The Pitch

By Deborah Anderson

The Brief“You have been commissioned by The Northern Echo to produce a new magazine or newspaper product. Your product could be in any style or genre but it must be self financed through sales or advertising. You must also produce your magazine for a specific audience segment within the 16 to 25 age group.”

Client ConsiderationsSecondary audience- Families, children and over 35s• No nudity• No taboo language• No inappropriate content

Dedication to the community• Use of local advertisers• Local topics such as their ‘Local Heroes’ Saturday paper

High production and editorial standards• Use of high quality personnel such as journalists and photographers

Genre ResearchRAVE is a hybrid alternative women’s lifestyle

magazine. I chose this genre because at first I wanted to make a women’s lifestyle magazine. However whilst doing research into the genre I discovered the lack of variety within the designs, layouts and contents. They were all pink, girly and, overall, quite superficial looking.I wanted to create a magazine that broke away from these conventions.

Genre Research- AnalysisOut of all the women’s lifestyle magazines that I looked at, my favourite one was Company so

I decided to critically analyse it.Masthead is partly covered- magazine is instantly recognised so we don’t need to be able to read it clearly

# shows mag is current and up-to-date

Alliteration gives energy – mirrors target audience

Cheap price- accessible to target audience

Feature images- gives a taster of what is to comeAlso has a collage effect.

Abbreviation- shows that the mag is aimed at a younger, fresher audience

Exclamatives are used- energy and fun

Rule of 3’s- fonts

Shows that the magazine isn’t just about fashion beauty but that it is quite cultured and perhaps not as shallow as you would think- refers to the Olympics- ‘gets sporty- how very 2012’

Main image is Jessie J- role model admired by target audience

Seductive body language but innocent face – her hands are almost pleading for the target audience to buy the magazine

Masthead font bold and easy to read

Genre Research (continued)I liked that Company looked quite amateur. Its design was that of a scrapbook which made it a lot more informal and accessible to the target audience. This inspired me to create a magazine that was full of different medium (drawing, painting etc.) and use a variation of textures.

Although I will take inspiration from Company, I won’t base my magazine on it as I still think that theirs is too girly to be appropriate for my target audience.

Audience Research

Target audience:Females aged 17-21 - studentsSocioeconomic group: As and BsTribe: Indie Scenesters and Creatives

This target audience has influenced my magazine because it meant that I have to use more youth-orientated language, images and article topics in order to sustain interest.

These tribes will want a unique and unconventional magazine. They will also want it to be creative, artistic and interesting.

Audience Viability

This was the title page that was made to go with both mock up 1 and 2. I wanted it to be a light hearted image so as to attract the target audience and make them want to read the actual article. The purpose of my mock ups was to experiment with the article itself and also the layout of the 2 DPS’s.

Mock up 1

Audience Viability (continued)

Mock up 2

Audience Viability (continued)

Audience Viability- Feedback

Comments: • “ I like the little comment ‘another clever person’”, “it’s funny, but still gets the message

across”• “it’s more informative”• “seems more personal and especially because it’s talking about 18-24 year olds, the language

used seems more appropriate for that kind of an audience. The other one seems more like a newspaper article rather than a magazine spread.”

• “I thought the 1st one was hilarious but the 2nd article is much more developed… The layout and simplicity of the 2nd DPS is much better than the first. Such a good design it’s a shame to cover it up.” (referring to the 1st DPS layout)

• About the 1st article- “It was funny, more informal”• “prefer layout of first one. Smaller chunks of text so more readable. Also like the tick boxes.”• “I like the layout of the second one best because on the first that white block just blends in too

much”• “Love the Downton reference, like the layout of the first one better, like the content of the first

one better too”• “I prefer the first one, it’s more fun”

Improvements:• “mix seriousness with a bit of non-seriousness and emphasise how Facebook makes people think

about what other people think about them and their image, making comparisons with other, and judging popularity etc… The first one needs to be less jokeyish but it does read a lot easier.” However, in response to this, someone else said that it shouldn’t be less comical “especially considering it’ll be for people around our age. I think if it didn’t have jokes in people would get bored of reading it.”

