Research into institutions that distribute similar products

Research magazine

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Bauer Media only has three music magazines which are Kerrang, Mojo and Q and none of these are RnB magazines. Because Bauer Media don't have an RnB magazine, it would be good to use them to publish my magazine because it would be something different to the music magazines that it already publishes. Also the other music magazines published by Bauer Media aren't targeted to female audiences whereas my magazine does so they can also establish a different audience.

Research into potential target audience (primary)

I conducted some primary audience research in order to:

• Find out what appeals to my target audience.
• To discover any flaws or potential improvements that could be made to my magazines genre.
• To identify any gaps in the market and place a refreshing new twist on the genre.

These are the products that I conducted my research on and these are the questions that I asked my sample:

Does the cover of the magazine make you want to open it and read it?

Can you tell from the cover what sort of genre of music the magazine will have inside?

Who do you think the target audience is?

Do you think that the model used on the cover is effective and eye catching? Why?

What artists/bands would fit well with this product?

Is there anything you don't like about the product?

From the research that I did, with a selective sample from my target audience, I found that: the front cover needs to be eye catching to make people want to read on; the mast head should be something interesting and not plain like the 'Q' mast head because the majority of people said that it is boring; the contents page is consistent with the front cover because it uses similar font and also has a smaller version. 

Below is a list of stylistic decisions I'll make for my project following my audience feedback:

• The cover should make people want to read the magazine and this could be done with intriguing sell lines or an interesting/eye catching model.
• My mast head should look more interesting and not plain like the one from 'Q' because most people found that plain was boring.
• Somehow link the contents page to the front cover, for example, by putting a smaller version of the mast head in the corner of the page or using the same font on the contents page as the cover.
• Maybe link everything back to the front cover so people know it's the same magazine for example adding a small icon of the mast head in the corner of each page including the contents and double page spread.

Reader Profile

The image above is a photographic collage of interests and hobbies I believe my audience will be interested in. It contains images of various R&B artists that they may enjoy listening to as this is an R&B magazine so they would obviously listen to R&B music. It also has various social networking sites that are a big part of 16 - 25 year olds lives at the moment and also festivals and high street shops that my readers will probably shop at.

Research into potential target audience (secondary)

http://www.bauermedia.co.uk/Brands/Q/ - 20th January 2012


Q Magazine
Q's audience is composed of passionate, engaged and open minded music fans driven to continually discover new music - and to use this lust for discovery to influence their friends. The audience is split 75% male to 25% female and is affluent (with 68% ABC1) The fact that the majority of readers are male means that many of the articles and advertisements are aimed at males instead of females.


For my further research I stayed on http://www.bauermedia.co.uk/Brands and looked at their other music magazines.


Kerrang
Kerrang's audience are young, individually minded and passionate consumers, an audience defined by attitude, passion and loyalty. The audience is 15 - 35 male bias. The age range is rather large so the articles and advertisements would have to range between those ages and they would also have to be more male orientated. 


MOJO
Discerning and passionate music aficionados, the MOJO audience is predominantly male (77%) and affluent (63% ABC1). These are heavy consumers of music see their passion as discovery without boundaries, genre and decade being secondary to quality.


My Magazine

Age - 16 - 25 years old


Gender - both male and female but predominantly female(60% female to 40% male) 


Hobbies and interests - my audience might be passionate and open minded about music and ready to discover new music because my magazine genre is RnB which is different to the other music magazines published by Bauer Media. 


I am targeting this group because as a female, it is easier to write and relate with other females than males. Plus there aren't many music magazines that are targeted at women.

Textual Analysis

Researching other print products will influence my ideas and will also help me achieve a successful finishing product. For example, I can learn what sort of magazine's different genres produce. I now know that my magazine will need to feature a band or a solo artist on the cover, a memorable mast head that could be used throughout the magazine e.g. on the contents page or as a small icon on the double page spread so people will remember it when reading the rest of the magazine etc.

Brief

Print


Preliminary exercise: using DTP and an image manipulation program, produce the front page of a new school/college magazine, featuring a photograph of a student in medium close-up plus some appropriately laid-out text and a masthead. Additionally candidates must produce a DTP mock-up of the layout of the contents page to demonstrate their grasp of the program.

Main task: the front page, contents and double page spread of a new music magazine.
All images and text used must be original, produced by the candidate, minimum of FOUR images per candidate.