Evaluation activity 4

Evaluation Activity 4When doing research for my target audience, I decided to aim my magazine at a younger demographic aged between 16-25. I felt this age range was the most appropriate as this is the age when people have started developing and expanding their music taste a bit more. They are also at the age where their parent’s interest in music taste is still influencing them. This was important to me because my magazine looks at both modern artists, old artists and modern artists that sound like they could be old. When doing my research, I found that a lot of people were fans of music from the 60s because their parents had played it throughout their childhood and that this also led on to them having an interest in artists who adopted a similar sound. I could have gone for an older age range for people who were listening to music in the 60s when it first came out but I wanted it to still contain a lot of modern artists and not just old artists. I stopped my target audience at 25 as this is when people are properly getting into careers and becoming more career driven. At this age people are less likely to continue buying magazines and are more focused on spending their money on other things. I understand that there will be some cases where a magazine receives more male or female attention but I wouldn’t consciously make a magazine that was aimed at one gender over another. The cover image is the convention that is more likely to get attention from a certain gender but I want my magazine to feature both male and female artists in order to appeal to both genders despite which gender features in the cover image.

I carried out a questionnaire targeting my target audience in order to learn more about them and develop my understanding of their interests, hobbies and the things that they want to see in a magazine. After conducting this research, I looked on the UK Tribes site to categorise my audience further so I could fully understand the audience I was targeting.

My research showed that my magazine is aimed at both the makers and the scenesters. The makers fit into the mainstream category but they are creative and don’t necessarily follow every mainstream trend in fashion and music. They are making original content and therefore like to be original in other areas as well. They are likely to have accounts on nearly every form of social media and are very active on every one of them, particularly Pinterest where they can ‘pin’ ideas and inspiration to their page. Having an interest in older music and modern music shows them as being different but not straying too far from the trends at the same time. The scenesters fall into the leading edge category, they set themselves apart from everybody else by creating new trends and aren’t afraid to have their own individual opinions. They are more likely to choose vintage/retro shops over high street stores when looking for clothing. Even though the two groups may seem very different, it emphasises how people who may appear to be very different can actually have a lot in common and similar interests in areas like music.

Even though my magazine isn’t exactly out there or completely different, it explores a variety of different genres of music that all manage to have a similar sound to them. This allows my target audience to not feel pigeon-holed in any way and allows them to branch out and explore different types of music. Neither are bold or eccentric as such which is why I wouldn’t want to style anyone that featured in my magazine in an eccentric way. However, I don’t want to dress them in a way that follows all of the trends, my idea is to dress them in a way that is influenced by trends but slightly different with a retro twist to them like the magazine itself. I styled my cover artist, Lori, in jumpers and skirts. I didn’t expose her body in any way like a lot of magazines do by dressing her in provocative clothing and instead I chose outfits that people would wear day-to-day. I want my target audience to look at what the people in my magazine are wearing and feel that they would wear it too. I don’t want my audience to feel like it is weird to be a little bit different and stray from the trends a bit, I want my magazine to help them channel that.

I think there is a gap in the market for my magazine as the only other magazine that I have seen do this is ‘MOJO’, a magazine already distributed by my publisher. I took some inspiration from ‘MOJO’ when creating my magazine but didn’t copy them completely, not only so my magazine could have its own identity, but also because I could identify that they have an older target audience than my magazine. However, for people looking for this sort of magazine they may have still bought ‘MOJO’ despite its older target audience. This means that it’s important that my magazine has different features that will engage an audience and make them want to buy my magazine over ‘MOJO’. It’s also important that my magazine is priced similar to ‘MOJO’, they release their magazine monthly like mine. They charge £4.88 per issue, which led me to setting my price at £4. I could see that a magazine similar to mine was doing well at a similar price, but chose to set my price slightly cheaper as I understand that ‘MOJO’ is an established magazine with a following. When conducting my audience research, I asked how much people would pay for my magazine and the majority of people said £4. This indicates to me that I am setting my price at something that my target audience would be willing to pay.

Audience Profile - Female Name: Megan Theresa Age: 20

Interests: Fashion, watching catwalk shows, going to gigs, listening to music

Favourite Shops: Independent vintage shops

Favourite Artists/Bands: Amy Winehouse, Postmodern Jukebox, The Beatles

Occupation: Blogger

Name: George Craig

Age: 24

Interests: Playing guitar, seeing live music, listening to music, cooking

Favourite Shops: Blacksheepstore, River Island, R.M. Williams, Ray Ban

Favourite Artists: The Arctic Monkeys, The Beatles, The Last Shadow Puppets

Occupation: Barman

Audience Profile - Male