• “maybe a bit less text but keep the questionnaire”• “maybe make the facts in the ‘did you know?’ box a bit easier to read by separating them”• “take the text of the first and format it like the second”• Would change the title to Facebook: Under The Thumb- the ‘of’ takes away some of the impact

The Magazine

My magazine is called RAVE. I chose this name because of the youth-orientated connotations the word has – dance/ music and ‘ranting and raving’. I thought these could be applicable to my target audience tribe. I also thought that this would allow me to write about a variation of topics such as social issues and music. Also, ‘rave’ is a short, punchy word with lots of energy – mirrors target audience.

Front Cover

• Layout - simplistic, minimalistic (general feel of whole magazine).

• It will act as the contents page as well.• Spider-diagram-like – RAVE will be in the middle of the page with

the articles names/sell lines and pictures around it.• Will also have page numbers on so articles are easy for target

audience to find• Images will be a mixture of cartoon and photographed images

from the articles. Links back to my aim of using different mediums and textures.

• Like Company, collage-y/ informal feel - make it accessible to the target audience

• Active layout- needs to be attractive to grab audience’s attention- so its not thrown away.

• Colours - mainly black and white, with a few splashes of colour

• Variety of fonts throughout the magazine so as to make it more visually appealing – it will keep it fresh- looking.

RAVE

Youth-orientated

‘Ranting and raving’ – applicable to target audience

Allows me to write about varied topics – music and social issues

Short, punchy word - energy

This will be an interview with rising star and local talent Andrew Backhouse. I will be talking to him about his podcast, his celebrity interviews and his increasingly successful future career in the music industry. Because he’s local, it fits with the Northern Echo’s community values.

The tone of this should be jokey and light- hearted. The imagery will include a visual play on the article name whereby a radio microphone is stood in front of him, while Andrew is having to lean to the side so as to not be covered by the microphone head. Other images will include him DJ-ing at Latitude festival (1 of the topics that will be discussed in the interview).

The article will include a break out box of Andrew’s advice on how readers can make a name for themselves in the music industry. This will also fit with the Northern Echo’s aim of helping the community.

Article 1 – The Man Behind The Mic

Article 2 – Under The Thumb Of Facebook

This article is about modern society’s addiction to Facebook. This is a social issue which is what I found to be the most read article type by my target audience.It will be a comical, sarcastic tone that will entertain the reader. Again, the imagery will be a visual representation of the article name where a model will be looking up, comically scared with the Facebook thumb over her head.

The main colours will be black, white and blue/purple. The DPS will basically look like Mock up 1 with a few details altered. I will take into consideration what the target audience said I could improve on it.

Article 3 – Make Do and Mend

This will be a ‘DIY’ article on how to transform a tired piece of generic clothing into something more stylish. I thought this would appeal to my target audience because they are students and so have less disposable income. They also hate waste-culture as creative tribes so I thought that this would appeal to them. This should also satisfy the aims of the Northern Echo as they want to protect the needs of the community and so the local environment – recycling.

The article will be a step-by-step guide on how to make something. Each step will have its own picture and then a small amount of text that gives extra direction. At the end of all the steps, there will be images of a model wearing the finished product.

Alternative Article 3

As an alternative to ‘Make Do and Mend’ I will create an article called ‘I Wear Your Grandad’s Clothes - I Look Incredible.’ This is a line taken from a song (Thrift Shop) that the target audience are likely to know.

This will be a photographic fashion feature focusing on the ‘old-man style’. It will include images of a model wearing various ‘grandad’ style clothes including baggy jumpers and tweed blazers. I think this will appeal to the target audience as this style is quite indie and alternative which is what my magazine is all about.

Commercial Viability

Commercial ViabilityI made a loss of £2383.40. My main expenditure was the printing costs. Because I was a free supplement to the Northern Echo, I had to print the same number of copies as them (40,000).

When collecting my personnel and equipment costs, I calculated them to their maximums so I think in reality these costs would be a lot smaller.

I think that if I create the high quality magazine that I think I can, my magazine would be likely to be a success and so with each issue, I could charge more for advertising space and so make more revenue.

However, I could rethink my distribution channel by changing to a retail strategy so that my revenue would be from sales as well as advertising.