Thursday, 4 October 2012

AUDIENCES: Demographics, categories for audiences

There are 7 categories you can fit an audience into, Age, class, ethnicity, gender, religion, earnings and education. These are generally represented by using these categories:

A -100k salary
B - 50/60k category, graduates. 
C1 - 35k, employed. 
C2 - Employed with training, for example doctors, nurses. lawyers.
D - Jobs with a bit of training, till jobs, brick layers etc
E - Not in education, employment and training.

However, you can't fully represent an audience using these categories. For example you can get a wealthy person who is un-employed, or a poor brain surgeon. Demographics can give an estimate to target audiences, but can't fully cover our diverse society.
This system is a benefit to industries. Demographics are used for:

Product placement
Marketing and promotion
Focus groups
Creating a target audience

For example. an industry that produces their shows for a 'E' audience would try to air their shows during the day, as their audience isn't in education, employment or training, for example 'The Jeremy Kyle Show'. Also,  its cheaper to air a show during the day.
On the other hand, if a company has produced a documentary about a socialist/dictator leading a brainwashed cult, they'll most likely try to air their documentary during the evening, as the educated/employed would be interested in watching.

It's not just industries that but audience into categories, audiences do it to. For example:
Traditionalist
Post modernist
Hedonist
Passive
Active
Preferred
Oppostional

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