How does your product represent particular social groups?

To attract my target audience I had to use imagery and text which they could relate to, this was generalised to reach mass audience however specific enough to bring in the correct age group. I represented a young demographic within a total age range of 12-30. I had a fairly large age range as my main theme being music and the genre of rock is liked by most ages. The sub theme I included in my magazine is art and this is also appreciated within the range of ages in my target demographic which was proven from the questionnaire. My magazine presents for both male and female however I believe it would edge more towards the male gender. I purposely didn’t include any purples or pinks anywhere in the magazine as I knew the females I was trying to attract would not be attracted through stereotypically “girly” colours. I did however use a boy on the front cover of my magazine, the boy is young and I used him to apply female gaze to the magazine, girls being interested in boys would be stereotypical for females, I had to juggle what would and would not attract my female audience carefully. I didn’t just use the boy to attract females – I believe this young successful band member would be what my male target audience aspire to be like and would look up to him and the direct mode camera shot would help the boy believe he could achieve what the musician has. I had to represent my target audience in a positive way so they would like the magazine and develop a relationship with it. A lot of the cover lines and mentioned features are all about rock music rather than other subjects; this specificity represents my audience as being strongly passionate towards their interest, this is a really strong trait to have as a person and through this suggestion I am representing my demographic in a positive way. To attract the younger side of my target audience I included a feature on my contents page which covers the story of a boy who uploaded a video of him playing a difficult guitar song perfectly to the internet, this hints that my audience are up to date with their technology and would have the knowledge and access to get onto the internet to watch this clip, I am re-representing them as having good technological knowledge. The men I targeted as my audience wouldn’t not be classed stereotypical men, that is the reasoning for not including any sports information anywhere on my magazine - sports are in connotation with men in the media’s eyes. My target audience would be classed as in between working class and middle class on the socio economic scale, my design features were based to attract these groups. My masthead’s typeface Tranquilla had scratches over the lettering, this scruffiness not only reflects the rock music genre but also the working class, the working class are sometimes viewed as “rough” I don’t think this would put my audience off as they often are proud that they are not upper class. The layout of the magazine isn’t scruffy and is in juxtaposition to the masthead, I believe this combination would attract in both working class and the middle class successfully. My demographic would balance more towards the working class, because of this I decided to include a free guitar pick – this would gain audience satisfaction as in my questionnaire I asked if freebies would entice the audience to buy my magazine, the majority answered yes, the majority also answered yes to when I asked them if they play any music themselves therefore the guitar plectrum was the perfect item to give away; the use of the work “pick” instead of “plectrum” would attract a younger demographic as this terminology is what they would know this item to be called. I believe my magazine products represent their demographics successfully and the target audience would be attracted to how I’ve constructed the magazine.