreography could have been more interesting and confident. Some people also suggested that our outfits could have been better.

We also took the opportunity to get feedback about our website:

Upon being asked whether or not our website looked professional, most people said it did. However, a few people said that it was not very easy to use on mobile phones and portable devices, which is something we could improve.