Reader Profile for my Magazine

Preliminary Task

This is the front cover of a college magazine my group produced for the preliminary task. We went around the college and took photos for the main and secondary images, and used  the best quality image for the front cover. Although it has been slightly stretched, I am happy with the image we chose as it depicts 2 students sitting outside the campus on the wooden bench. The name we all agreed on is 'Student Life!' as it is straight to the point and makes college seem exciting and fun.  

On the cover we have also included the official college colours to make it official. Down the left side of the cover we have included all the cover lines, then the puff in the bottom third which explains that there is a free notebook, and also an upcoming trip to paris. The essential information is in the bottom right corner and shows the price, barcode and date of release, although we did forget to include the issue number - so I will make sure to add that to my final magazine I produce. 

This is the finished contents page, which has a slightly basic look to it, and we still stuck to the official sunderland college colours to show that it is in a college magazine. We also mentioned the article being about the new building, and included an image of it being built, the page number and a short summary to show it is the main article. Down the left side we talked about the other articles throughout the magazine with all the page numbers. We also shown an image of the free sunderland college notebook that comes with this issue of the magazine.

Here are the flat plans my group created for the front cover and contents page of our college magazine. I think we stuck to the guidelines we decided on very well, although we didn't mention any colour or font ideas on the plan - just where the major conventions will be placed.

Survey Results

Question	Average Answer	Reflection on Results
What is your age?	Most of the people I surveyed were around 15-17	As a lot of the people I asked said they do read magazines, I should aim to appeal to this age range.
What genre of music do you listen to the most?	Lots of people said either rock or pop, mainly rock.	Although I was planning on doing a magazine strictly based on pop music, I may have to broaden the horizon of what artists/bands I include in it so I can appeal to a wider audience.
Who are your favourite bands/artists?	Arctic Monkeys, Rihanna, Lady Gaga, Kasabian, Katy Perry, Blink 182.	Since I have knowledge of who people listen to, I can include all of these artists in my magazine.
How many music magazine do you buy every 3 months? (0-1, 2-4, 5-7, 8+)	The average answer was 5-7 magazines within 3 months.	This shows that most people don’t buy every single issue of the magazine they read since they didn't choose the 8+ option, which makes me think I should only have 2 issues per month. This will also make the readers anticipate the next issue more.
Would you want to go to music festivals? If so, which ones?	Most people said yes, and mentioned festivals such as Download, V festival and Leeds/ Reading.	As my readers will go to festivals like these, I should probably include information about them in the magazine, and give them a chance to win free tickets. I should also set up a stall at the festivals where my magazine will be available to buy, so I am directly appealing to my target audience.
How much do you think a music magazine should cost and why?	The average price was around £2-£3, as it is fairly cheap and affordable.	Because my audience are probably in their teens, they most likely won’t have a part time job and won’t be making any money, so I will make my magazine on the cheaper side so it is still affordable to those who are unemployed.
What do you look for in a music magazine?	Some suggestions were articles about current music, fun interviews and some reviews on new releases.	Although my main selling point is going to be fun and informative music reviews, I will make sure to include some of the suggestions so it will appeal to the audience as this is what they are looking for.
How much do you spend on music per month?	Mainly around £15+	As most albums are fairly dear, we will include a chance to win a certain amount of albums in every couple of issues, and will also include a free album every so often.
What would you like to see on a front cover?	The majority of the people said they’d like to see celebrities, famous artists and bands.	Since I have an idea on what bands/artists my target audience likes, I can find good quality images and use them in my magazine.
When you see an article, do you read it in full or just skim-read it?	Almost all of the answers were that they just skim-read the article.	As around 75% of the people won’t read the article properly, I will make sure to use bright colours and eye-catching fonts to draw them into it and convince them to read it in full.

The Simpsons Movie Poster

For media I have created a poster for The Simpsons movie using Photoshop. Some of the tools I used were transform, text, and colour. I took an original image of Homer Simpson holding onto a donut, and pasted it over the top of the word 'movie' that was used on the actual poster to make it original. I also used the official Simpsons logo and changed the colour to black, to draw more attention to the word 'movie', and the release date. 

I found an image of the entire town in The Simpsons and made that the background of the poster, to show that the movie is relating to the TV program. I found Photoshop fairly easy to use as I have a small amount of experience using it in other subjects, although I have still discovered a few new helpful tools.

Magazine Institutions Research

Reader Profiles

Kerrang! have created a reader profile for the magazine to show what the average reader is like. The age range for readers is 15 - 24 years old (making the average age around 19), with a few older readers too, and 60% of the audience are male. The readers are typically fairly intelligent individuals who enjoy social media, fashion and video games (who buy around 30 albums every year). Almost all the readers - 87% - buy the magazine every single week. They are also tend to spend a lot on music, purchasing an average of 6 albums per month; which is 53% more than the national average. They also are 8 times more likely to spend £200 per year than a non-reader of Kerrang!, and are 5.5 times more likely to go to a rock concert.

