analysis of mastheads

So far we have been analyzing music magazines in the classroom. We have basically been focusing on the target audience and have been trying to think about the type of people who will read the magazines , their demographics and their psychographics. Demographics   include  characteristics such as their gender, race and age etc. Psychographics include characteristics relating to personality, values, attitudes, interests, or lifestyles. I have been looking at many magazines including the magazine Top Of The Pops & NME magazine. We found that the mastheads of magazines can tell us the characteristics of the magazines target market. Here is one of the mastheads that i have looked at :

From my analysis of the TOTP magazine I found that the target audience of TOTP magazine was for young girls aged from about 7-13 years old. The psychographics of this audience  best suited this publication because of the bright pinks and yellows used along with other bright colours. The publication also provided free stickers including justin beiber and cheesy quotes reading 'bite me'!!! It featured interviews with the famous JLS who have many young female fans. The adverts in this publication also show that the magazine is aimed at young girls as they are advertising womens toiletries and advertise special offers for make up products.  The magazine isnt much money for the target market and if so it is likely that parents would but them this magazine.

The target market for this magazine in my opinion are boys who are in to the kind of Rock/Indie music from the age of 13+. This audience best suites the publication because of the dark colours in the publication. Majority of the bands featured in this magazines are also male. They also advertise things like computer games and boyish films and appeals to the typical emoish type of boy. I think mainstreamers are the main type of people that buy this type of magazine because there are alot of features on the way certain artists live and those who buy this magazine "follow the crowd"

By looking at these magazines it has helped me on what type of things i would like to add in my own magazine. It is important to have a target market to produce a product  so that it can sell well and so i know what to add into it eg. features, quizzes etc.