Round 2- types of research, methods of

research, purpose of research.

Types of research

.Quantitative
.Qualitative
Methods of research
.Secondary
.Primary
.Data gathering agencies
.Self-generated
Purpose of Research
.Audience Research
.Market Research
.Production research

Types of research
Quantitative data

This type of research method is used often though out different

aspects of life such as, marketing and psychology. Quantitative
data is data that can be measured and it can also be put down
in numbers. This would be in forms of percentages or figures. In
the music form of media, I see this as important fact due to the
public/ artists needing a figure on how popular it is. Generally
these answers are expressed over various charts. Quantitative
questions are usually closed questions which allow the
researcher to get the exact answer needed, so there is no room
for other approaches.
In the music industry artists are judged my views and sales,
this is something that is seen as big in the music industry. For
example you have a weekly top 100 tracks, and that is made
out of sales from online sales as well as in store purchases,
most views on social media sites such as YouTube and vevo.
Artist are ranked on a daily bases across so many forms, such
as social media sites and vevo; social media would advertise
the videos due to it being popular or on the vevo site it
advertises you to look at certain videos because a majority
number has looked at it.
Quantitative data is more about finding out things quickly and
this industry I think this is used a lot more than qualitative data.
Due to the fact of it being easier access for a lot of people, for
example people can entre questionnaires over social media as
well as websites such as YouTube, as audiences are allowed to
like and dislike the videos meanwhile being able to share their
views in the comment section of the website.
Quantitative data is there to give a quick and overall stanza to
what is going on, for the videos publicity. For example, as
above, you would have things such as YouTube that gave you
quick results on peoples reactions towards something an artist
may have released. Over things like online could equate to
various pieces of information, on whether you like their latest
song or latest look, this would then come back with a total of
what people thought and what they didnt like.

Like anything else this collection of data has its faults in that,
there is a lack of detail; the platforms in which are the
questions are asked within this data category, such as:
questionnaire, restrict the people they are asking from
answering in grave detail, especially as a lot of the questions
are done closed. Also this form is also open to the of variables
and certain piece of information that it needed, in comparison
to qualitative data, that actually you dont necessarily have all
pieces of information needed to completely see the whole
situation.
I feel that within this industry, it relies on this data, as
everything you look at is based over numbers. As said before,
viewing numbers on YouTube will gain you more of an audience,
then earning a place in the charts consists with the artist,
gaining sales of their song on both download sites such as
iTunes and popularity of the artist over things such as social
media.

Qualitative data
This type of data is more about qualities and opinions, whereas
compared to quantitative data it actually cannot be measured.
This can be collected through things such as focus groups, and
interviews. This allows the artist to have more of a detailed
answer on what the viewers like and dislike.
Focus groups I think are things that are commonly done, but
not necessarily done as often within this side of media as the
likes of books and games. Focus groups are when a company or
label get together a group of people that would be asked a
variation of questions on one topic so that their specific
questions could be answered.
Qualitative data looks at more than just the numerical count, it
allows them to look at ideas more independently and gain some
deeper knowledge on how, what thy may be considering for the
music artist, may affect the public and they view their artist.
I think that collecting qualitative data can be helpful to the
label and the artists growth due to the fact that if qualitative

data is used to give more detail and allow that of the artist and
label to pin point their questions and what they wish to learn
and gain from things such like focus groups that will be
Qualitative data like everything has its flaws, subjectivity is
something that can be misinterpret when collecting qualitative
data, so data that was give over may be misinterpreted by the
researcher make the information inaddiquet and bias. The data
cannot be generalized due to it being the individual persons
view but it can be converted to make percentages and
numbers.
I feel that the music industry in a sense neglects this side of
research in the sense that it actually the public dont see it
collecting this different side of data, because in a sense all
publicity even if its not good. When researching to try and find
information on the collection of qualitative data within the
music industry, there was a limited amount on this. If the artist/
label/producer decided to use this type of data collection then,
this would help them to get a better understanding of the
audiences views and opinions on their new ideas, old videos,
and image overall.

Methods of Research
Secondary
Secondary research is pieces of information from third party
resources like, websites, books, and social media. Its important
to have secondary research as it is data that was originally
collected, it allows more of a dimension in their work due to the
fact of you can see the transition in opinions.

