Question 4: What Have You Learned From Your Audience feedback?

At the beginning of creating my advanced portfolio I initially had another music video in mind to create for my promotional package but from gaining feedback from close friends who listen to the indie folk genre they didnt particularly like the concept of my video and felt like it wouldnt effectively be conveyed the meaning of the music video. This was my first inital audience feedback and after this I learnt that I should in fact make conscious decisions with the target audience in mind. As I had already filmed sections of the original music video, I felt that it was wasted so instead made it into a montage of the clips already shot and placed it on my artists website making the website look more realistic. From this I found that my audience actually quite liked the video featured on the website and believed it was quite conventional to see this on music websites. 

After making a draft of my first music video and presenting it to my teacher, I found that the majority of the video had to be refilmed and was not presentable, the ony way to progress was to start again. The only problem with this is that the actress initially used was unreliable and could not commit to refilling meaning at such a sort space of time I would have to step in a refilmed the video By myself altering the music video to a more abstract piece. 

After collecting my audio feedback from my target audience  after finishing my music I decided to present it via GoAnimate due to the majority of my target audience not wanting to be featured on video. I also gained feedback from using social networking sites such as Instagram (uploaded ancillary texts and featured 15 seconds of music video) and from Facebook I gained further feedback on my promotional campaign which I believed was quite effective as I opened my products up to a wider range then just my target audience. By also making 10 people complete a written question I felt that it was quite effective as they where anonymous meaning they could put honest opinions about my music video and ancillary texts.

I thought it was also important to not gain feedback from my talent who was featured in the music video as I felt may have been biased or focused on her own performance rather then analyse the video and the ancillary texts.

After making my music video, I decided to use written questionnaires and ask individuals who I didn't particularly know or knew what genre of music they preferred and ask them to give me some feedback for my music video. I then asked them to fill out the seven question and collected 10 answers in total.

When I asked the question ‘What genre do you think my music video and ancillary texts would represent and why do you think this?’ the majority of them felt that I was representing the indie/alternative/folk genre which suggests to me that it was clear that to them they felt my music video and ancillary texts was in the genre that I wanted to appeal to.

I then lead on to asking if they could identify the target audience of my products with 100% of them saying they believed it was target at teenagers showing that I managed to make it clear that I wanted to appeal to the teenage market. 

I asked the 10 volunteers if they 'thought my promotional products related to one another? if yes why and if not why not?' and all 10 believed my promotional products related to one another followed by feedback such as 'all feature the brown/white/black colour theme and this is also reinforced with the use of the white dress often seen in the/ancillary texts. This shows to me that the consumers believed that i linked all of the promotional package together effectively with the use of the key elements (colour schemes, nature theme etc) By effectively linking the three products together, it means that if my product was to be promoted in a real life setting it would have potential to be sold as if the audience hear the song, view the video they will be more persuaded to buy the album/ visit the website as they are all interlinked with one another. 

From gaining this feedback, I have learnt that the majority of my target audience believed that my video fit the conventions of a indie folk music video with its nature themes running through the music video which is a typical convention within this sort of genre. However,t hey also believed my music video was unconventional in the sense that it had a more of abstract feel to it and that it was in black and white contrasting with the brown/white digipak/website, I also learnt that my ancillary texts wasn't as effective as the same artists didn't feature in the music video and the ancillary texts confusing some of my target audience. 

I particularly liked the comment made by Emily Benstead which suggested that the mirrored images acted like my talents mental torment which I didnt actually think of when creating my music video. However I like how this came across as it shows that my music video cna be intepreted differently.

From the audience feedback, I have learnt that potentially I could have made the narrative a lot stronger and clearer to the audience on what was actually happening in the video however I felt that it was supposed to be more of a abstract piece so was pretty subjective. I also found that I should of used a better quality camera so that the music video overall looked a lot cleaner and worked more smoothly. I also found that I could of used more locations showing the protagonists looking more lost. By not using more locations and showing more footage of the actress in different locations, the narrative is sometimes lost within the music video meaning the song potentially doesn’t have as much depth to it as I would of liked. 

Personally, I feel that my video also lacked in narrative like the audience has suggested and that it could have been edited more to the beat. Varying the styles of fast edits and slower edits. One of my target audience also suggested this and said that I could of made my artist appear more at a lost cause and wanting to be free, I also agree with this statement and although in my original edit I did feature more scenes of my artist looking lost and longing to be something greater I felt that it didn't look as effective with too many ‘mourn’ scenes so took them out of my next edits.

From the audience feedback, I have learnt that to improve on my ancillary texts I should of varied the images on the pull out section of my digipak- as a couple of my target audience suggested that the images were too similar and that the felt I could have varied them a lot more. I also agree with this statement and only realised that the images where similar once I had completed the final digipak. However, like I suggested in the analysis of my digipak, the talent could be looking back on her past/ looking towards her future in the two images leaving it open to interpretation from my target audience. But, this would be something I could reconsider to improve on my digipak so that it connected more with my target audience effectively.

To improve on my website, a couple of my audience felt it was quite plain and simplistic which was contrasted with the comments which suggested that as it was simplistic it was more effective. However, I also felt that the website could be made less plain and effective by adding more buttons or someway the target audience could interact with the artist more via messaging or contact buttons. I also felt that I could of added more clearly that it was a website for a music artist as I felt that it didn't really present itself clearly that it was a website for a artist. Even though after researching several indie folk artists websites I found that they was quite simplistic and didn't really featured music on the homepage only when the audience searched further around the website they would find specific areas for music. I also felt that I should of made it more aware that the audience could interact with the artist via Facebook and Twitter as this would of opened opportunities for my artist to be more publicly known as it would of opened more platforms in the media for them to get involved in and keep the audience up to date with latest releases and dates etc. As well as this, I felt that the buttons for the social networking sites could have been larger and more clearly presented (maybe at the top of the website?) although I did not want to clutter the website as from personal experience as a consumer of music I do not like to go on music websites that are over cluttered and instead prefer simplistic and clearly presented information.

From my online poll originally conducted once first researching my audience, I have found that more of target audience would be female and that this fit what I expected from my audience. This is clear through the audience profile I originally created on Prezi shown above: showing that my target audience are well connected via web 2.0 with their music and are very aware of different social media platforms such as Youtube, Twitter and Tumblr where my video could be viewed by the public therefore being able to watch my music video on various websites and on different devices such as their laptops, mobile phones and tablets. 

From the YouTube statistics sections I have found that the majority of my target audience do watch music videos via a tablet which is clear from how 53% of my music videos views come from a tablet whereas 44% come from a computer showing how my target audience would music prefer a handheld device to view videos. 

Below is my original target audience questionnaire gaining information about what my target audience preferences and dislikes are allowing me to adapt my music video to their needs as the consumer. This was also useful and I have learnt how to properly adapt my video to appeal to the audience making my music video more liked by the consumer resulting in it becoming more successful. I also thought that by asking a consumer of my target genre what they thought of my music video and ancillary texts it would give me a true reflection of what they thought worked well with my music video and what didnt work too well. 

To summarize from my audience feedback I have learnt that I should:

• Make my ancillary texts more appealing my changing the colours from the colour brown to a more eye catching colour 

• Whilst editing ensure that there is a greater focus on the narrative rather then trying to appeal to the target audience by using nature and forest scenes which is conventional in the indie folk genre

• Do not be repetitive with the video clips i have used previously in the music video, to overcome this I could of shot more footage during the filming process. 
• Make smoke scenes more effective