MUSIC MAGAZINE SURVEY ANALYSIS

SURVEY MONKEY

PAPER SURVEYS

EXCEL PIE CHARTS

GENDER

One of the elements I needed to find out, and have successfully done so is the general gender of my audience. It has been established that the audience is more male dominated, according to the online survey, given that there were 19/30 respondents who were male. The paper survey also agrees with this fact as there were slightly more males responding too, with 60% being male. This may have been the case that my surveys was initially sent to more males than females, thereby, it will have skewed my data slightly, in consequence. However, by this virtue, I can make the decision to focus my magazine based on a more male-dominated audience, which means that it would be convenient to make certain representation which would appeal to males. For example, in relation to my research into the codes and conventions of magazines, certain magazines which were more male-dominated, such as NME, The Wire and UNCUT, represented men to be more dominant and superior - usually having men on the front cover and in the centre of visual interest of almost every page. Judging by this fact, I aim to conform to this particular code and convention of magazine, so as to relate to my magazine audience more. Having said that, a reasonable amount of females have also responded to my survey, hence I would need to represent women within my magazine as well, so as to appeal to this potential audience as well.

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEYFemale

40%

Male60%

AGE

Age is another vital piece of information which determines what the average ages of my target audience is. According to my online survey, the majority of respondents were 18 or younger. In fact, over 70% of respondents were of this age, which takes up the majority of the respondents. It may be the case that despite the range of people I sent my survey to, it is still the case that younger people tend to be more internet savvy. In this way, they will have accessed the survey more actively than the older respondents, and therefore, it skews my data largely. However, with the combination of my paper survey, I predominantly allowed for people aged between 18 and 30 to respond to the survey. 21-30 year olds still dominated the responses with 70%. I did this purposefully because this is the ideal age range I would like to aim my target at, and now that I have the data of the people of this age, I can focus my magazine based on what they have said throughout the rest of the survey. Also, by having a clear idea of the average age of my audience, likewise with gender, I know that the language I use, as well as the colours and images will have to relate to the target audience, and represent this specific audience well.

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY18-2030%

21-3070%

HOW OFTEN DO YOU TEND TO BUY MUSIC MAGAZINES?

Weekly30%

Monthly20%Bi-monthly

10%

Rarely20%

Never20%ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

My third question was related to the frequency in which respondents usually buy and read music magazines. This is a particularly significant piece of information to know given the fact that the more frequently people buy this media product, the more knowledgeable they will be in terms of knowing what makes a successful music magazine. In reference to my online survey, the majority (60%) never read music magazines, which is slightly dis-heartening as it means that they may not necessarily know what makes a music magazine successful from not having first-hand experience. Nevertheless, a small percentage do read it between weekly to rarely, therefore they will have a clearer idea as to what should be incorporated into the magazine. In comparison to the online survey, my paper survey was dominated by people who read music magazines weekly (30%), and therefore this is slightly more reassuring as overall, it means that I have a reasonable number of people who read music magazines frequently, and therefore their information will be particularly meaningful and usable. Only 20% of people never read music magazines, therefore this is data that I can rely on to that extent.

WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR FASHION SENSE?

Casual 10%

Smart Casual 80%

High-end fashion 10%

I was also rather interested in finding out the general fashion sense of my target audience because I believe this is important in terms of being able to represent my target audience within my magazine. For instance, I know will what clothes to use when planning for the photos which will be added in my magazine. Both surveys have come to the agreement that smart casual is the general fashion sense of the respondents. In fact, interestingly, it shows up as 80% for both surveys to be more popular than casual or high-end fashion, thereby I know that when it comes to taking photos and props, I will have to keep this in mind in order to represent my target audience accordingly.

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

IN TERMS OF CONTENT, WHAT DO YOU LIKE/EXPECT TO FIND IN A MUSIC MAGAZINE?

