Audience Classification and Defining the Audience

When looking at a media production, we must identify a media product with an audience. Audiences make up the viewership of things like a television programmed so it is necessary for a media product to appeal to an audience so that the media product has legs and can survive against the competition.

There have been numerous methods of audience classification in the past, some of which are considered outdated and nonsensical and others which have been put across as too vague or stereotypical. Overall, audience classification is useful to an extent, but it cannot be said that it has flawless accuracy, as there is always the chance and quite likely possibility that viewers of certain television programmes as an example, do not fit the audience classification categorisation that has been bestowed upon them by the typical audience of a media product.

What do Media Companies Look For?

When it comes to defining the audience, media companies will look at demographics. Demographics are records of quantitative data which can be shown in charts and graphs and gives the media companies and idea of their audience, however these methods of classification can be vague.

Demographics can involve, age, gender, income, job, ethnicity, education, neighbourhood, sexuality and language and so entail most of the things that make us as humans, who we are. It can be argued that there are derogatory undertones in audience classification, for example, to say that a person with low income must surely watch television shows which offer no real intellectual substance, such as reality TV, which is the observation of real people going about their lives, with little to no informative value whatsoever, would seem offensive to some. I personally believe that while it can hold relevance, audience classification should be taken somewhat with a pinch of salt, due to the fact that there's no way of promising that all individuals who watch the 'antiques road show' are old and rich. I like the 'antiques road show' and I am a young adult with a part time job.

There are also psychographics, which is how the media companies can pinpoint their media products to your interests, by looking at your behaviours and beliefs and what generally takes your interest. These are often used in the advertising industry and this is why adverts relevant to the projected audience will play in-between breaks of certain shows.

For example, cruises are often aimed at the older generation, a chance for them to unwind and enjoy their retirement, hence these sorts of adverts might play in-between older television programmes, such as Roald Dahl's 'Tales of the Unexpected' which was a popular show in the 1970's and would most likely make the elderly generation of today very nostalgic. I can see cruise adverts playing in between airings of shows like this and this trend can be seen elsewhere in terrestrial television.

On children's TV channels like CITV, you will most likely see children's toys being advertised in-between airings of the child's favourite television programmes. This method of marketing is very successful on the impressionable and excitable minds of children and so when a child sees something that interests them on television, it is not bold to assume that they might exclaim "I want one of those."

Methods of Classification

One of the oldest methods of audience classification was the analysis of social classes. Class was more evident in the previous century than it is today, but even then there was an illusion to the entire principle. Class did not necessarily indicate status or wealth, but is generally associated with the two.

The social classes were as follows;

- A (upper middle class)

- B (middle class)

- C1 (lower middle class)

- C2 (skilled working class)

- D (working class)

- E (casual/ lowest grade workers)

With social classes focusing on one's profession more than anything, this failed to indicate anything which held any real value to the audience, their interests and opinions are not considered here, only how much they make every year. This method can perhaps give indications of how wealthy someone is and thus how the higher classes are more likely to go to the theatre, perhaps in the box seats and how the lower classes are more likely to work in factories and mines. When it comes to looking at media products however, I do not believe that this method of audience classification is very useful.

Another method of audience classification is the 'Young and Rubican Cross Cultural Consumer Characterisation' method (also knows as the 4 C's method), which presents us with seven titles, each to label an individual in somewhat the same vain as the Myers-Briggs personality test in the way that things about the way you are give indication to the sort of person that you might be and according to this logic, will give a further indication into what sort of media products that you are most likely to consume.

The audience categories are as follows;

- The Resigned (rigid, strict, chauvinist, authoritarian)

- The Struggler (alienated, struggling, disorganised)

- The Mainstreamer (conformist, conventional, passive)

- The Aspirer (materialistic, fashion and appearance focused)

- The Succeeder (vivid goals, confident, organised)

- The Explorer (autonomy, experience, challenge)

- The Reformer (freedom from restriction, personal growth, social awareness)

The audience categories from the 4 C's paint a picture of all of the different sorts of people interested in different types of media products, from the more right-wing and authoritarian views of the resigned, across to the liberal and humanitarian views of the reformer. Politics and culture can certainly play a part in this sort of indication of a media product and its audience and in my opinion, this method does a far better job of representing an audience than the social classes, due to actually taking into account one's character and interests.

Another more recent adaptation of audience classification is the BBC's 'New Social Classification' which neatly uses seven types, thus shares similarities with the 'Young and Rubican' 4 C's, however does so in a more stripped back way and leans away from stereotypes in the way that the 4 C's does, which some would view as derogatory and offensive. The New Social Classification looks at the "three capitals" which represent aspects of one's life such as the economic, social and cultural capitals of one's life.

The audience categories are as follows;

- Elite (the most privileged group in the UK, with the wealth capital setting this class apart from the rest, however this group does still have the highest levels of all three capitals.

- Established Middle Class (the second wealthiest, scoring highly on all three capitals, this is the largest group and scores the second highest when it comes to the cultural captial.

- Technical Middle Class (a smaller and newer, more distinctive class group which does well for wealth, but scores low and social and cultural capitals. Social isolation and cultural apathy set this social group apart from the rest.

- New Affluent Workers (a young social group, projected to involve the future generations, scoring well on social and cultural capitals, with middling levels of economic captial.

- Traditional Working Class (scoring low on all capitals, but not completely deprived by any means, the members of this class group generally have high house values, which is made comprehensive by the oldest members of this class group being on average, 66 years old (at the time of writing).

- Emergent Service Workers (another relatively new social group and most likely encompassing myself and many of my peers at college, a younger, urban group which generally does not score well for economic capital, but has relatively high social and cultural capitals.

- Precariat/ Precarious Proletariat (the poorest and most deprived class, scoring low on social and cultural capitals.

I see this method of audience classification as one with positives and negatives, while I think that this is a useful and certainly relevant method of audience classification and definition, I believe the economic aspect to be somewhat insignificant, as money in my opinion, cannot truly have an influence on one's interests, but perhaps their lifestyle. I see it as a far cry from the '4 C's' and as a developed and more modernised as well as slightly less derogatory adaptation of the original 'social classes' method of audience classification. Overall I see all of these methods as having some form of substance and significance, each with their own ups and downs.

Audience classification is perhaps like most things in media, something which time tends to affect and leads to developments and alterations as time progresses. The social classes is where we came from and looks more at wealth than anything, the 4 C's looks at the type of people who consume certain types of media products and the BBC's new social classification gives us an idea of the different measurements you can take into account in one's life and how they may influence the type of media products that they consume. It should be said that none of these can guarantee 100% accuracy, but they can certainly give us a somewhat decent idea of one's audience.