A2 Evaluation 3 - What have you learned from your audience feedback? 

Throughout my research and planning, the development of my product relied hugely on the audience and their feedback. From my initial ideas in the pitch and the feedback received, the audiences opinions were hugely important in the shaping of my product as they gave me information on what they felt was good and what was bad about my proposed product and then I was able to compile he information and look at it collectively, determining which ideas were most opposed and which were recommended for me to continue with.

Above is an example of the audience profiles I created as part of my research. As you can see the age group had very similar interests to those which I wanted to use in my product so this worked well as it meant I would be introducing categories which both my audience and I had an interest in. A similar post to this was my Primary and Secondary target audience identification. This allowed me to better understand who my audience was, looking at my main primary audience and my secondary, less important audience. This meant I was able to clearly put down and identify the interests of each audience and what they could potentially want.

One of the most important tasks I undertook in an effort to discover what my audience would be interested in was the surveys. The surveys allowed me to ask very specific questions and find detailed answers which helped to develop my product. Using the information I found from the surveys I was able to determine that social media was a huge platform used by my audience and that more than half of my target audience were students. This meant that I was able to target my articles and style towards a student audience, adding student discounted and free events to entice them, as well as advertising my product as free. I was also able to use the interest gathered such as their favorite genres and what they would like to see in a regional product, 100% of my audience saying they would like to see regional events and images in my product.

After discovering how much of my audience used social media through the surveys,  I decided to take advantage of this through Facebook Survey and asked my friend some questions about what would interest her. Doing this only confirmed a number of the things which I had previously discovered about my target audience, such as the genres which the age group was interested in and their want for regional events and information. My friend also made it clear through the interview that having regional locations shown through images would be an important feature to her if she was to buy the product or she would find it difficult to tell it was in fact a regional product.

Next I created a Video Interview using inspiration from the Paxman & Brand interview. This interview was created in a very professional format similar to the real Paxman and Brand interview which I used as inspiration for the Mise En Scene and camera angles. This interview allowed me to get information from someone who fell into my potential target audience age group and again further refine my age group. From the interview, similar to my surveys, I learned that audiences wanted a free magazine but if a price had to be paid it would average at around £1.99.

I was also able to provide the interviewee with this image and question. This meant I was able to find out which features on this front cover which inspired me they enjoyed most, giving me an idea of what I would implement into my own work. The interviewee identified that the Masthead was interesting and that she liked the contents section which appeared on the bottom of the page. This was helpful as both of these features became part of my product as a result of this interview. I was also able to determine that my audience would not like a product that was published too frequently as they felt doing this would result in a product which lacked content.

By this point I felt I had received a considerable amount of feedback and had began to construct my products. When creating them I regularly received feedback from my piers, friends and college lecturer to ensure I was creating a professional product but also one that my target audience wanted to read. I received the feedback in a variety of ways, from audio to post-it notes, white boards to printouts and assessment papers. Throughout my drafts I felt it made more sense to put the feedback in there so that a more gradual progression could be seen and the way I was influenced by the feedback. Compiling all of my draft and feedback into a single powerpoint resulted in an overall more organised and chronological order of events and changes, making the changes easier to see.

My Final Feedback was complete as a means to confirm my products ability to compete in the industry. From he feedback m target audience told me mainly that they liked the product and that they felt it was "appealing" and that there was "lots of creative links" within my products, linking ancillary and main products. One of the audiences even went as far as to say they "would purchase this product" despite it being free. I feel this is very indicative of the standard my work is at but also shows the amount of work I have put into this process.