Target audience, features and genre of my music magazine

My magazine will need to contain a mast head that is the main feature that stands out and is the most dominant icon on the page. It will also need to be the full width of the page to achieve this. It will need to be short and snappy to make sure it is memorable. It will need to do this so that it’s the one they keep coming back to and eventually buy. Many existing magazines have short snappy names like ‘NME’ and ‘GQ’. They’re usually just the first letters of two or three words to make it snappy and memorable. Some magazine feature either a music related TV show like ‘The Hex Factor’ or ‘Kerrang’ but others feature bands like ‘Clash.’ I have decided to name my magazine "RAVE" as it connotes happiness and also represents many students lives etc. It is also short, snappy and easy to remember, following the conventions of other music magazines.

It needs to have a house style that is consistent throughout the magazine, not only making it eye catching but also easy on the eye. The main image on the front cover needs to be large and the most dominant image on the page. It needs to be a mid-close up of the model and also the model needs to have eye contact with the audience to engage them. This will make it feel more of a personal buy, like the reader is actually looking directly into the models eye, catching the reader’s attention. I was thinking of having my house style red, black and white throughout the year, but the Christmas issue (published in December) in gold, silver and black to relate to the season and month the issue is published in. I think both house styles are good as gold and silver connote Christmas and Christmas decorations and red connotes passion and love as well as danger. This would make my magazine apply to all sorts of genre of music and also lots of different people would be able to relate to it as most people in my target age range are either in love, searching for love or want to take risks in life. I have chosen to create an issue for January, just after Christmas, so I will be following the house style or red, black and white.

I am targeting my magazine at 15 – 24 year old as I am within this age group and I feel I’ll be able to relate to them better and produce a magazine they would be interested in, both males and females. The S.E.G I will be aiming my magazine at are group E, D and possibly some C2 but focusing mainly on E. This is because most people in groups E and D fit into my age range as they’re either in full time education or newly employed. Some people in C2 may fit into this category if they have done apprenticeships instead of going to college, meaning they will be semi-skilled workers. I will focus my magazine on selling to outer and inner directed people as most if not all college and university students will fit into this category. This is because some of them will be belongers, wanting to belong to the group of buying my magazine, and also some of them will be I-am-me’s and some of the music featured in my magazine will be their type of music. All of these groups cover at least half of the UK’s population, making it a good target audience as a wide range of people will be interested in it.

I will be representing the people in the magazine in different ways. My main cover story I will want to represent the person featured as positive as I can to make the reader want to read about them and to create a main positive feel overall. However to engage and interest the reader I may also throw in a negative representation of something/someone featured in my magazine in a smaller story to also engage the reader because I think everyone wants to hear a bit of gossip. It may not come across as negative representation, but I think I need to add some gossip to make the magazine worth reading. For example, I may add this gossip under the letters page or review comments. Or it could just be a feature of an interview of a famous artist. I intend to create fully positive morals and values of the artists featured in my magazine to advertise the artists as well as my magazine.

I will be creating my own artist for my main front cover image and story to make it easier to write about and take images. However I may feature actual artists’ names to make it more interesting for the reader. These won’t only just include artists in the charts such as ‘Jessie J’ and ‘Katy Perry’ but also it will have other features that this particular audience will be able to relate to well. I will feature artists bringing out new albums or singles to advertise but to also engage every member of the target audience by featuring all different types of musicians and music.

Based on pre-existing music magazines the average price for a monthly issue is £3 to £4. I am aiming to sell my magazine for around the £3 mark, stretching to £3.50 if necessary. This is because the majority of my target audience are unemployed or just recently employed and therefore won’t really have the extra money to spend on a music magazine.

I will be releasing my magazine monthly as the music industry doesn’t change that drastically from week to week, however it changes too rapidly to only release one for each season. It means the magazine will have more content as there will be more topics to cover over a longer period of time between issues. It will also cost less as there won’t be as many publishing and printing prices. It will also suit the target audience more as many of these people won’t be able to afford the money to buy a more expensive magazine weekly. It also means the buyers can save up if they need to to buy the magazine as they’ll have a longer time to do so. They may not have the time to sit down each week and read a weekly issue with busy college or university lives or focusing on new jobs. Having a monthly issue will mean they will have a longer time to read each issue. I will be creating a website to advertise my magazine on where the front page and contents page will be shown. This will show the reader the awesome things in the issue and engage their interest, making them want to buy the magazine to read more.

As the front cover is the main focal point of a magazine and therefore is the main selling point, I will include advertisements, competitions and free stuff featured in that particular issue of the magazine. The will include things like competitions to win tickets to a concert, free stuff you can claim when you buy the issue and also advertisements for albums or products that fit that age range. (e.g. hair products or fashionable clothing like the artists wear etc.)

