Often we use some really general terms when referencing the people who support our organizations which tends to make us think of them as monolithic entity. Having written this blog for 10 years now, I bear more than my share of guilt despite my continuing effort to conceive of them as brains, rather than butts in the seats.
Blogger Nick Sherrard offered a little kick in the pants back in December with a post titled: Hey Arts Organisations, I am not Audience: Why arts organisations should stop talking about people behind their backs
He sums it up best in this passage (my emphasis):
The fact of the matter remains that ‘audience’ does actually mean people who take part in turning up, tuning in, or downloading what you do.
If you don’t believe me go ask them.
Turn to the nearest person who doesn’t work in the arts and ask them what an audience is.
I think that describing people in terms they wouldn’t understand themselves is generally not a good idea —its talking about people behind their backs.
He goes on to point out that what we term as our audience is actually a group that is comprised of different segments, each of which have different expectations of their relationship with our organizations.
He uses the terms customers, fans, superfans and collaborators, but there are obviously many gradations as you care to define. The first step toward that though is recognizing there are differences and discerning what the expectations of each are.