Content of my features page

Reader Profile

We looked at NME's Reader Profile to help us create our own. NME's profile included facts such as Key Stats, NME reader quotes and short paragraphs about music. I didn't want to over crowd my page with pictures because i wanted to keep a minimalist look about it. I wanted it to look smart and i think i achieved that with the font i decided to use and the use of only black and white colours.  Including relevant pictures to the genre of music seemed appropriate as they link into my magazine and help show what the magazine is about.

Results of Questionnaire

To find out what my target audience are like, I created a questionnaire for them to fill out. I generalised the results to get a general idea.
The majority or people lives busy lifestyles, whether it be school or work. This means I'll need to magazine easy to read and portable. I found out almost everyone who answered my questionnaire do download music, so including websites and songs for them to download could be a good feature. The genre of music people most liked was 'trance/house' music, so creating my magazine specifically for this genre of music, will relate to these people. Most people would happily pay £2.50-3.50 for a decent magazine they can rely on. Other types of media the people i asked used was mainly Radio and TV, so features related to these types of media can appeal and interest them. Social places they visited was generally clubs for example Ministry Of Sound, so writing articles on pubs wouldn't interest my target audience. The ages ranged from 16-22 so house style and house colours need to appeal to these ages and the gender was a complete mixed bag so it also needs to appeal to males and females. Including free objects such as posters and Cd's would encourage people to buy my magazine too. Most people said they only buy music magazines once or twice a month so making my magazine into a monthly thing, will keep those who don't really buy them happy as if i did a weekly magazine, people may stop buying it because they've missed out on other issues or just don't have the time.

Flat plan of features page

Forms and Conventions and Target Audience of another music magazine

As you can tell, Top of The Pops uses completely different forms and conventions to NME.
The mast head goes all along the top of the front cover and uses a serif typeface. They use a pink serif typeface as that appeals to the audience that its trying to attract and helps connect with their young audience. The mode of address TOTP uses is quite a casual way to speak to their audience. Their cover isn't full of writing and the writing which is there, isn't formal or hard to read. As you can see, they've decided to use a lot of brightly coloured graphics such as pictures and words. What they achieve by doing this is catching peoples attention to their magazine and try to encourage them to buy it. They have used cover lines to summarise the most enticing features and articles which are inside the magazine such as ''54 star style essentials'' to persuade a reader to buy this magazine.

Forms and Conventions and Target Audience of a music magazine

The masthead on NME is always in capital letters and always uses the house colour red. Excluding the strapline, everything written on the front cover is all in capitals. The masthead is always in the top left corner which follows the housestyle.

Brand Identity is used in NME to make it easy to identify what magazine it is. Things they use is putting the masthead in the top left corner on every issue. The colour and typeface used is always the same so it is easy to distinguish NME to other magazines. The mode of address used by NME is quite casual and they use a laid back type of language. No formal words are used to it can related to their younger audience. NME has a mass audience which appeals to both genders aged from late teens to mid 30's.

The cover of a magazine needs to be able to attract their readers. NME does this by using bright, distinctive colours and lures are used to encourage them to buy the magazine and read the rest of the article. Direct address is also used in this example of a NME front cover to give the buyer a sense of connection with the magazine and influence buyers.

Evaluation

One convention which I have decided to use in my magazine is the same typography throughout my media production. I decided to do this as I wanted to keep my magazine simple and neat so using the same font created this image. Most mastheads on the majority of magazines are either in the middle or far left, I decided to put my masthead on the right hand side, as well as the other text on my front cover. Doing this followed my idea of a neat magazine look and didn’t make it look like my text was all over the place. I followed the look of a simple contents page as I didn’t want to make it look too different so the point where people couldn’t make sense of it. I didn’t want to overcrowd my magazine with a lot of graphics so I only used 4 images, one consisting of a medium close up on the front cover.
As my magazine was produced for a private female school, the look I was going for was a simplistic, smart but unique which match’s the schools reputation. It represents an upper class readership, specifically for sixth formers ages 16-18. The reason I did a magazine for only sixth formers is because the majority of the content wouldn’t relate to the younger member’s of the school so they’re less likely to pick up a copy of the magazine anyway. The antique look I went for represents the typical old fashioned view on a private school and show’s the school in an old but modern fashion.
The institution my magazine would be distributed by would be the school and would be given away for free. It wouldn’t be distributed by another other institution such as WHSmith or something because it simply won’t sell as it wouldn’t appeal of the people who go in there. The audience of my magazine is female’s ages between 16 and 18. Seeing as it is a school magazine, it is created for students so things about school are included. If someone else who wasn’t a student read this magazine, it wouldn’t appeal to them.
The smart look about the magazine attracts the audience it is set out to attract. The font of the text is formal but not so formal that sixth formers wouldn’t look at it. Including pictures of people who are actually from the school will attract the students of the school as it will actually relate to them and lure them in to pick the magazine up. Including articles in the magazine which students would like to read about such as ‘events coming up’ which is relevant to their age will attract the audience as they would like to read about things they can do.