What have you

learned from your

audience feedback?
Gemma McDougall

For this question we asked a select group of 7 students.

This was because they are part of our primary target
audience. We showed them our documentary, double page
spread and our radio trailer. Whilst doing this, we also gave
them questionnaires in which they had to fill out so we
could get a conclusion on what their thoughts were of our
documentary.
Some of these questions and answers are displayed on the
following slides.

Documentary

Did you enjoy the documentary?

Amount

Yes

No

How could the documentary be improved?

This was an open question, we decided to let our audience
individually state what they wanted to be improved for the
documentary to be of a higher standard. Some answers
included: making the editing smoother; having consistent sound
levels and transitions between clips and decrease the volume of
the backing music in comparison to the speech being presented.

What do you think the objective of the

documentary?
(Tick Two)

No.
People

To
To inform
educate

To
To
investiga
entertain
te

21%
36%

21%

21%

What message did you take away from the

documentary?
No. People
Social Media has a
positive influence on
your life
Social media has a
negative influence on
your life
Social media has a
positive influence but
there are some
negatives

From this feedback, I learnt that our documentary was

well received by our target audience. Our product had
been successful in depicting our reading on the subject.
We used Stuart Halls Encoding/Decoding theory to give
our product the preferred reading of Social Media has a
positive impact on a persons life, however there will be
some negatives for over using it. Although we did not tell
the vox pop interviewees and the expert interviewees
how to answer the questions, we mediated their answers
in order to get the clips we needed to put forward our
view.
From the feedback on my documentary I learnt that the
main things people thought we should have improved,
and what I can improve on if I need to do this again, is
the sound levels and the transitions. I learnt that our
sound levels were not ideal for a documentary and they
would increase/decrease at random times.

Double Page Spread

Would you read this spread if you saw it in a

magazine?
7.5

No.
People

Yes

No

6
4.5
3
1.5
0

yes

no

Would you watch the documentary after reading

the DPS?
6

Yes

4.5
3

No. People 6

1.5
0

no
yes

No
1

From the questions asked and the replies given we found that
six out of seven people asked would read the spread if they
saw it in a magazine. This was useful to me as it meant that
our spread was fun but informative. This was the same result
when asking if they would watch the documentary after
looking at the spread. As it was not 100% yes, we could have
improved our spread to make it look more professional or
important.
We also found that the readers liked the colour scheme and
found that it supported the topic of social media a lot of
social media sites use the colour blue as their colour schemes
and this is what we wanted to replicate.
We found that we couldve improved the spread by using
images more related to social media such as phones or the
use of an app. Saying this, people recognised and liked how we
used social media app logos to create the DPS heading which
differentiated the spread in comparison to other TV listings.

Radio Trailer

Did the radio advert grab your attention?

No. People

Yes

No

Did you understand the day and time the

documentary would be aired?

No. People

Yes

No

After listening to the radio advert, would you

watch the documentary?

No. People

Yes

No

On reflection, the ancillary product of the radio trailer was

not as well received as the double page spread one less
person said they wouldnt watch the documentary after
hearing the advert. We had full positive feedback when
asking if the advert grabbed their attention, however the
difference between the two questions displayed that
although the radio advert was captivating and attention
grabbing, there were factors missing in order to fully entice
someone into watching the documentary afterwards.
One of the key conventions we needed to follow was
making sure the listeners would understand the date, time
and channel we would be airing the documentary on.
Knowing we had all 7 replies confirming we did this
convention correctly and clearly shows we had
appropriately edited the advert.
The replies for the advert surprised me, I did not think we
did as well as we could have done when producing the

Overall

Can you see the connection between the three

products?
No. People

Yes

No

Which was your favourite product?

No. People

Documentar
DPS
y
2
3

Radio
Advert
2

documentary
dps
radio
0

0.75

1.5

2.25

3.75

In conclusion, our audience research results did go how we

wanted them to. It proved to me that our products were of a
standard that our primary audience enjoyed and would
watch. The results given to us was helpful in showing to us,
that we were able to create a successful brand identity where
the audience were aware that all three products were linked.
It was surprising to find out that our most popular product
was the double page spread especially considering this was
only an ancillary product.
If I could do the advanced portfolio a second time, I would be
more aware on making sure the documentary fully conformed
with general codes and conventions of a documentary, as
well as ensuring the sound levels were suitable to be shown
to an audience. Hopefully, this would then create an image of
what the full documentary would be about if needed.