Interviews with upcoming

artists15% Album/single

reviews14%

Music news14%

Concert/performance reviews

12%

Information about upcom-ing concerts/festivals/gigs

12%

Music album re-leases11%

Competitions5%

Free Gifts9%

Images from music events

8%

This question was particularly necessary to ask as it refers to the content that I could potentially put into my music magazine. I will use this information as a guide, particularly when constructing my contents page, to know what should definitely be put into the magazine as I will know from this data that readers will want this to appear in the issue. Both magazines are agreed that aspects such as the interviews, reviews, news and upcoming information are essential for a music magazine, therefore they should be included in the magazine. However, aspects such as competitions and reader interactions are not as appealing or expected. In the online survey, there were 30% of people interested, compared to only 5% from the paper survey. Similarly, just over 10% of people from the online survey were interested in the reader interactions, compared to 0% of interest from respondents from the paper survey. This is interesting because usually music magazines still include some of these aspects, although they were possibly not very well advertised, and are simply not as appealing. However, there was still some interest, and as a result, I am going to include it in my magazine nevertheless, but only very subtly i.e. reserve no more than a page for this feature.

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

WHICH GENRE WOULD YOU BE MOST INTERESTED IN BUYING AND READING ABOUT?

Indie 60%

Rock 30%

Folk/acoustic 10%

As you can see, this question was focusing on choosing between which genre out of the three I had provided, would be their favourite to buy and read about. Before sending out the questionnaire, I had some idea of which genre to focus my music magazine one, however, it wasn’t 100% and I was expecting the responses to consolidate this for me. I had also done a considerable amount of research into magazines of this similar genre, hence why it would be time efficient to focus on the production of my own magazine in a similar genre of music, too. Interestingly, both surveys have agreed on indie music being the most preferred genre to read about. However, to analyse that in more detail, the online survey indicated that it was very close between rock music and indie music by the minute difference of 0.13 in their ranking scores. However, the paper survey shows a much stronger preference to indie music rather than rock, with indie being at 60% and rock at only half of that: 30%. That said, folk music was the least favourite, and therefore I can rule this one out. Nevertheless, given the closeness in scores between rock and indie music, not to mention the closeness in music material, I may even go one further as to combine the two genre. By this, I will focus my music magazine on Indie-rock music.

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

PRICE – HOW MUCH WOULD YOU BE WILLING TO PAY FOR A NEW MUSIC MAGAZINE?

£0.99 - £1.99 10%

£2.00 - £2.99 60%

£3.00 - £3.99 30%

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

This is a piece of information that I was interested in knowing, as the price is particularly significant in determining whether people would buy the issue or not. According to my online survey, the most favoured price category is £0.99-£1.99 with over 40% suggesting this. Interestingly, the paper survey responses indicated that the magazine could even be at £2.00-£2.99 with 60% suggesting this price range. I believe that overall, a price of no less than £0.99 and no more than £2.99 would definitely be reasonable, especially given the fact that it is a new magazine that isn’t particularly well-known. By having the magazine at any more than this may deter people from tasting the magazine.

WHAT KIND OF ELEMENTS MOST ATTRACT YOUR ATTENTION ON A FRONT COVER TO MAKE YOU WANT TO BUY A MUSIC MAGAZINE?

Popular artists8%

Colours8%

Headlines20%

Quotes10%Images

20%

Incentives18%

Layout2%

Editorial features12%

ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

This was another essential question to ask, given the fact that one of my tasks is to create my own front cover. In that case, these are the elements on the front cover that would most attract people to actually buy the magazine. In relation to the online survey, the element which would most attract people is if there were popular artists on the cover. 80% were in favour of this, along with the headlines and images being key aspects (over 50% of respondents opted for these elements). However, the least popular elements were typography, quotes, colour and quotes, which is interesting because I would have expected that these offers and aesthetics would encourage people more to buy the magazine. Clearly it is more about the content which encourages people, hence the headlines and images being rather than the visuals. On the other hand, the paper survey showed that far less people believed that popular artists are what would encourage people to buy the magazine, as only 8% opted for it. As it happens, 21% of respondents would still be encouraged by the headlines and 21% for the images, but also, these respondents were more interested in the incentives, editorial features and quotes. It is clear that both surveys are in agreement with the fact that the colours and typography are least important, however, I will still ensure that my magazine is of top quality. I prefer to take the data from the paper survey about incorporating less of the popular artists, as I would prefer my magazine to be more about unknown artists.