Choice of music genre

Originally I chose to base my magazine on pop artists, but after I experimented, I decided to change the theme of my magazine as it proved hard to create a pop magazine. This is because there are very few pop magazines about, and I found it hard to find a model magazine to base mine on. So I changed the theme sightly. I still wanted to feature pop artists in my magazine as I felt that because pop magazines are hard to find, my magazine may sell more because of this. However the house style of my magazine will not follow this genre, as it has to appeal to a wide range of people, so I'm planning on adopting a neutral style to suit everyone.

Prezi on the LIIAR analysis of existing music magazines

LIIAR analysis of the brief for the music magazine

Typical music magazines have a large mast head at the top of the page. Conventionally, it is the top left hand corner, however a few magazines use the mast head to the full width of the page. Well established music magazines may have their model on the front page covering the mast head slightly. They can afford to do this as the magazine and institution are so well known, the reader will know what magazine it is just by looking at the house style and font. There is also an obvious lexical field of words used in music magazines to make it specific to that one group of people interested in it. Each music magazine will have their own style of writing but ultimately, all the language used will fall under the same obvious heading of music.

An 'exclusive' headline is often a convention of a music magazine as that is how they promote their main, most important story. This sells the magazine as readers can't help but read the headline, which makes them want to read the magazine.

Most music magazines are published monthly as the music industry doesn't change drastically enough to be written about weekly. Also, to be published once a season there would be far too much content, which would make it more expensive too. The price of the magazine mainly depends on how often it is published., If a magazine is published weekly it is likely to be around £2.00 to £2.50. This is because it wont have as much content. Weekly magazines are more like newspapers rather than magazines, such as NME. Monthly magazines are around £3.00 to £4.00 purely because of the content. There isn't many music magazines published once a season, but those that are in excess of £5.00 because they contain a lot of information, meaning their publishing costs will rise dramatically. The institutions also have to make a lot of money to keep their company going between issues published, so they put the price up to cover the costs and ensure they have money to spend on the issue for the next month.

There are many different genre's of music magazine, the largest being pop. The age range for this is huge as children can be interested in pop music such as Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez and Justin Bieber. These artists are largely admired by those from around 5 or 6 to about 12/13. However older teenagers and even some adults can also be interested in these artists. This means that there needs to be a range of magazines for all age ranges to buy as pop music can be listened to by people of all ages. There are other genres such as rock and indie which are mainly listened to by older generations from about 25 to 35 but also some teenagers are interested in these genres. Both of which in fact are very popular amongst teenagers.

The target audience for music magazines largely depends on the genre of the magazine. There are loads of different age groups that music magazines are aimed at,  but the biggest group is 15 - 24yrs. This is mainly because these are the unemployed people that have more time to read magazines and also the majority of them go out to clubs and other various parties and listen to music. This group also includes college and university students. These students are more likely to have a spare bit of time to read the magazines while resting before exams etc, as opposed to a business man or woman who generally doesn't have a great deal of free time.

Music magazines conventionally portray a positive image of the music industry and also of the readers. They do this by using positive language and focusing on the positive aspects of the music industry. However, the institutions know everybody likes a bit of gossip, so they will sometimes feature a few negative headlines of certain artists to engage the reader and make them think the gossip is 'exclusive' to that magazine.

Music Magazine Brief

Main task: the front page, contents and double page spread of a new music magazine (if done as a group task, each member of the group to produce an individual edition of the magazine, following the same house style).

Final Front Cover and LIIAR evaluation

I chose to use the mast head 'Wyke Knowledge' as it is catchy and refers to education. Also, 'knowledge' sounds a bit like 'college' which is the word it has replaced. I chose to use the logo as a part of my title as it is familiar to students and also advertises the college as well as the magazine. It also shows the institution of the magazine, although it isn't in the bottom right hand corner where the institution is normally advertised. I have used purple, blue and green for my house style as purple and green are the college colours and blue has connotations of calmness, representing the college as a calm and therefore relaxing place to be. The title mast head out as 'knowledge' is the only piece of writing on the page which is white, there is no other white on the front cover. It also stretches to the full width of the page, making it the first thing the reader will see. I have used a question just underneath the title starting 'what's your opinion.' This will draw the readers in as they think that the question is actually being asked to them. I added in the strap line ‘be in the know’ underneath the mast head to relate to the word ‘knowledge’ and to tell the reader what type of magazine it is (a college magazine).

I added in the picture frames in green on the images to keep within the house style and to make it look more professional. I also put the word ‘successful’ into the colour green as green has connotations of positivity, therefore relating to the word successful. I used mostly black text to make it easier to read and see against the background.

