Research!! - UK Top 40

UK Top 40


These are the UK top 40 for march this research was to determine how much music from the dance genre makes the top 40 and from first glance owl city is in the top 40. This shows how niche dance is whilst yet being popular in terms of magazine sales and also success in the charts therefore, i feel as though my choice to cater to the niche audience of dance is a good one.

• Position
• Last week
• Artist
• Title
• 1
• 1
• TINIE TEMPAH
• PASS OUT
• 2
• 2
• RIHANNA
• RUDE BOY
• 3
• ***
• JUSTIN BIEBER FT LUDACRIS
• BABY
• 4
• 4
• ELLIE GOULDING
• STARRY EYED
• 5
• 3
• JASON DERULO
• IN MY HEAD
• 6
• 6
• ALICIA KEYS
• EMPIRE STATE OF MIND (PART II)
• 7
• 5
• FLORENCE / DIZZEE RASCAL
• YOU GOT THE DIRTEE LOVE
• 8
• 10
• CHERYL COLE
• PARACHUTE
• 9
• ***
• GABRIELLA CILMI
• ON A MISSION
• 10
• ***
• MCLEAN
• MY NAME
• 11
• 7
• TIMBALAND FT KATY PERRY
• IF WE EVER MEET AGAIN
• 12
• 31
• LADY GAGA FT BEYONCE
• TELEPHONE
• 13
• 11
• OWL CITY
• FIREFLIES
• 14
• 8
• NAUGHTY BOY PTS WILEY FT EMELI
• NEVER BE YOUR WOMAN
• 15
• 23
• BLACK EYED PEAS
• ROCK THAT BODY
• 16
• 16
• CHIDDY BANG
• OPPOSITE OF ADULTS
• 17
• 12
• GRAMOPHONEDZIE
• WHY DON'T YOU
• 18
• 18
• YOUNG MONEY FT LLOYD
• BEDROCK
• 19
• 13
• DAISY DARES YOU FT CHIPMUNK
• NUMBER ONE ENEMY
• 20
• 9
• BOYZONE
• GAVE IT ALL AWAY
• 21
• 15
• JLS
• ONE SHOT
• 22
• 17
• KESHA FT 3OH3
• BLAH BLAH BLAH
• 23
• 14
• SUGABABES
• WEAR MY KIss
• 
  
  
  
  
  • 24
  • 24
  • LADY GAGA
  • BAD ROMANCE
  • 25
  • 19
  • LEONA LEWIS
  • I GOT YOU
  • 26
  • 33
  • PIXIE LOTT
  • GRAVITY
  • 27
  • 22
  • JAY SEAN / SEAN PAUL / LIL JON
  • DO YOU REMEMBER
  • 28
  • 20
  • GLEE CAST
  • DON'T STOP BELIEVIN'
  • 29
  • ***
  • STEVE AOKI FT ZUPER BLAHQ
  • I'M IN THE HOUSE
  • 30
  • 25
  • 3OH3 FT KATY PERRY
  • STARSTRUKK
  • 31
  • 27
  • JOURNEY
  • DON'T STOP BELIEVIN'
  • 32
  • 29
  • IYAZ
  • REPLAY
  • 33
  • 32
  • LEMAR
  • THE WAY LOVE GOES
  • 34
  • 30
  • FLORENCE & THE MACHINE
  • YOU'VE GOT THE LOVE
  • 35
  • 21
  • MARINA & THE DIAMONDS
  • HOLLYWOOD
  • 36
  • 28
  • JAY-Z FT ALICIA KEYS
  • EMPIRE STATE OF MIND
  • 37
  • 37
  • MUMFORD & SONS
  • THE CAVE
  • 38
  • 36
  • KESHA
  • TIK TOK
  • 39
  • 38
  • GLEE CAST
  • DEFYING GRAVITY
  • 40
  • 34
  • MARY J BLIGE
  • I AM

Research!! - Institution and Distribution

Institution and Distribution!!


After some research i have found that the institution that i want to produce and distribute my magazine is IPC and this is because IPC is a very large company as they produce over 85 iconic media brands. Also simply their print brands are read by two thirds of the women in the UK and 44% of the men whilst having their online brands collectively reaching 20 million users a month. IPC is the leading UK consumer magazine publisher and therefore, would be an ideal choice for my magazine giving it a head start from the beginning. IPC also publish for some of the biggest music magazine companies around such as NME and therefore, would be an ideal choice as they are already experienced in the music magazine area.

