That’s a huge factor in the production of any show, and some producers usually realize it far too late after they’ve spent a lot of effort pandering to the masses.
Recently, the winning strategy seems to be to establish a smaller, but more dedicated following of people who know exactly what they want to see. After that, the fan base can grow organically once word starts spreading.
For “One Punch Man”, the size of its fan base shouldn’t even be a concern for the showrunners, as the show already managed to draw in plenty of people with its first season. Right now, they have no reason to compromise the values they’ve established in an attempt to get more viewers, so season 2 should turn out as good as fans are hoping.
The only thing left to sort out now is the release date, but as we said above, this is not an issue for the community at all. As long as creator Murata Yusuke keeps communicating with his audience as reliably as before, things should run smoothly for him.
The director actually seems interested in talking to his fans quite often, so it’s possible that he might take some ideas that have been brought up in fan discussions and implement them into the show itself. We’ll find out in 2017 at the earliest, so stay tuned.