95% of Record Collector readers are male, with an average age of 44 years old (90% aged between 30 - 59 years old, and 68% between 40 - 59). 15% of their readers tend to go to a live concert at least one time a week, and 36% listen to live music once a week or more. Their audience will probably own around 2144 vinyl albums, and 1046 CD's. The magazine welcomes a large range of genres, which means the audience will also probably listen to a lot of different kinds of music. Their current circulation is around 35,000, with a readership of at least double that figure.

The average Metal Hammer reader is a young male, with an average age of about 22. 41% of the readers are in employment, with 51% studying. The audience spend approximately £113 per month on things like music and concerts, half of them will see music at least once a month, and 79% will be attending some sort of festival within the next year. A lot of the readers play some sort of musical instrument, as 2/3 play the guitar, and 1/3 are in a band. 41% of the readers have made some sort of purchase because of reading the magazine, and 61% have visited another website. 

Proposal Forms

Proposal Form (Basic)

Describe your idea for the brief: The cover will include a main image which will be a photo of a band/artist, all the essential information, and the cover-lines will list the articles included inside the magazine. The contents will also list some of the essential info like the issue number and the website, and all the different articles will be put into different categories such as reviews or interviews which makes things easier to find.

Genre/ sub genre: list similar texts which have inspired your thoughts The genre of magazine will be music, and the genre of music will be mainly pop, although will occasionally sometimes include other genres. The magazine that has inspired me the most is Kerrang!, as even though the music genre isn’t the same, they clearly show what is included in the magazine, and use bright colours and appropriate fonts to attract the target audience (early teens – mid 20s)

Target audience: gender/ age/ characteristics/ behaviour The target audience will live in quite a busy place with supermarkets nearby, and will be in a middle class family and area. The magazine will hopefully attract a male and female audience who are in their teens, with a fairly normal and enjoyable upbringing, and are close with their family and friends.

Major conventions I will use The masthead each week will simply be the name of the magazine, the main sell-line will be the reviews of the new music and concerts, the essential info like the release date, price and so on will be in the bottom right corner.

Conventions I may subvert/ change/ not use I will probably use most of the conventions of the magazine, although I will slightly change them so the magazine doesn’t seem too cluttered. For example, the colours and fonts will complement each other so they don’t clash too much, there will only be one image on the front cover, and not too many other images throughout the rest of the magazine.

Original images: what/ where/ what If possible, I will get some friends together and book out the studio in the college so I can take some photos and pretend my friends or music artists and I will use the photos for the images through the magazine.

Potential difficulties/ Plan B: If creating a physical magazine is too much of a difficulty, I can find a way to make a digital version and distribute them online instead of in newsagents.

 

Proposal Form (More In Depth)

Type of Magazine (fashion, music, etc)	The type of magazine is going to be a music magazine.
Name of Magazine	BEATS
Audience (male/female)	It’s going to be mainly a female audience, although hopefully we can attract a male audience as well.
Audience (attitudes and interests)	Of course the audience will have a liking to music, probably around 16-19 although some younger and older people will also enjoy the magazine. They use social media quite a lot, have their phone out constantly, have a fairly good behaviour in school and have a good education. They are a part of an average family with enough money to get by, and they enjoy following all the current trends.
Outlet (where it can be bought from?)	Although they can mainly be bought as a physical copy in local newsagents and certain music shops, digital versions will also be available on their website, which will be advertised using social media such as Twitter and Facebook.
Necessary Information	The amount I will charge for the magazine is around £2 - £3 as most of the target audience won’t have a part time job and don’t have access to a lot of money, so it’d be better to keep it quite cheap. The issue number, date of release, website, price and bar code will all be located in the bottom right corner of the front cover.
Selling Point	The magazine will include reviews of things like new songs, new albums and concerts, including some reader-submitted reviews and ratings, giving the readers some participation in the creation of the magazine.
Theme (article)	Each week the main article will be about the most popular song/album of the week, and will include colours and fonts that will change every week, and will relate to the certain topic.
Images Front Cover	The image on the front cover will be of the band/artist that the main article is about.
Images Inside	There will be various images all through the magazine, mainly photos of bands/artists, or single/album covers for the reviews page.

Proposal Form (Potential Problems)

Potential area where there might be a problem	How I will deal with this problem
Front cover images	If any of my friends aren't available for a session in the studio, I will have to find an acceptable image that I have took of a band I saw live and use that as the main image instead.
Article Inside Magazine	If there are no topics to write about in an article for the week, instead there will be a special article about the music popular song/album of the year at that point, or an interview with a artist/band.
Images to accompany article	If I can’t find any suitable images for the main article, I will just use the cover photos of the album/single of the artist/band that the article is about.