At first i thought of the magazines that are out there today, starting with the typical young/middle aged womens gossip, fashion and tv magazines. Then for the demographic of older women. The stereotypical house wife where we are introduced to the health, creativity, psychological and cooking magazines. For teenage girls we are shown famous boys, health related and celebrity topics. For the young men we are brought the explicit magazines, car, bmxing, biking, gaming, music and electronical magazines.Finally for the teenage boy demographic we are brought the stereotypical gaming, sporting and music magazines. My fisrt instinct was to reproduce a magazine that my interests relate to, fashion magazines. However to really get an insight on how magazines work i think creating a production for a demographic that i cannot relate to as easily will help me really consider the codes and conventions magazines use to appeal for their demographical target audience. One area in which i realised that wasn't well covered was for the demographic of older, more mature men, maybe with a comfortable, well of family at home, waiting for that big promotion at work, or for their business to really take of. The kind of dominant men of the household.
So i began to think what are this demographic interested in, and what they want from a magazine...
Older male INTERESTS IN GENERAL:
-CAREERS
-FAMILY
-TECHNOLOGY
-ENTERTAINMENT
-WORLDWIDE NEWS/ POLITICS
-WOMEN
-APPEARENCE
-FUTURE
However my magazine will be aimed at a smaller demographic, of middle/upper class working men. These will be educated, mature and knowledgeable, and so are more likley to have SPECIFIC INTERESTS:
-POLITICS (will be opinionated men and are likley to have their own party in which they support)
-ECONOMY (are likley to have own buisinesses in which they will need to know about the current climate, inflation, the rate of house prices, the best time to buy new technology etc, when to invest, when to sell, house prices for their next move.)
-TECHNOLOGY (the latest gadgets to run in their business)
-HOME LIFE AND DOMESTICS (will have a family at home in which they would support, would look to a magazine for advice, and common problems.)
These i believe are the three main things in which my demographic will be intersted in, but there is not an overproduction of these magazines in the market already. SoWhat magazines are out there for these men already?
So what are the codes and conventions of these magazines? -They are simple, fairly masculine/neutral colours, maybe incase a family member may find interest in an article within the magazine.
-Have bold, often white text wich informs the demographic of the appealing articles within the magazine.
-The front cover features a stereotypical image of the middle aged, middle/upper class man (the exact demographic). This helps when promoting the magazine as the demographic will search for images before text to find what they are seeking, in other words the magazine will be eye catching as they can empathise and understand the image on the front cover.
-The stories feature the stereotypical interests of the specified demographic. the stories are life inspiring and cleverly worded, "10 real adventures for mere mortals" wich is perfect for the middle aged educated man who wants a bit of excitement in life.
Some nice insights here Emily - well done! Since you've identified some specific genre codes and conventions, it might be an idea to look at one example in close detail and even look inside at the adverts; they might provide some further insights into target audience and persuassive techniques.
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