DOES IT MATTER TO YOU IF THE MAGAZINE MOSTLY COVERS UNKNOWN ARTISTS/MUSICIANS?

Yes 20%

No 80%

ONLINE SURVEY PAPER SURVEY

This links in with the previous question about contents and aspects that would encourage people to buy the magazine because I am concerned that people may not be interested in buying a magazine mostly about unknown artists. The online survey shows overall that it matters to people if the magazine consists mainly of unknown people. Nevertheless, there is only a slight difference, where just over 50% of people said ‘yes’, and just over 40% of people said ‘no’. In terms of the paper survey, there was a much bigger difference of 80% of people saying ‘no’ – it doesn’t matter that there are unknown artists/musicians. This is very reassuring given the fact that I would prefer that the magazine be focused more on unknown artists as it would be more interesting and keep the readers curious.

WOULD A FREE GIFT (I.E. A FREE CD) ENCOURAGE YOU TO BUY THE MUSIC MAGAZINE?

Yes 90%

Other 10%ONLINE SURVEY

PAPER SURVEY

Lastly, this question refers to the research I had previously done about the codes and conventions of magazines, in that some of the magazines I had researched included free gifts, i.e. a free CD. I believe this is a strong incentive to encourage people to buy magazines, therefore I wanted to know if my specific target audience would be encouraged as well. Overall, according to the online survey, it shows that over half of the respondents would be encouraged, or simply it did not matter to them, with only 10% of people saying a free gift would not encourage them. This is almost identical to that of the paper survey, in which 90% of respondents said that they would be encouraged, compared to a minute 10% who said that they wouldn’t be encouraged. In this way, I am confident that most of my readers would benefit from a free gift, hence I will add this into my magazine.

CONCLUSIONOverall, my magazine surveys have consolidated the ideas I have about the plans for my music magazine, and have enabled me to make reassured decisions based upon my responses. Firstly, I have decided that my target audience will be male-dominated, although I will still cater for females. Also, the average age range will be around 18-30 year olds, because I feel I would personally be able to relate to a younger audience more so than the older age market. Moreover, as aforementioned, I had some idea about the genre of music my music magazine would focus on, however, I know now that it will focus mainly on Indie Rock music, due to the popularity of this from the responses I received. I can also relate my planning to my research, as I researched on magazines mainly focussing on this particular genre, like ‘NME’ and ‘UNCUT’. Furthermore, in terms of the clothing and props I will use in the images that I will include in my magazine, they will include a smart casual fashion sense as this is generally what my respondents relate to, and this will therefore enable them to relate to my music magazine through these appropriate representations.

In terms of how much the magazine should be priced at, I have decided that the starting price will be £2.40. The most preferred category was £2.00 - £2.99 and I believe, for a new magazine, that £2.40 is a reasonable price to pay. In addition, I am going to make the magazine be published weekly, based on the fact that the majority of respondents still read music magazines weekly. Also, magazines such as ‘NME’ that I researched publish weekly, which means that I can take inspiration from that as well.

In relation to contents, respondents were very keen on issues including interviews with and information about upcoming artists, reviews on concerts and performances as well as albums and singles reviews and images from events. Only some were keen on competitions and reader interactions, hence why I will confine those to no more than a page. This information was particularly useful for the contents page, as that is a requirement for the task. Due its popularity, I would like to dedicate my double page spread to an interview and information about an upcoming artist. Furthermore, having interpreted my data according to both surveys, I have come to the decision on my front cover that I will focus on the headlines, some quotes and images, and definitely incentives as well as editorial features. I will still incorporate the colours, typography and layout according to how I find it suitable for the content. As for the popular artists, I will not incorporate too much of this into my magazine because I want my magazine to be more unique and help discover more unknown artists, however, I will allow for some mentions of popular artists so as to still familiarise the readers with this particular genre, but this will mostly be within the music news. This is justified by the fact that overall, my respondents did not mind if my magazine consisted of mostly unknown artists/musicians, hence this is my decision. Lastly, in terms of incentives, I will include a puff which advertises a FREE CD of the artist who will be the subject of my cover story, who will be affiliated with Indie Rock music.