social media evaluation

In this evaluation I will be talking about how social media platforms are used in different ways and with different purposes. I will also be talking about the evidence from my survey primary research and my internet research when I looked up two film franchises and I will explain how they are able to target their specific audiences by promoting these films through social media and also what effect this has on the consumer in the way they are able to access these films.

Firstly to find out how social media platforms are used and their different purposes, task 1 involved conducting a survey to find out why people use social media the most, what is the most popular platform, what are the advantages and disadvantages of using these platforms, and how frequently they use them and why they use each social media platform.

From the results of the survey I found that 40 percent use snap chat and 40 percent use YouTube. From this evidence it explains that social media sites are mostly used for communication and this can also tie in to how films get promoted and heard about.

To find out how social media sites operate I also had to ask people about if they use different social media sites for different reasons as this can help when promoting a film as not all platforms will have the same capacity to generate a mass audience as some social media sites are specifically friendly for video sharing.

The third question I asked was 'do you use different social media sites for different purposes?' To summarise my evidence, most people said they use social media sites for communication. Some said they used it for interactivity  and to watch videos.

In question four, I asked people what did they think the advantages and disadvantages was of using social media sites. To summarise my findings, this information demonstrated to me that there were some beneficial advantages to social media, such as it being easy to communicate to people and also that they can access videos and entertainment purposes. Linking this to how a film would benefit from social media, this evidence shows that if there was a film being released at the cinema, the use of social media can help to promote the film and generate a mass audience, by creating a promotional page about that film. People also said that the advantages of social media is that it is easy to communicate with people, so this would be useful for a new film at the cinema because a lot of people can access social media. This benefits the directors, it helps to boost the directors views and ratings for the film and also helps the consumer to access any content or information . The disadvantages that I collated in my survey was people saying that there was cyber bullying, for example with a film, as the pages are public anyone can access this, however this allows people to generate negative comments that may discredit the film and give a negative representation. For the directors this can have a major effect if this is a big budgeted film, as they may lose profit on the film if there is negative reviews and this goes viral.

From my survey I found that YouTube came up the most frequently. One person stated that they found YouTube useful, because there  were millions of videos featuring various genres. From a film perspective this a useful platform as YouTube promotes advertisements for films, meaning you have to view the trailer before the video. It promotes it to a large audience, and can inspire them to watch the film, from the consumers point of view. From the director's point of view it is useful because consumers have to watch trailers and they can also generate comments which makes it interactive. This links in to unit 6 and interactive videos as consumers when they are watching an interactive video have a choice about what they say they want to watch if they like the content. Also YouTube has the option to link a film to other social media sites making it easier for people to access it, this makes it interactive with the user to share and comment across platforms.

Research the way in which institutions use social media to promote products to an intended audience.

Media sites promote their products to an intended audience with films, for example. Different social media sites have different features that are unique to their platform, to help them promote and share films. For example the Twitter Harry Potter page allows people to retweet what they have posted allowing the film content to generate a large audience.  And this also can be linked to other social media platforms such as Instagram, though not all platforms. However YouTube is a platform that allows film content to be shared easily with many users on social media, as unlike Twitter you can share across more platforms. It also personalises the content you access such as playlists.

Comparing the Platforms

The uses of social media makes it easy for consumers to be able to share and discuss films via use of different platforms. For example Facebook has a Harry Potter page which keeps viewers up to date several times a week. Facebook is very user friendly because it has 6 different 'like' icons that range from like  and love to anger so it is quick and easy to register your opinion even if you do not wish to make an actual comment. Facebook had more 'likes' (279) than Twitter (55) for the Harry Potter page. Facebook has a 'share' option which is available on Twitter as 'retweet.'  A benefit for users of Facebook, as well as for the film company, is that the user can write much more on their views whereas on Twitter you are limited to how much you can write. Twitter allows links to subjects, films, genres and many other interests via hashtags which potentially generates a massive amount of publicity through linking and cross promoting. Facebook allows people to reply to each other on individual threads within a main thread. There is also the huge potential for the audience to share links to the film in a way that benefits the film company. Both social media sites allow sharing of links to either film websites or review websites. A benefit of Twitter is that it recommends pages for you to look at and other films you may be interested in of a similar genre.

YouTube by comparison shares mainly videos, and film companies can promote a film through their own film channel, for example, the ‘Harry Potter channel.’ This has 156,360 subscribers. The last posting was August 2017 and it has had 71,292 views. The comment section is disabled. There is a promotion button which allows you to buy the film. There is a huge potential for the audience to view the video and share it, and for the film company to promote its film and merchandise. Its main competitors would be Twitter and Facebook and Instagram. Youtube gives you the option to share across other social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram through the use of icons that link up to these sites. In my opinion, YouTube is the best promotional platform for film companies and also for the audience because it gets the most views and you can subscribe and you can also link up to other social media sites to exchange comments and content.

In my opinion, though the film company have many options to promote their product, it is the audience which does most of the promotion for the company through sharing, commenting and cross promoting through different social media sites.