Audience Analysis

In addition to philosophy about the objectives for a given com- munication, you need to determine who the viewers is, what they know about you and the matter, how they feel about it, and what sorts of appeals might work best.

When you communicate with an important person, you are in spirit communicating with all of the people that person communicates with as well. Many managers do not think about this beforehand.  Thus, the secondary or concealed audience is as important to think about as the main audience when communicating in business.

One of the huge difficulties in management communication is that the same communication may petition to some members of your spectators but not to others. This requires you to tailor your message for different viewer's members depending upon their requirements. For example, rather that is in the company's best attention may not be as good for its employees and their family.

As important as analyzing the spectators is analyzing their knowledge base. How much do they know about the subject you are discussing? If they know very little, you have to comprise more background information; if they know a lot, you need to come up with a new advance to the topic.

You will need to build credibility with the audience as you are covering the main topic. Their approach about the topic is also an important part of the analysis. If the audience is optimistically disposed toward your topic, they will be more disposed to agree with you. You have to work harder to reach your purpose.

In calculation to couture your message to your planned audience, you must also believe others who may view the communication, as well as others with whom your planned audience will communicate. This is your minor audience. Advances in communications technologies have made tailoring messages to secondary audiences important, as information can be rapidly passed to many people. For example, it is not uncommon to see "inside" information posted on web sites. One such site, thevault.com, allows employees of a company to incognito post their grievance online, where they can be read by investors, analysts, and probable employees.

Be sure when crafting a message that it is modified to both the primary and secondary audiences.