Secondary research over time has become easier to access due

the internet, before had researcher would have had to do
extensive amount of researchs in places like the library.
Whereas now the internet now has the large amounts of
information that is needed to complete market research. For
that reason secondary research is generally used.
Another thing is that secondary research is low cost, in
comparison to that of primary research, secondary research is
gaining information that is already there and then applying it to
the predicament. So rather than paying for focus groups and
interviews to be put in place, and even though it may have a
better outcome due to more recent accounts of information, its
overall a low cost to use information that was found, and an
earlier date.
There are a few faults with secondary research; that over time
the research becomes more and more un-reliable due to the
fact that the public change and their opinions change through
time, but it can still give a good outline of information.
Information can be inaccurate due to how people perceive it
and the way that the original research was written as well as
how the orginal research understood the results. This shows
that through secondary research mistakes can transferred and
the secondary research then becoming unreliable.
Secondary research is seen for setting out the foundations for
the primary research to begin. As it allows the researchers to
ask questions based on previously information and see how
things may have changed. This way it is good, because
secondary can both lead the way to primary research as well as
the secondary research possibly answering the questions that
were leading towards actually having to do primary research.
Secondary research is important within the music industry, as it
allows the artists to make comparisons of their past work
towards their current/future work. It also allows the majority to
look at the transfer and transition of music overall.

Primary Research

Primary research is when you get a variety of opinions for a

variety of opinions; this can be done through things such as
focus groups and questionnaires. This is researchers carrying
out their own information to make sure they get what
information they need, this being the information that they
couldnt necessarily retrieve from secondary research. Often
the information that is retrieved from the primary research is
Harvard into a computer to later be analysed.
There are firms that would create and collect this information
for their clients. But there is different variations of the firms
that would complete it for example you would have full service
market researchers which would collect the information,
through things like focus groups and interviews, and then
analyse the result they got from them, after they would make
sure to apply those results to get the best impact for the artist.
For example if Nicki Minaj, was to have a focus group on how
the audience feel about her and what she should do next a full
service market researcher would hold focus groups with her
target audience and discuss the questions that the artist feels
needs to be answered and then they would analyse the result,
then bring back to the artist that certain people want one thing
where as another group of people want this.
Primary research does have it weaknesses, it is a lot harder to
create or make than that of Secondary research. Firstly, primary
research consists of focus group and interviews and this can
lead to a cost, because you end up using more time and
resources to complete this sort of research. Primary research
can be misleading in that, when conducting the primary
research, if the researcher misinterprets certain pieces of
information it can be seen as bias and incorrect.
For a music artists label to use primary research allows them to
deal with events in their situations so can make it personal in
their own problems, instead of trying to apply secondary
research to their predicaments. It also allows them to get
precise answers on what they are wanting to answer and do.
Overall Primary Research allows the label/ artist to have more
control over every aspect, as they can pin point questions

which will automatically answer what they need to make sure

that their artist brings their audience what they want. It
provides them with the chance to

Data gathering agencies

Data gathering agencies, are agencies that are there to collect
information on the audiences that are listening to the radio and
the music on the radio. In my view this would be seen as
something wildly important within this industry due to artist/
labels wanting to know who they are really appealing to and
what is their true target audience.
RAJAR is an agency that measures audiences throughout the UK
over radio. It was first established in 1992, by both the BBC and
the radio centre. It is a business that manages and created an
audience measurement system throughout radio stations. This
company provides the third party sellers with quantitate and
qualitative data.
For example third party seller, are people trying to air their
advertisement, so companies such as RAJAR, would judge
where there advert would be best placed. If an advert was
advertising opera tickets, you would expect to hear this on the
royal orchestra radio channel as these ticket would apply to a
lot of the audience.
I think in the music industry this is important as it allows third
party seller to understand their audience, and that pieces of
music were rightfully shown to the target audience.

Self-generated
Self-generated research is when there was no need for aid,
because you already knew the information, things like a
creating video by the persons self, would be considered as selfgenerated information.
Self-generated research could be seen as more beneficial for
someone who was wanting more of a targeted answer. Selfgenerated research is similar in the way of primary research,
but instead of using other people and their opinions, but the

label using their own views and information. This can be from
experience or just their overall feelings.
I feel that self- generated may be used a lot more within the
industry, especially with well-known labels who have managed
larger artists would possibly understand what was needing to
happen and grasp their own knowledge rather than using other
types of research to build the information.

