Research

These are the questionnairre results I have received from 20 people (click to view larger image).

This shows that my results are from nearly equal amounts of boys and girls. This means I will have the results if I decide to create a gender neutral magazine which is useful because both genders buy music magazines. I think, from these results, that I will create a uni-sex magazine because the results are from nearly the same amount of girls and boys. 

This graph reveals that I mainly have results for 16-20 year olds, therefore, my target audience will be for people between this age group. The second most common age is 5-15 so I could also target my magazine for young teenagers too. This will be easy as my friends and I are of this age range and also read music magazines. This is also the most common age to buy music magazines so it will appeal more to it's suited target audience.

 

Using this data, we see almost half of my resposes' favorite music is rock, therefore, it would be appropriate to create a music magazine of this genre if the target audience is most interested in it. I am interested in Rock myself so this genre would be easy for me to create, I will analyse Rock magazines to get a better idea of the layout. Another popular genre of music, coming joint first with Rock is punk, so i will consider creating a magazine of this genre as well, I have lesss knowlege of this genre so I will need to do research on bands and the codes and conventions of the magazines. The third most popular genre appears to be Indie, I will also consider creating a magazine of this genre if it is popular within this target audience.

This graph shows what the audience will expect from the magazine and what they find most interesting. It shows that most preferred keeping up to date with bands. This is very helpful as it means I know to definately include the latest information about bands suited to the genre of the magazine. The second most popular was exclusive interviews, this tells me that including interviews with popular bands would make my magazine appeal more to my target audience.  

From this, I have a good idea of how much i would sell my magazine for my target audience. The majority of people have said they would pay £3 for a magazine so I will aim to sell mine for around £3. A quarter of people have said they would pay £3.50, so this will be my highest price to sell it for. Also, the third most popular price is £2.50, so I know not to sell my magazine for any lower than this. I will probably sell my magazine for about £3 as that is in the middle and the most popular price. I will also do some research into how much other music magazines are being sold for that have a similar target audience to me.

With this information, I know that 75% of my target audience are interested in their favorite celebrity's lives, therefore, I know to try to include it in my magazine. This will be easy as long as I write about the right celebrities that are being most talked about at the time that my target audience would want to hear about. As for the other 25% who either aren't bothered about reading this, or don't particularly like reading about celebrity's lives, I know to include other features in my magazine apart from just this to still attract readers that want to read about things apart from this.   

Using these results, I know that if my magazine were to include a free gift, I could raise the price of it slightly, as most of the target audience are willing to pay more. What with my selling price ranging from £2.50-£3.50, if  decide to include extra accessories or gifts then I will aim to not make the price any higher than £3.50. Also, three people said that they would not pay extra, so I do not want to highten the price by too much. I will search the most common selling price of a music magazine to give me a clearer idea of what my target audience would pay. 

This gives me a clear result of what would attract my reader's attention to the magazine. Nearly all of my responders have said that a large image of their favorite singer or band would attract their attention to the magazine. Therefore, I know that if I use an image of a band or singer suited to the genre of the magazine, it would have a huge impact on whether my target audience would be interested in buying it. I will analyse front covers to see how they have created their magazine to attract their readers.  

Over 75% have said that they look up to celebrities wearing the latest trends. This helps me because I know to include a buzz line exclaiming that the celebrities are wearing a certain popular brand of clothing. Also, in the mise-en-scene I will include the band or singers to be wearing something that my target audience would want to be wearing. Regarding the four people who either don't look up to celebrities or aren't bothered, they would still want the bands or singers to dress to suit the genre of the magazine. I will still include buzz lines encouraging readers to want to wear the clothes, and perhaps it will still attract the people that don't seem bothered about their clothing.

  

 With these results, I can identify that the most popular pages are 'News updates'. I know to definately include this within my magazine as it appears to be an audience expectation of a music magazine. 'Latest news on concerts', is another popular page, if I were to include this, I could link it in with 'lastest news on celebrities' within the double page spread. 'Interviews' and 'Band reviews' is also popular. I coud easily include this in my magazine, making sure I include the right kinds of bands, saying the right kinds of things to suit it's genre and target audience. This will help me as I have a clearer idea of what to include on my two-page spread, but I will analyse Rock, Indie and Metal double page spreads to give me an example of how they manage to target their audience.

 

If I decide to do a heavy metal magazine, this will help me with the styles and presentation of the front cover. I will make sure I use the same techniques to create the same connotations as this magazine. I will bear in mind what things they have advertised and what they have included in their sell and buzz lines. I will also try and create the same atmosphere that the main image has crreated.  

