Target Audiences: Audience Profile

Media products are created to make a profit however they are created with the understanding that they can be sold or promoted to an audience.  All of these products are created with a specific target audience in mind.

The media use several different ways of creating an audience profile. They use things such as social grading, quantitative information and qualitative information to gauge an understanding of who will be interested in their products and whether they are worth publishing out into the wide network of media products.

Social Grading System:
Some media products are aimed at people that fit into the following categories:

Companies may also look at demographic information. This is factual information that can be used for creating products. This includes things such as

• age group
• gender
• ethnicity
• location
• education 
• class

They may also consider physcographic information which is information that is personal to you and is made up of opinions and preferences. This could be:

• politics
• self-image
• religion
• interests
• likes/dislikes.

Everything that you watch on the television has a target audience.

An example is The X-Factor.
It is an entertainment programme that is aimed at young people, or housewives with children. People audition in order to win a record contract with leading record label SyCo.

The social grade that the X-Factor target audience satisfies is Grade DE.

 Using this and several other pieces of information, an audience profile can be created.

The typical audience profile for The X Factor:

Age: 26

Gender: Female

Ethnicity: British

Location: Essex

Education: GCSEs and a levels. 

Occupation: Housewife

Likes: fashion, celeb gossip, cosmetics, stereotypical girly things.

Dislikes: football, dirt, politics.

Religion: no religion.

This is a typical person that the producers would aim their show and content at and they assume if she likes it then most other people in the same category will too.