Conduct primary market research into mobile gaming formats, pricing and popular mobile games.

Task 1 (17^th September)

Conduct primary market research into mobile gaming formats, pricing and popular mobile games.

Conduct secondary research to discover the most popular selling devices and platforms.

Also research current ‘hot’ cultural memes (e.g. Mine Turtle) which you could use or imitate in your own game.

Create a blog entry in which you explain:

• the importance of market and audience research in the interactive media industry (GC3.1);
• the comparative uses of primary and secondary research (GC3.1)

your research methods and results (GC3.2, GC3.3).

Market research in the interactive media industry

Market research is the simple investigation into similar into a information about a market or customers, it is hugely important business strategy. research teams in companies carry out this research to find out: how competitors in the industry are getting on with their products and what the current generations opinions are of their media, what is the best piece of media on the market at the time. This research can be carried out to make sure a company doesn't make the same mistake as a competitor, or maybe use ideas from other companies which could benefit the researcher. All in all it is to keep up to date with the competition and what the market needs, market size and what the customers want.

Audience research in the interactive media industry

Without research teams in industries they would not be able to anticipate any success or popularity in the industry, audience research is one the most important research companies (especially in the media industry) can carry out. They need to make sure their piece of media whether its a game or a website had suited their target audience and will be successful on the market.

The comparative uses of primary and secondary research
Primary research is the investigation into to collected data in through methods like: questionnaires, quizzes, feedback sheets a collection of data by a number of people which they can contract percentages and data from. Secondary research is the step after primary research, it is also known as desk research as it is very much done behind a desk. It is the process of using the data and results concluded from the primary research it is the process of turning individual pieces of information and formatting them in a way that can be presented as data.

Quantitative research
Quantitative research is information collected based on number, IE; graphs, bar/line/pie charts which can be used to present data. Normally deducted from simple surveys and simple feedback sheets.

Qualitative research
Qualitative research is more personal than just numbers and data, this can be reviews and feedback left by an individual used on mass to deduct the general popularity of a product or piece of media. This technique also allows you to use these comments as another form of advertisement as positive feedback can be used to attract more customers.

This research technique is used through out the industry and is another very important business tactic

What we did.
Market research: our market research was basic investigation into gaming platforms and popular games in the industry. Our results showed us that although Android are on paper the most successful and popular platform of phones, iPhone netted a lot more profit last year and people between the age of 14-16 prefer to play on an xbox than any other gaming platform. Most importantly the majority of mobile gamers prefer to play on an android platform rather than: blackberry, Sony or IOS.

What else we did
To collect some more personal data, we sent a questionnaire to our class containing questions to gain feedback of our re skin of the basic catch/avoid game. We gathered a decent ammount of data from this questionaire but it wasnt conclusive as we cannot base the prospects of our game on what a class of 25 think. On our survey we tried to create a set of questions to allow us to collect some Quantitative and Qualitative data at the same time, which we succeeded in, although we collected the numeric data we required to proceed with our research we collected some more personal informations, people views in words rather than numbers and statistics. We then used these positive pieces of information to premote our game to our audience. 80% of our sureverys said that the game was enjoyable and 100% of our replies said the game suited the target audience which was a huge plus, our game recieved an average rating of 6.8 which again was a big bonus for us. We then went onto using the negative parts of the survey to bulster ideas for improving the game, for example alot of the replied said that the graphics could be improved, and there could be more levels introduced into the game which we will look into if we ever decide to improve on our game on a bigger scale.

With this information we collected via our new research techniques we presented our data to the class in a business type pitch to get our information and the concept of our game across. On a whole it was very successful.