Audience Research

For my research, I asked twenty people their age, gender and their favourite genre of film, and recorded it in a table similar to this. I did it this way to save time, which could be spent on other aspects of planning. The reason I only asked for these three aspects of the participants (age, gender, genre of film), was because after this stage of audience research, I wanted to look closer into the lifestyles of the people most interested in the genre of film I am doing; Thrillers/Horrors.

After researching which type of audience would be best to target, with the genre I have decided to do, which is horror/Thriller, I have found it would be best to target late teens to middle aged people, who are of both genders, but mostly women.

This came as a surprise as I was expecting to find that more men liked to watch thrillers and horror, but in actual fact the majority, which was 70%, said that their favourite genre of film was comedy. I found this in the majority of all my results, as 50% out of all participants said that this was their favourite genre.

I have chosen to target this audience (late teens to middle aged people, who are of both genders), just because the people that said this was their favourite genre of film varied, even though there was only 3 people that said this. Even though there weren't many participants who have this genre as their favourite, I am still going ahead with doing this genre, as I believe a Thriller/Horror film can be enjoyed by many ages, and by both genders. It doesn't matter if it's not their favourite, they can still enjoy it.

After further research into the lifestyles of the people that said they liked thrillers/horrors as opposed to any other genre, I found that they did have things in common. All three were into heavy metal music and gothic scenes. Participant 3, said that his favourite styles of music were 'heavy metal' and 'rock', which was similar to what participant 5 said,which was 'alternative metal'. Again, this response was similar to participant 6's answer, which was 'black ambient death metal'.

After asking each participant which was there favourite style of music, I asked them to put them self in a categoric group or a stereotypical assumption. All three answered similar, with 'Goth' or 'Mosher' being the main answer or grouping they would put themself in. In addition this, I asked them to tell me their main hobbies, to see if they correlated in a similar way. After listing three hobbies each, there were some similarities, but there some differences.

I found from asking them their hobbies, that all three enjoyed going to see live bands in concert or going to local gigs. Participant 5 and 6 also had a similarity in the way the they both enjoyed 'going on road trips' on their motorbikes, with there boyfriends/husbands. While participant 3 said he enjoyed 'hanging out with his friends in a scater park or just hanging around in town'. The other hobbies varied, as participant 5 said she liked to spend time with her children, which she said was one of her main hobbies. Participant 6 said she enjoyed playing hocky, which I found suprising for someone who would categorise themself as a 'goth', and participant 3 said that he enjoyed 'playing guitar'.

From the extended research I have carried out, I believe that the audience I should be targeting with my film trailer is people of all ages, and both genders, and also people into heavy metal music, who enjoy a range of different activities.