I’ve taken a medium close up image of my model with a folder. The folder represents college life i.e studying, again showing it’s a college magazine. I used the college as the background to advertise the college campus and to reinforce the fact that it’s Wyke college magazine. The background image represents is a bright and colourful image, giving off a positive representation of the college and its students.

I have included issues about the college within my front cover, showing images of the college facilities. I have also included the current topic of the second year where the new oak building is has been used. This will draw the readers in as they will want to know more about college life particularly the new AS students.

I have included the issue number, bar code and date my magazine was published in the bottom right hand corner which makes the magazine look more professional. My magazine is also free, as I don’t think students will pay for a magazine with information in it that they can find out on their intranet.

Mock up of my college magazine and feedback

I asked a number of people what they thought of this as a college magazine compared with the final magazine. I asked them about the background, the text (if it's clear or is related to the image), the image of my model and the mast head. The results are below.

Do you like the background of this magazine?

Yes – 32% No – 68%

Would you prefer an image of the college as the background?

Yes  - 98% No – 2%

If no, what would you prefer?

All 2% said they liked the background

Do you like the house style of the magazine?
Yes – 12% No – 88%

Do you like the mast head? Does it stand out?
Yes – 4% No – 96%

Do you like the captions of the images?
Yes – 7% No – 93%

Is it clear and easy to read?

Yes – 0% No 100%

Is the main image relevant?

Yes – 14% No – 86%

Does it stand out?

Yes – 73% No – 27%

Are the extra images well presented?

Yes – 17% No – 83%

Would you say adding a boarder around these images would improve it?

Yes – 100% No – 0%

Overall,  all the participants said they preferred the final magazine cover as this didn't hold many conventions of a magazine and also doesn't look very professional.

Marketing my college magazine

To market my magazine, I could create a website for my magazine which all college students from all colleges including Wyke and secondary school year elevens, interested in the college. It will have the current front cover and contents page available to look at and also information of where to get one within college. I could also advertise it around the college campus, putting up posters with the current front cover on it. If i were to create a website for this magazine it will also have a link from the college intranet making it easy to view. I asked a number of people in and outside of Wyke if they would visit a website for information about the current magazine and 76% said they would. 94% if the students within Wyke said they would find it easier if the website had a link on the students intranet. If my magazine wasn't free, I would show competitions and free stuff on the website or posters which would be an easy way to persuade people to buy it. For example, an idea for the current magazine would be the 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th and so on, magazines to be bought would get a free ticket to the upcoming Wyke Halloween party.

This is how my magazine would look if it were posted on a wall within the college.

If my magazine website had a link on http://www.wyke.ac.uk/ it would be up here with the rest of the sub-headings of the magazine.

This is where the link to my magazine will be if it is advertised on the student intranet, either next to the library subheading or within it.





Front Cover Development

Firstly I started off with this image of my model. I like it as it's a medium close up of my model and she is looking directly at the camera. This draws the reader in as they make eye contact with the model, making the reader feel the model is looking directly at them.

I cut around my model using the quick select tool in photoshop. I then copied the image and pasted it onto my background.

I chose my background as the college as it shows which college the magazine is for. I took a sample of the sky in the image to colour in the white space left at the top of the page. I then blended the painted colour into the image using the smudge tool.

I then added in my mast head "Wyke knowledge." I did this by choosing my font from dafont.com and downloaded it. I then cut around it again using the quick select tool and parted it onto the top of the page. I did the same for the Wyke logo.

I then added the strap line "be in the know" using the text icon and changed the colour to purple to keep within the house style of my magazine.

I added images onto my magazine by opening them in photoshop and copying and pasting them. I added the boarder round the images making it green to fit into the house style and also 50% transparent so you can still see the image behind the boarder making it look more professional.

I added text above and below the images to describe the images using the text icon, telling the reader what is in the magazine drawing them in. I've used the same font as the strap line, using black, green and purple to create the house style. I used the colour green to emphasise the word "successful" as green has connotations of strengths. Images and captions are very conventional of magazines, including a lot of information of what is going to be included in the magazine.

I then added the bar code, issue number and date in the bottom right hand corner using the bar code generator.  I used free transform and scale to make the bar code just the right size to fit on. This adds to the conventions of the front cover as all professional magazines have a bar code, issue number and date.

I then added the Wyke website to the bottom of the page n green to make it stand out. This adds to the professionalism of the magazine as it shows the institution off to the reader and it is also a convention of a magazine.

Overall, I am pleased with my magazine as it has many professional, conventional features. However I could have included advertisements on the front cover as that is a massive convention of all magazines.

Final draft of contents page

First Draft of contents page