Media Studies A2

1. Music Videos:
Audience Research
Survey
Brontë Vickery

2. This shows that Music Videos are currently popular. Whilst
not everyone enjoys watching them, The majority of the
people asked do, which means that music videos would be an
effective and worthwhile promotion product for a song.

3. The most popular genre of music among those who we asked was Pop- this is quite
unsurprising as pop music usually dominates the UK charts. RnB was also very
popular, and Indie, Dance and Rock were equally popular in third place. I think that
choosing a song that combines Pop with another popular genre (such as Indie)would capture
both a mainstream and the niche audience, making it likely for the song to be very
profitable and popular. However this result may not be totally useful as the question may
be interpreted to mean just the music itself- whilst the person might enjoy the song, it is
possible that they might not like videos with the conventions of that genre.

4. The majority of those asked said that they like to see the artist on screen as part of the
video. I would suggest that this is because they can better relate the video to the song if
the artist is present, and as fans the audience would want to be able to see and connect
with the artist as much as possible. Some artists do however use other actors in their
videos for effect, such as Ed Sheeran’s use of Rupert Grint in his “Lego House” video. I
think that whilst this helps to tell a story and make the video more interesting or even
humorous, this is a risk and would not be a good idea for a new up and coming artist to
use, as they need to become better known and established as an artist.

5. Most of the audience said that they enjoy videos with a
storyline. Many artists use this technique to visually
present the story behind the lyrics of their song, helping
with the audience’s understanding of it. The use of a
narrative also makes the video more interesting in many
cases.

6. The majority of those asked said that they enjoy the use of
humour in a video. I think that this can be effective and add
interest, captivating the audience, however I think that this
is hard to do well and can easily backfire and so would not
want to attempt this as an amateur.

7. The majority of people asked said they do not enjoy action
sequences in music videos, which I think may be as this would
detract from the song, and would not be fitting for music of
many genres. However there is still a fairly high
percentage who do like action sequences so I do not think
this should be completely ruled out.

8. A high percentage of people surveyed said that they like to see
dancing in music videos. This Is a common aspect of music
videos, especially in more upbeat songs. I think that this would be
because in seeing the artist or a crowd of people dancing, the
audience would also want to get up and dance along to the
song, which would likely increase their enjoyment in listening to it.

9. The responses to this question was quite varied, so I think it
would be hard to appeal to everyone in the audience when it
comes to colour. The majority of people said they would not
be put off by any colour effects in a music video, although
quite a high percentage do not like the use of sepia.

10. The majority of people asked said that they prefer
music videos to include shots of more than one location.
I think that this improves the pacing of a video and
would make it much more interesting.

11. Over 60% of the audience felt that a music video can
detract from the song itself. With this in mind I think that
it is important not to over-complicate a music video or make it
hard to follow, as this would mean the audience would need to
focus on the video rather than the music.

12. The aspect of a music video that the audience found most
distracting is the over use of diegetic sound, which I think often
jars with the song, and would mean a delay in the introduction of
the music, or an interruption. Many also disliked the use of
actors(which can be confusing), preferring to see the artist
themselves. Overly complicated videos were also unpopular, which
shows the importance of keeping the video fairly simple and
allowing the music to take centre stage.

13. The majority of those asked said that they have been influenced
to buy a song after watching it’s music video, which shows that
videos do promote the music. However, 46.2% did not
agree, which I think shows that the music video is often seen as a
side product, something that one would watch to consume the
music in addition to simply listening to the audio version.