For my research I created a questionnaire using Survey Monkey and came up with a variety of questions so the answers could help me when making my own music video and deciding on details such as genre and target audience. I posted my survey link on Twitter and Facebook as well as asking my friends to fill it out. This gave me a wide range of people which was great as it means I had more of a representative sample. Overall, I was able to get 30 people to do the survey however some people unfortunately skipped some of the questions as well as people putting ‘joke answers’. I will not use these answers when analysing results. The results I have got from this I will use however I will also question more people on video as it will give me more valid results, they won’t be able to skip questions and will also show me using different medium forms.
My first few questions were on the type of people they were so I could see the range of people I had asked and this would give me an idea of what demographic I could direct my video towards. The majority of the people who filled out the questionnaires were aged between 14 and 17. 7 were aged between 18 and 20, 2 were between 10 and 13 and finally 4 were 20+. This was quite good as I would like to direct my video towards an older audience and therefore this will give me insight to what they think and what they would prefer in a music video. My second question showed that 63.3% of the people who filled out my survey were female and only 36.7% who filled it out were male. Because of this, I will ask more males when doing a video interview so my results aren't bias towards the female gender. The next two questions on my survey showed that the majority of people watched music videos in their spare time. This is good because they would have more idea about what they like as they have seen more videos as well as the fact they enjoy to watch them. My fourth question asked how often they watched music videos. The results showed that 24.1% frequently watched them, 65.5% sometimes watched them and 10.3% of people never watched them. 1 person skipped this question. Although I would have preferred people who frequently watched music video, I still think it was good to get a variety of individuals to carry out the survey. I then asked if watching a music video had an impact on whether they bought the single or album or not. 2 people skipped this question however the overall results came out as 50/50.
My questions were specifically on what the audience like in music videos and what they’d want. Two options were available for the question ‘what genre of music you like the best?’ The two most popular were ‘acoustic’ and ‘pop & chart’ followed closely by ‘indie’. Although pop and chart were the highest rated with 60.7% of people preferring it, I will most likely chose the acoustic genre to shoot my media video because personally I like the relaxed genre and the videos can be more narrative than pop and chart. I then asked what makes the music genres my audience picked enjoyable. A few examples included “Being able to understand the words that people are singing.” And “Up beat and cool”. Because of these answers I have decided to choose an upbeat acoustic song which audiences can maybe relate to or there be a narrative behind the lyrics. My next question consisted of what the audience looks for in a music video. I believed this was an important question as it will show me what may be the most important feature to include in my video. According to the results, narrative was the most important feature followed closely by comedy. Due to the genre I have settled on, I will not be including comedy however I also believe story line is important in a music video and should relate to the lyrics. I believe narrative was the most popular as videos which have a set narrative can be more gripping for the audience due to it almost being like a short film. An example of this would be 'You belong with me' by Taylor Swift which has a clear and strong story line, this music video went on to winning MTV's video music award for best female video. Here is the music video below.
On this question I also had an ‘other’ option. A few examples that my participants filled out were ‘clothes and fashion’ and ‘shots’. I will insure I will consider these when planning. My 9th question asked my participants what there favourite music video was and why. I got 24 responses for this question however some were not serious. A few examples were “Spice Girls Viva Forever - when I was younger I would sit and watch it for hours on end, thought it was very creative, no music video has made me feel the same way since”, “Beyonce - Countdown. Really good and interesting effects, like the artist etc”, “Anything by Britney Spears - iconic costumes and choreography” and “Ed Sheeran - A Team - The story line relates well to the lyrics”. These examples of responses were really helpful and I will regard them when thinking of things I could do when making my video. My final question was “If a band/artist produced a bad quality music video would it put you off the song?” 69% of participants said no and the rest believed it would. Although I most of the participants said it wouldn't I will still try create a high quality music video which won’t put my audience off the general song.