This analysis of a rock/punk magazine will help me if I decide to create a magazine with a Rock genre. This will give me a clearer idea of what colours, styles and techniques to use when I create my front cover. I will think about how these codes and conventions attract their target audience and aim to advertise, present images and make good use of graphics as Kerrng have done. I will also think deeply about what title to give my magazine, as Kerrng have cleverly use this word as it is the sound made when a power chord on an electric guitar is played. This is clever because the bands that this magazine include play songs with loud guitar solos within them, making this kind of sound.

This magazine analysis will help me if I choose to create an Indie magazine. I can identify the techniques, styles and colours they have used, I will try using the same techniques they have used, including the facial expressions of the main image, the mise-en-scene and the typography they have used and take these into account if I create a magazine of this genre.



 

Using these magazine analysis' it will guide me as to what to do on my contents page. I think I will follow the codes and conventions they have used by using three or four colours. I will also include images of bands at their concerts and put the page numbers on them to help the reader navigate more easily. I will also put a letter from the editor (me) in the contents page because I think it is effective and helpful as it contains an over view of the magazine.  

All about IPC

IPC Media (International Publishing Corporation) is the UK's leading consumer magazine and digital publisher. IPC creates content for multiple platforms, across print, online, mobile, tablets and events. They engage with 26 million UK adults – almost two thirds of women in the UK and over 40% of men in the UK.  Connect is one of three magazine publisher divisions for the mass market women. SouthBank is for the upmarket women and Inspire is for men. Their award winning portfolio of websites reaches over 25 million global users every month. They also sell over 350 million copies every year.

These are some of their brands, so they work with a wide range of magazines, including NME, a popular Indie Rock magazine. They range from having just a female target audience, to a male target audience, to having a wide uni-sex target audience of all ages.

Their mass market women's division comprises famous women's weeklies including Now, Chat and Woman; TV entertainment brands including What's on TV, TVTimes and TV & Satellite Week and the goodtoknow network. Connect's magazines are read by 9.4 million mass market women, which equates to 49% of all mass market women, while its digital brands reach over 5.3 million unique users and deliver 35 million page impressions every month. IPC Connect serves its consumers in the following key sectors: celebrity and fashion, lifestyle, traditional, TV and entertainment, real life and casual gaming.

Their men's portfolio, IPC Inspire, has a wealth of leisure brands including Country Life, Horse & Hound, Rugby World and Decanter, as well as lifestyle brands including Nuts, Mousebreaker and NME.  Its portfolio of 38 brands covers a huge spectrum of interests, such as: Country, shooting, equestrian, marine, sport, men’s lifestyle, music, cycling, descanter and technology.

IPC Southbank is their upmarket women's division and comprises luxury fashion brands including Marie Claire and InStyle, lifestyle brands including woman&home and Essentials and home interest brands including Ideal Home, Livingetc and housetohome. This division focus on the three key markets of Fashion, Women's Lifestyle and Home Interest. Southbank is home to some of the most iconic magazine brands in publishing and reach a readership base of over ten million.

 

Bauer Media

 

Bauer Media is a division of the Bauer Media Group, Europe’s largest privately owned publishing Group. This Group is a worldwide media empire offering over 300 magazines in 15 countries, as well as online, TV and radio stations. They also span over 80 influential media brands, ranging from Heat, Closer, GRAZIA, MCN, HM, MATCH, parkers, Magic 105.4, Kiss 100, 4music and Kerrang! . They reach over 19 million adults with their brands.

Bauer Media Radio advertising

Bauer media radio has two portfolios in which they advertise their brands using. Bauer place portfolio offers the chance for brands to engage personally with loyal, local communities in specific geographical locations and brands seeking to engage and appeal to consumers emotionally will fit into the Bauer Passion Portfolio.

Stations in the Bauer Place portfolio support local communities and strive to deliver more relevant local programming and to unite listeners in the places they live. Dictating the premier cities and towns across the UK, Bauer Place is big in all the relevant places, as commercial market leader in all of our 21 markets, including London, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Belfast and Southampton. Some of their radio stations are: West FM, Downtown radio, Coo, FM, Forth one, Clyde 1, Magic 1161, MFR, Magic 828, Radio City, Magic 1548, Magic 105.4, Metro radio, Rock FM and Wave.