Research!! - Artists (Calvin Harris)

Research For a Dance Magazine (Artist - Calvin Harris)

I also chose to analyse an artist called Calvin Harris’s image as it keeps with the style of magazine that I am going to create and he also caters to the dance genre in music and therefore, he is an ideal candidate in giving me ideas for the artist that i am going to make. In this image he is in a pool of balls whist wearing some unusual glasses. In this image you can only see his head and he has a very neutral facial expression. This image connotes his originality in the artists pose, surroundings and costume whilst also showing off his popularity in the sense that he is able be in an image such as this. Again this style of image is very different to ‘conventional’ images of artists and again looks amusing and appealing to the reader being male or female. It has similar bases to the image of Basshunter but in a completely different way and this is why I chose to analyse this image it has given me numerous ideas as to how to create my artist.

Research!! - Artists (Basshunter)

Research for a Dance magazine (Artist - Basshunter)

In order to create a celebrity for the dance magazine that i am going to be making i need to research the image of musicians/celebrities who cater to this genre currently therefore, this would give me the foundation in creating my celebrity. The first artist that i have chosen is Basshunter he is Swedish artist who caters to the dance genre. This is a good and interesting image as it follows the abstract theme that is going to be unique selling point as his image is not “conventional” one of the reasons why I chose to cater to the dance genre is because of its uniqueness to other genre’s. Basshunter in this image is in a very particular pose in clothing which portray him as being slightly ‘mischievous’ and as a rebel and then to oppose all this he is holding a rubber ring which is used to save life’s by lifeguards. This image adds a sense of likeliness to his character and adds the fun factor as this picture whilst maintaining his status and popularity as a major artist looks amusing and appealing at the same time. In my opinions it appeals to males using the status and amusement aspects and then appeals to the female part of the audience due to artist being male and dressed smartly which could appeal to the female part of the audience.

Research!! - Target Audience

Target Audience! 

In order to create my magazine cover, contents and article appropriate to my target audience i needed to find some information out and this was done by handing out a questionnaire out to five girls and five boys aged between 16 - 18 years which to whom i decided to make my target audience as findings from this questionnaire suggested that there where not any magazines released which catered to this specific niche target audience along with the genre's they are interested in.  


Firstly i had to create the audience questionnaire in which i would ask relevant questions to find out information on what my intended audience are interested, it consisted of 10 questions which had a box to tick where relevant in most questions the participants where allowed to tick more then one box. This is what it looked like:

Here are two filled out forms by an anonymous male and female: 

The following are the results that where obtained after the questionnaire had been completed by all the participants:

The age range that I am planning on catering to are teenagers aged from 16 - 18 however, it also cater to ages up to 25 as it is a young peoples magazine. Therefore, I gave this questionnaire to people aged 16 - 18.

In order to get a fair representation of my target audience i handed the questionnaire too five males and five females in order to get unbiased opinions and information which would give me direction in creating a successful music magazine cover.

The next question was to determine what type of genre's my intended audience would be interested in and the results i gained where that the genre which i was intending to cater around is alongside R&B the most popular genre that was listened to by teenagers aged 16 - 18. However, I feel as though this genre alongside this age group is not properly catered for and therefore, i feel as though this is what i plan on doing,



The proof for my previous statement was in the following question of my questionnaire the question was asked on whether they had any knowledge of whether a magazine was currently out that catered to their age range and the genre's that they are interested in and all ten members that took part in my questionnaire where not aware of any magazine that currently did this and this supported my idea of creating a magazine to rectify this.

I needed to know whether people aged 16 - 18 currently purchased magazines as then my choice to create a magazine for this age range would be wrong and this is what i found. I found out that 90% of the participants involved in filling this questionnaire at least occasionally purchase magazines and 60% within that regularly purchase magazines. This is very positive information as this age group is interested in magazines and therefore, not having any magazine that tend to this age group leaves a big gap to which needs to be tended to and this is why i am catering for this age group.

Following this the next question which needed to be asked was whether the participants would actually purchase the magazine if one came out which tended to this age range along with the genre that they are interested in and surprisingly all the participants agreed that they would purchase it including the 10% that showed they did not usually purchase magazines.
Therefore, it would be smart to tend to this category.

