Thursday, 15 January 2015

Evaluation: (Question 5) What kind of media institution might distibute your product and why?

My magazine is aimed at a mass audience, therefore I need to find a media publishing house that has a mass audience. My magazine does not have a niche audience it has a mainstream audience.Bauer and Timeinc are popular choices of publishing house. Both publishing houses publish magazines that are similar to my media text. Bauer publishes Q magazine. Q is similar to my media text. It is a similar genre. I have used similar conventions. I would also like to attract a similar audience to Q. I think my target audience is similar to Q's target audience.
Below is some NRS figures taken from Bauer's website.

Here you can see the total readership of Q magazine is 377000. This explains the popularity of Q magazine. I want my magazine to successful and this would a readership total that I would like to have. When looking at the breakdown of what audience is reading Q, this is also similar to what I want to achieve. Q magazine seems to be more popular with younger people. Also people in the ABC1 social group more commonly read this magazine. This would be my ideal demographic. Something that I would hope to be different about my readership is that I would like more females to read my magazine. I find surprising the small 1.4% of 65+ reading Q. This is the idea discussed previously of the Penumbra effect. I would be pleased if my media product attracted a small, unexpected audience. This would show the success of my magazine.
Whilst these NRS figures are credible for Q and Bauer I think I should compare this another publishing house. Timeinc is another successful publishing. A popular music magazine that is published by Timeinc is NME. Timeinc was previously known as IPC media. NME is very similar to my magazine. It is designed in a very same way and it gratifies a similar audience. To find readership figures for NME I went onto the NRS website. 
 So the total readership is 154 00. NME has an even lower female readership.  From these figures it would seem that Bauer is a more profitable publishing house to  choose, it attract a greater audience. I should also consider that Q magazine can still be bought in print form. In order to buy NME you would need to subscribe. Perhaps I should asses the idea that having my magazine published by Time inc could lead to it becoming online only. Despite the readership figures I should also look at what media institution would suit my magazine more. Both publishing houses have magazines similar to mine but I need to consider what publishing house would be a better representative of my magazine. On Bauer's website one on the first things they advertise about themselves: "Bauer Media reaches over 22 million UK adults every week".  This suggest to me that Bauer media are clearly proud of the figures their magazines receive. It tells me this is something they want to maintain this. They also state on their website that  how they achieve these if with "a portfolio of world-class, multi-platform media and entertainment brands. It creates and curates entertaining media content that audiences love whenever, wherever and however they want through a multi-channel strategy and a focus on product excellence and audience insight."  I like that the Bauer media's focus is on the audience and providing a good service and like the idea that this whenever and however. I feel this is suggesting that Bauer a mixture of print form and online. On Timeinc media's website this is something you would find if you clicked the section where they explain about themselves: Over 90 brands. 50 global offices. Millions of loyal consumers. One-of-a-kind experiences. Countless conversations.  I like the idea that Timeinc advertise their loyal consumers. It almost suggests that it doesn't matter what form the magazine is available to  read because its customers are loyal and they will still read it anyway.  The one of a kind experiences is interesting it could possibly convey this would a riskier choice. The numbers used on this website advertise how big the company is, rather than the audience it attracts. 

On Evaluation I think the media institution that would publish my media product is Bauer. Bauer media seems be a successful  media institution. It relies on its popular brands and big audience. I think my magazine would be suitable for Bauer because it is similar to a brand that Bauer all ready successfully publish (Q). I am confident that my magazine would attract a large audience that appreciate music and would take the time to read my magazine. Being published by a well-known and popular media institution would be ideal for the distribution of my magazine. I also believe that having my magazine available in print form is something that is important to me and my magazine.  We live in the computer age. So many things have been made easier by technology. However I believe that you should be able to hold a magazine and keep a collection of magazines. I feel that going in a shop and looking through a magazine and deciding if you want to buy it, is the best way to buy a magazine.  Now I have gone through the process of making a magazine, I have started to appreciate the thought and time that goes into making a front cover. I now realise  how much work goes in to attracting an audience.  This is why I feel for this work to be truly appreciated a reader of a magazine should have a hard copy of the magazine they buy. They should be able to keep it forever. I think I am not the only magazine reader that has this opinion, so I believe Bauer is the right media institution for my media product, because I want the chance for my magazine to be on a stand in shop.


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