Purpose of research
Audience research
This is when companies measure their audience, this is show
that they can see what their audience is like, what they want to

see, as well as seeing what sells in the audience that they are
aiming their video etc. at. Artist label for example, would do
focus groups, interviews, and Questionnaires to understand
what their target audience like and dislike, to make sure that
they are appealing to them.
Companies have ways of how they judge audience research.
Firstly on how they engage, its very important in the fact of the
audience engaging with what the artist would be bring to them,
if they are not interested, and you need to see how a variety of
people. React, and react in the way that the artist needs to gain
the publicity, views and money.
Secondly, on how they identify themselves with the piece of
media, think when doing audience research its key to notice
how said audience connect with the piece and how it impacts
them. My view would be that the audience connecting with it,
liking and disliking a video.
Companies such as RAJAR do leak in to this section of this
research due to the fact that they investigate the audience over
the radio they look at what channels people are listening to and
what sort of people they are. This gives their third party seller,
such as people selling commercial adverts, as to who is
listening to each channel and what would suit what audience.
For example, if there was an advert selling Rock festival tickets,
RAJAR would look into and see what audience would suit this
advert best, so this would possibly be played on a rock music
radio channel.
Overall I fine extremely important, especially in this industry as
the audience are the people that actually watch the videos and
make the artists the money, so understanding the audience
that are viewing the videos is important so that the artist can
truly capture them and give them what they want to see.

Market research
Market research is there to make sure that their audiences
needs are fulfilled in the way that actually they know what their
audience want, need and strive for. Market research is such a

big part in any industry when it comes to research, it allows the

label/artist to grasp what their audience like and dislike
allowing them to bring what their audience want to them to.
Market research helps the artist with new ideas and images,
and understanding if that is good thing or a bad thing. Before
an artist may bring out a new music video, it may be market
researched so that they evaluate the chance of a new idea and
whether it needs any improvement. This is because of the
audience expressing what appeals and doesnt appeal to them.
Having Market research it allows the label and artist to view
their process of everything
Some pros to market research can be that its low in cost in
comparison to that of focus groups, the internet has helped this
greatly as it is able to facility online market research. Also it can
be time saving as results can be calculated quickly on the
internet to come up with an answer, these answers are
normally quantitative data, such as statistic and figures.
It is important, because it allows the artist/label to get to know
their audience, with market research it illustrates what would
be effective in a group and for their overall target audience. It
allows them to truly see what the public would respond to, so
that it makes a big impact.

Production research
Production research is something that focus on how something
is made, this is when a new music video is being formed. This
research would look what would work with the audience in
making the artist popular or noticed within the public.
The production research in the aspect of creating a music video
is overly important. Production research is looking at the whole
creation process of it, this includes things such as content,
placement, locations as well as things such as auditions. These
things are used to plan out the music video and to truly grasp
how the production will be laid out and how the audience will
respond to it. It use other types of research to gain the
knowledge, such as the placement they would look at their
target audience to see where they are most likely to view or

listen to the music and then act on the results. This research
would important because it overall would affect the artist, due
to their image and the way their video would come across.
It is important to the music industry because it affects the
artist, on how the audience will see the artist in the video. For
example, Miley Cyrus in her music video we cant stop it was
perceived by the audience as being too sexualised and was not
viewed in a positive way, but this possibly would have been
thought out as Miley overall did get the publicity she wanted
and needed from a variety of people.

Bibliography
http://classroom.synonym.com/problems-research-quantitative-qualitativemethods-4418.html

http://www.shmoop.com/probability-statistics/qualitative-quantitative-data.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billboard_Hot_100
http://archive.learnhigher.ac.uk/analysethis/main/quantitative.html
http://www.knowthis.com/data-collection-primary-research-methods/quantitativedata-collection
http://www.shmoop.com/probability-statistics/qualitative-quantitative-data.html
http://archive.learnhigher.ac.uk/analysethis/main/qualitative.html
http://www.knowthis.com/data-collection-primary-research-methods/qualitativedata-collection
http://www.knowthis.com/data-collection-low-cost-secondary-research/secondaryresearchadvantages
http://www.knowthis.com/data-collection-primary-research-methods/what-isprimary-research
http://www.knowthis.com/data-collection-primary-research-methods/primaryresearch-advantages
http://www.knowthis.com/data-collection-primary-research-methods/primaryresearch-disadvantages

http://www.slideshare.net/09SC1/data-gathering-agencies
http://www.rajar.co.uk/
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/self-generated
http://www.slideshare.net/hurtwoodhousemedia/audience-research-and-targetaudiences
http://www.slideshare.net/AnnieRose95/audience-research-22808080?
next_slideshow=1
http://www.esomar.org/knowledge-and-standards/market-research-explained.php
http://www.slideshare.net/marleylong/audience-27055236
http://live.surveyshack.com/blog/bid/34826/Online-Market-Research-The-Prosand-Cons
http://www.slideshare.net/marleylong/audience-27055236
http://www.slideshare.net/marleylong/audience-27055236
http://www.ehow.co.uk/info_8177706_problems-primary-vs-secondaryresearch.html

http://ieuan-lloyd.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/market-research-and-productionresearch.ht