To keep within the intended audiences interests the question needed to be asked of whether the magazine would need to be a weekly or monthly magazine this is also because this information would then determine the cost of the magazine as a weekly magazine would cost much less then a monthly magazine and also the contents of the magazine would be much higher if the magazine was a monthly as to a weekly. Results showed that the majority of the participants preferred the magazine to be a weekly magazine i feel as though this would be because they want to be kept up to date with the latest releases and artists along with news.

As expected following the previous question the prices expected to pay for the magazine where of the lower choices as the most popular release time table for the magazine was weekly so it was expected that participants expected to pay much less however, surprisingly some participants would pay a little more for a magazine that catered to their specific age and music interests.

This responses to this question where very interesting as this question would determine what topics the intended audience would be interested in. It was found that the female audience where interested on gossip where as the male part of the audience where interested in news. However both male and female participants where interested in new releases and artists which was predicted.

This question was just asked to ensure the type of artists that my intended audience would be interested in as female audiences could be more interested in male artists and vice versa  for males. However, all the participants where interested in all types of artists.






All these results gave me valuable information as to what the contents of my magazine could be and also what the interests of my intended audience are.

Research!! - Circulation Figures

Circulation Figures!!

For further research I needed to find circulation figures for music magazines in order to determine how popular the genre of music that I am attending to is on a much wider scale which then would give me direction to work on my niche audience. This was posted early 2010.

These are the circulation figures:

• BBC Music 42,810 (45,144)*
• Classic FM 32,534 (35,751)*
• Classic Rock 71,242 (70,301 / 70,188)
• Computer Music 17,427 (18,261)*
• Future Music 10,862 (10,860)*
• Gramophone 32,313 (34,628)*
• Hot Press 18,394 (19,387)*
• Kerrang! 41,125 (43,253 / 52,272)
• Metal Hammer 41,777 (46,004 / 50,269)
• Mixmag 26,116 (30,159)*
• Mojo 98,484 (97,722 / 100,507)
• NME 38,486 (40,948 / 48,459)
• Q 94,811 (100,172 / 103,107)
• Terrorizer 11,641 (13,786)*
• Top of the Pops 107,576 (119,739)*
• Uncut 75,518 (76,526 / 87,069)
• Word 26,555 (34,280)

I was happy to find that similar magazines to mine such as 'mixmag' are here selling some of the most number of magazines. This tells me that the dance genre although being a niche genre as it is not on as larger scale such as R&B and hip hop is still quite popular with people and i hope that my magazine follows a similar trend. I find that the dance genre is particularly popular with the younger adults however. these circulation figures have given me a wider insight into the popularity of dance magazines as they are more popular then predicted.  

Research!! - My USP (Unique selling point)

My unique selling point!!

A lot of music magazines base their unique selling point around showing major stars on the cover and include them in their magazine I feel as though I want a truley original unique selling point on my magazine cover. Another unique selling point for a magazine cover could be all the competitions that can be entered and the prizes won on a magazine cover however, this is not what i am aiming for. I feel as though to attract further audiences my unique selling point will be the abstract look of my magazine civer which will not specifically cater to a minour audience which will cater to a much larger audience. I have chosen this as my unique selling point because I feel as though my idea is original and not taken from the conventions of other magazine covers. By abstract I mean I am going to make this magazine cover look completely appealing by my use of colours, effects and images which would amplifiy the image of a star through colour and by showing a love of music.

Research!! - My initial ideas!

To begin with my ideas where to have a boy band in total 3 which would take priority on my magazine cover. My other ideas where that I should create a dance magazine consisting of DJ's or other artists who prioritize the dance genre for example "Basshunter."

The genre's to which i was considering doing based off my initial ideas where:

• R&B
• Dance
• Trance

Overall, i feel as though i want to create a magazine based around the dance genre as i feel this genre is not as widely known as other genre's such as "R&B" etc. Also i chose this genre as it would be a challenge for me which i am looking forward to take part in.

The audience to whom I am hoping to target are teenagers and young adults which was one of the reasons why i kept in mind certain genre's. As my mind was leaning towards the dance genre i decided to also find some artists who specialize in this field such as:

• DJ Tiesto. 
  
• David Guetta. 
  
• Basshunter.
  