Bauer Passion portfolio is the home of passionate, iconic brands dedicated to music and lifestyle, designed to unite listeners around their interests. This portfolio includes dance music station Kiss, rock music brand Kerrang!, iconic music brand Q, celebrity brand heat, and the UK’s biggest commercial digital station, The Hits Radio.

Bauer Media magazines advertising

Bauer Media's portfolio of influential media brands includes many of the best known magazines in the UK, which deliver excellent content to their audiences. This provides an excellent platform for any business to reach their target audience through an effective magazine advertising campaign.
In any given publication period 9.9m people in the UK will read a Bauer Media Magazine.

In their women’s magazine portfolio, it includes magazines such as: CLOSER, GRAZIA, HEAT and more! This portfolio covers a broad range of interests from celebrity, fashion and lifestyle with heat, delivering celebrity news and gossip; to real life news and celebrity stories with Closer. GRAZIA reveals the world of fashion and brings complete glamour and designer fashion to its readers, whilst more! delivers weekly gloss to its readers.

 

 

Metal Hammer

 

Metal Hammer is a monthly heavy metal music magazine published in the United Kingdom by Future Publishing, and in several other countries by different publishers. Metal Hammer articles feature both mainstream bands and more unusual acts from the whole spectrum of heavy metal music. In Germany, Metal Hammer has been the market leader since it was launched in 1984.

Wilfried F. Rimensberger first came up with the idea of Metal Hammer and owned Metal Hammer Uk Ltd in 1983. Before the magazine got published, Rimensberger suggested to Kerrang! that they should publish a German version, but they were not interested. He then gave the idea to Jürgen Wigginghaus, publisher of MusikSzene magazine, and proposed the idea of a multi-lingual rock music publication. He also approached some of Europe's largest publishers such as Springer, Ringier and Bauer, but none were interested. 

During it's peek, it got published in 11 different languages across the globe - at the time largely outselling Kerrang!. Metalhammer had local language editions in countries such as Israel, Japan, Serbia, Spain, The Netherlands, Italy, Poland, Hungary, France. Metalhammer was also the first Western youth publication in the Soviet Union.

He later sold it to Wigginghaus, but remained an advisor to him until the early 90's. Rimensberger also promoted the first Lorelei Metal Hammer festival, with leading metal acts such as: Metalica, Motorhead and Venom. This gave the magazine more popularity. He also linked the name Metal Hammer with successful brands such as the BBC Friday Rock Show, MTV metal show and Castle Donington Monsters Of Rock Festival.

Metal Hammer in the UK also includes its website and iPhone application which both feature original and exclusive content from news, reviews and interviews to multimedia and Metal Hammer TV. 

 

I will try to use the techniques this magazine uses as it is a very successful magazine, aiming it at the same target audience as I am. 

 

 

Kerrang!

Kerrang! is a UK-based rock magazine, it is also the world's biggest selling weekly rock magazine. It was first published on 6th June 1981 by Bauer Media group. It was initially as a one-time supplement in the Sounds newspaper, which focused on the New Wave of British Heavy Metal phenomenon and on the rise of other hard rock acts. Launched as a monthly magazine, Kerrang! began to appear on a fortnightly basis later, and in 1987 it went weekly. The original owner was United Newspapers who then sold it to EMAP in 1991.

They named it 'Kerrang' because it is the sound of an electric guitar when a power chord is being played, which are commonly played in the long guitar solos of rock/metal band's songs.  

They originally started producing and printing the magazine in a small printing house, and now it is a world wide magazine. They now have 6,600 employees and a £1.6 billion annual turnover. The magazine, however, has a niche audience because their target audience is young people, mainly male, who would have to be interested in the older 'thrash' bands that were around in the 180's and 1990's.

Kerrang! includes full page advertisements for music companies such as HMV and Play.com as well as promoting other retailers such as Virgin, Playstation,  xBox, alternative clothing and jewellery manufacturing and concert ticket lines.

There are many interactive features of this magazine, readers are given the chance to send in their drawings of singers/bands, photos of spotted celebrities, letters, gig reviews, competitions and the chance to win a Kerrang! bag if they send in a completed cross word. The Kerrang! team are also linked in with social networking sites such as: Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. This encourages readers to follow them and gain access to celebrities pages.

Kerrang! has been proven to be very successful at it's advertising; a survey showed that 83% of Kerrang! readers bought an album because of an article in their magazine. Kerrang! also has their own radio station and music channel, also very successful, which encourages readers to read the magazine as well.

I will try and make my magazine a lot like this as they are extremely popular and have the same target audience as me. I will try and use the same techniques they use to attract my target audience.