Audience research 1:Demographics

A common and widely used method of audience research is called demographics. This aims to define certain groups of adult society largely by the occupation that they have.It brakes the population down into six groups and labels in a lettering code to describe income and status of those in each group.

Producers find it important to know the demographics of their potential audience so they can adapt to product they are producing whether it be text or product to appeal to a group with known viewing habits.
For example if producers at a television company were wanting to produce a DIY programme there target audience would be C2 demographic and maybe D.

This does not infact reflect a complete picture. It fails to tell media producers some things they may wish to know, such as each groups income ans how much each has to spend each week.Some skilled manual workers earn the same amount every week as a teacher but they are unlikely to spend it in the same way.

Also these demographics only focus on the main earner of a household and fail to include other member of a household such as younger children