Q4. What would be the audience of your media product?

Overview of what was covered in the above video:

My primary target audience is male mainstreamers between 18 and 25 in the ABC1 social bracket. My secondary target audience is both genders between 16 and 30.  I decided to target my magazine predominantly at men because there is a larger male readership of music magazines. Furthermore, the indie genre is dominated by male artists and bands, although there are successful females. Therefore, I feel males are more likely to relate to and identify with those featured in the magazine. This was reflected in my contents page, where only one article focused on a female artist. The others were male artists, all male bands or male dominated bands.

I have chosen to target a psychographic audience of mainstreamers for several reasons. Firstly, mainstreamers offer the largest target audience for my magazine, meaning I have the potential for a higher readership. Also, indie music is becoming an increasingly popular genre and has become quite a mainstream genre, with artists such as Ed Sheeran and bands such as Coldplay and Kings of Leon getting number one singles and albums. Moreover, indie music has recently become a popular culture, with fashion trends being one of the biggest influences indie artists have had on culture. Indie artists such as Lana Del Rey increased the popularity of the vintage clothes trend. Therefore, my magazine aims to target this indie-pop audience.

The ABC1 social bracket is likely to have more expendable income. Therefore, those interested in reading my magazine will have the money to purchase it. The magazine would have a monthly circulation and for this reason, I have chosen to price my magazine at £3.99, because this is the average price for monthly music magazines. Due to the age of my target audience (18-25 year olds), those in the ABC1 social bracket will be university students and white collar workers. This is why I assume that readers of the magazine will be busy and have tried to tailor my magazine to people who are ‘on-the-go’, having it available to purchase on tablets and smartphones. I targeted this age bracket also because they will be interested in current music news and about the industry itself. A younger audience would not be as interested about the artists and what they have to say about their music and would rather read more about their personal lives.

In my magazine, it is clear that I have targeted the ABC1 social class through the size and tone of the article. I chose to write the article in this way as this potential audience is stereotypically better educated than those in the C2DE bracket.

My secondary target audience is both genders between 16 and 30. Though I have tailored the magazine to a male audience, who are likely to identify with the male artists, there are still female artists featured and mentioned throughout the magazine. Furthermore, indie music has both a male and female fan base. It is also likely that female fans of the indie genre would be attracted to the male artists. Therefore, I am likely to have some female readers. Also, I extended the age bracket for my secondary target audience because there are likely to be a few readers who are younger and some who are older, yet still have the same interests as my primary audience.

Both NME and Q are magazines comparable to mine; both of which have a largely male readership. However, Q’s target audience is older than Indievisual’s. 64.5% of Q’s readers are aged 25 or older. NME’s target audience encompasses my own, targeting 15-34 year olds. This means that I would be in more direct competition with NME than with Q. Stylistically, Indievisual is more comparable to Q, with a black, white and red colour scheme and organized layout. This reflects the target social class, as NME’s readership is largely from the C2DE social group. Both Q and NME do cover indie music; however their focus is usually on pop rock. For this reason, I feel than Indievisual may be comparable to these existing magazines, but would have a potentially new audience that would be similar, but not the same as Q or NME.