Welcome to Year 12 Media Studies!!

On your desks you will find a questionnaire – please

complete it by the time the song has finished and bring

it to the front.

Thanks!

Unit 1Research Techniques for Media IndustriesLesson 1

Friday 10th September 2010

Starter Questions

•What is research?•Why do we research?•How do we research?

I think, research is... Yeah, I

agree with you

In pairs......

&

Linking the Thinking Chart

Ignore the right hand side of the chart for now. Think about your discussions in pairs. Write your answers & ideas in each section.

Learning Objectives

•To know what research is and why we conduct it.

•To understand categories of research in the media industries.

•To be able to unpick the requirements of the Assignment Brief and Task 1 successfully.

Assignment Brief:Research Techniques for Media Industries

Assignment Brief:Research Techniques for Media Industries

Research Techniques for Media Industries

Research is fundamental to all aspects of mediaproduction and is the essential starting point for productions of any scale. It can be used to determinethe financial viability of a future production, to gather a range of information relevant to the content of the production, or to assist with the planning of technical and logistical requirements.There are also media companies which conduct extensive research using a range of sophisticated methods to gather data about audience consumption of media products and services. This has become increasingly necessary in the highly mixed and competitive environment of the media industries.

•Working in the same pairs, unpick what this paragraph means.

•Think about the Starter Question – WHY DO WE RESEARCH? But word it like this:

WHY DO MEDIA INDUSTRIES RESEARCH?

•Pick out the key points of the paragraph that you think will answer this question?.

•Summarize them in no more than 4 sentences or bullet points.

Research Techniques for Media Industries

1.

2.

3.

4.

Why do Media Industries research? Key Points of paragraph

Reasons for Research

1. Cost of media products – financial viability

Reasons for Research

2. Production content

Reasons for Research

3. Creating the production – technical and logistical planning

Reasons for Research

4. Advertisers and audiences

Key Media Industry Research

Market Research Production Research

Key Media Industry Research Market Research

The collection and analysis of information about the market within which the product will compete with other products for audience and revenue.

Data about the audience Audience awareness of media

product and product reach Audience profiling Attitudes towards products and

services Audience patterns of behaviour Analysis of competitors Advertising placement and

effects

Production Research

The collection and analysis of information related to the creation and content of the media product.

Provides information about the content of the product – historical and factual

Is the production commercially viable – related to how much money will be spent in creating and marketing the product compared with how much revenue expected

Plan production and post production – technical and logistical aspects about the creation of the product

Market Research

Media producers will often commission specialist media research agencies to complete market research on their behalf.

Hire “experts” Cheaper overall for business Control of project

Focus on core business No redundancy in business

Market Research

Some of the specialist agencies who carry out this research are…

National Readership Survey

Nielsen Media Research

ABC

Broadcasters Audience Research Board

Radio Joint Audience Research TNS

Market Research - Audience Segmentation

Age Gender Culture and ethnicity Income and Social Class

Market Research - Income and Social Class Groupings

Source:- NRS Website

Production Research

“Time is Money!!”

Media products cost, so careful planning of production and post production is needed to minimise this cost.

Provides information about the content of the product – historical and factual

Is the production commercially viable – related to how much money will be spent in creating and marketing the product compared with how much revenue expected

Plan production and post production – technical and logistical aspects about the creation of the product

Production Research - Viability

Costs

Staff

Equipment

Locations

Licenses

Rights

Distribution

Marketing/Advertising/Promotion

Illegitimate copying

Income

• Sales (tickets, DVD’s, etc.)

• Merchandise (T-shirts, fluffy toys,

McDonald’s Happy Meals etc.)

• Subscriptions

• Competitions

• User involvement (e.g. American Idol

voting system)

• Spin off’s in other media (e.g. licensing)

• Product placement and advertising

• NGO grants e.g. Lottery, Arts Councils etc.

Cost IncomeViability

Types of Research

Primary Research Secondary Research

The primary way to categorise general research is into two types:

Types of Research

Primary Research

The collection of information and data that does not already exist. This research is carried out by the researcher themselves.

Secondary Research

The collection, collation and summary of information and data that already exists. This is when a researcher uses the data and information of another researcher to help them evaluate but they have note conducted the research themselves.

Assignment Brief:Research Techniques for Media Industries

Homework Task

• Your homework is to answer the 8 questions you have written using SECONDARY RESEARCH

• For example, if one of your questions for Production Research is about where you might shoot the programme you might begin by doing a Google search of British universities outside London. Then you might pick 4 universities from your search and look in a little more detail into their campuses and locations to find one which you think would suit the nature of the show given what you have read in the Programme Treatment.

• Likewise if one of your questions for Market Research was, ‘How many males would watch a show like this?’ You could do a Google search on the demographics of the audience of ‘Skins’ and ‘This Life’ as these are very similar shows.

Linking the Thinking Chart

Now think about the right hand side of the chart.Think about the key questions we have covered. Consider your discussions throughout the lesson. Write your answers & ideas in each section.

Linking the Thinking ChartNow think about the centre of the chart. Consider what we have done in the lesson in order for you to jump from the left hand side of the chart to the right. Write some notes about how you gained you new knowledge.