This grid shows the results from the NRS readership survey from July 2008- June 2009. It shows a list of general magazines. The headings at the top state the ages of people who read them and in the appropriate column (the highlighted one) it shows my choice magazine and it shows how many men, women, and the ages who read them. From this chart you can see that the majority of people who read top of the pops magazine are females, and hardly any males read it. In particular, people who are over 45, don't read this magazine, with only 0.1% of the population reading it.
I have begun research into the pop magazine genre, and in particular 'Top Of The Pops'. From my research i have discovered that this magazine is generally for ages ranging from '11-15 years', with 87% of the readers being girls and just 13% being boys. I got this information from the top of the pops advertising website; http://www.bbcmagazinesadvertising.com/Magazines/Top_Of_The_Pops.html
I think that in order for your magazine to be a success you need to make sure that you feature articles that would appeal to people of that particular age group. so for my magazine I will have to do some research into the type of things that 11- 15 year olds would want to read in a pop magazine. To find this I will probably ask my younger sister, as she is 13 years old and she knows the type of things people her age would like to read. Also I will read as many recent pop magazines as I can so that I can get some ideas of what to feature in my magazine and what sort of articles I could consider for my double page spread.
In terms of the demographics for this magazine I don't really think that you can give it a socio- economic classification as it is more of a childrens magazine. However I think that you can say that these type of magazines wouldn't be the type that the 'A' class (high rankning professionals such as doctors and lawyers) would want their children reading, as stereotypically you would expect that they would want them reading something more intellectual. Simply because it is a childrens magazine, I am struggling to see how I could pass and socio- economic judgement, but if it was completely necessary I would say that it is more likely that the B-D classes would read this magazine as it does require some reading and it is certainatly not the type of magazine a pensioner would pick up in a shop and consider buying.
In terms of psychographics I believe that it is more likely that 'Mainstreamers' would read this magazine as it appeals to many types of people and it includes people and issues that most people would know about and be familiar with, and this would suggest that this would be the type of magazine for average children who like pop music, boys and gossip. I also believe that it would appeal to succeeders, as these people don't like to flash the money they have, and it is possible that they would buy this instead of a more upper class magazine simply because they enjoy reading it and it interests them, instead of showing off how much money they have by purchasing a more affluent magazine.
The other magazine that i will be looking into is smash hits! This magazine was "which was essential reading for teenagers during its peak in the 1980s" and was immensely popular until it closed down in 2006, due to a huge decline in sales. This magazine is mainly aimed at kids and was described as a "much-loved mag for kids for 28 years." The two websites i used to obtain this information about the magazines were ;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/newsid_4670000/newsid_4673300/4673300.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4673136.stm
Again with this magazine, making sure you hit the interests of the target audience right in the face is essential to success for the companies. This magazine is a little bit more alternative pop, compared to top of the pops, but it still uses similar features as part of its attraction for its target audience. To ensure that the magazine is successful the publishers and creators would have to select specific articles from a particular area of interest, and they most probably carried out surveys when deciding what to put in their magazines.
In terms of this magazine, I think that it is most likely to appeal to most readers. Similar to the 'top of the pops' magazine I believe that the high rankning professionals or 'A' class, wouldn't really want their children reading this magazine as it doesn't seem as intellectual as others they could get them to read, but I think that if they were well off and their children asked for it then they would get it, possibly because their parents have the money to do so. This suggests to me that people who are on benefits, and in the extreme cases, possibly don't have the money for anything but the essentials to live on each week, wouldn't get this magazine because they wouldn't have the funds to do so. Similarly to the 'top of the pops' magazine i believe that this magazine would appeal more to the 'B-D' classes.
Secondly I think that this magazine would again be for 'mainstreamers' rather than any of the other categories. This is because it again includes issues and celebrities that everyone is familiar with and the gossip which people will probably have read about, but would read again from a different perspective. This magazine probably doesn't appeal to individualists as it doesn't have anything that is completely different to everything else going on in society. Also it wouldn't appeal to aspirers as it isn't a magazine that would stand out as showing wealth or status so this would probably not even be looked at on the shelf and would be ignored for things such as 'Teen Vogue'. This magazine could possibly appeal to succeeders, as these children may enjoy the articles in this magazine and would buy this magazine because they enjoy and don't feel the need to flaunt their money.
To summarise the information i have researched i think that my average reader for the magazine I create will be female, and will be between 11 and 16 years of age. They will be into pop music and particularly celebrities, most obviously the ones who are in the media spotlight either all of or at the current time. I think that they will be the sort of people who have posters plastered all over their rooms and who are interested in reading all the 'gossip' about celebrities.
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