 I found these artists as they can also provide me with an image as to which i have to base my own characters around. Also these artists give me a deeper insight as to how i should create my dance magazine and also of how it should look like along with providing me with key information about what topics to place on my magazine, how to make the cover look, how the heading shall look and also as to which audience i should be targeting as the magazine should also be made according to the age range and/or sex you are targeting as different groups have different interests and expectations on magazine catering to there specified group.

My ideas at presant are to have a single character on the magazine cover and this is who I am going to make the main DJ on my magazine an upcoming youngster. The colour scheme that I am going to keep on my magazine is lime green and black and this is how I am going to make my magazine cover look abstract and this is going to be the foundation to the appeal of my magazine cover.

Research!! - Feature Article

Feature article!!

This is an article from a popular music magazine called mixmag and this article is about a group called 'The Teenagers.' This article has a very simple layout as there is one major image on the left hand side of it and then text on the right with the main header spreading in the middle of the left and right hand page. The color scheme used is very appealing and grabs the readers interest. The image of the group also is appealing to both males and females because the male artists are there to impress the female readers and their surroundings added with their posture and facial expressions could be in place to make the male audience look up to them.

As written in the article as the 'filthiest songs' this suggests to me that this article is ironically aimed at teenagers at phrases such as that are there to entice the reader to read on in the article and then this would repeat itself. The journalistic style in this article is very friendly and inviting whilst being informing at the same time. The images along the side and next to the header also add to the effect that this article has on the reader and is there to persuade the reader to read on.

This article has given me good direction in how to make my article not only look but how it should be written for the reader to keep the reader interested.

Research!! - Magazine (mixmag contents page)

Research for a magazine cover! (mixmag contents page!)

This is the contents page of a magazine called mixmag. This magazine cover is suites the magazine in terms of the colour scheme and over all appeal along with the images and text along with the colour of text used. This contents page based on the  images used is aimed at both males and females encouraging them to read on as there are males in these images which and add the sex appeal and also a female. Although this does not necessarily  mean they where there to add the sex appeal but also as they could be aspirational figures who both the male and female audience look up to and there fulfilling their purpose to make the viewer read on.

These images also dominate the page similarly to the main cover however, have a lesser role to the text which direct the reader to go to the wanted page. Following this a convention of a contents page is to have the header at the top of the page and this contents page caters to this as it is located in the top right hand corner on a magazine contents page just before the text on the page and therefore, it is seen first. Finally the list of contents in under sections which are lined out by subheading e.g. "VIP," this is a typical convention of a magazine cover. Overall, this contents page convinces the reader to read on as it looks appealing due to the images, style of text, colour, topics etc.

Research!! - Magazine (NME)

Research for a Dance magazine! (NME)
The is a music magazine called NME and this is a magazine based on all the latest groups and songs that are around. The also provide the latest news on artists and songs and is basically solely music in general based. I chose to analyse this music magazine cover because it amplifies the group shown on the main cover's image and appeal well and the positioning of the members of the group is done well which amplyfies the groups over all appeal well. This done by placeing the single female in the group at the front of the cover in an extravogent pose which would appeal the male part of the audience and the four males in the background however, still maintaining their appeal due to their poses and this appealing to the female part of the audience there based on the arrangements of the members of the group the appeal is done well. There isn't however a specific colour scheme to this magazine cover that is immediately visibe but the colour used does look appealing and does grab the readers attention especially the logo "NME" and the name "PARAMORE" which is wriiten in pink and stands out from the dull colours on the page for example: the black that the band are weraring.  I feel as though this magazine cover in particular is aimed at a much wider audience including males and females aged between 18 - 30 this is because the characters are all very young and appealing and this would attract the much younger audience. The appeal to the older audience would be the retro look that the band personnify.

The header used on this magazine looks very appealing and does stand out on the page whilst at the same time looking appealing and not clashing with any colours that are around it. The colour used on the header makes the header look very appealing and easily visible which would attract audiences. The image used on this magazine cover is of a band called paramore and this image suits the magzine cover because it is very simply and yet attractive due to the positioning of the band members on the cover as mentioned before.

The mode off address on this magazine cover is DIRECT mode off address and this is because all the band members are looking directly into the camera and this dennotes there personna as well as style as based on the image and their stance alone a lot can be drawn from it. This cover has given me quite a few ideas as how to make my imagazine cover.