Question 3What have you learned from your

audience feedback?

Audience feedback was very important when I was planning my production and then creating my production. My focus group thoughts were very important when creating my magazine because they are the people who are my target audience, so it is important to make sure they are interested in my production. I created my focus group right at the beginning of doing the research into my production so I would always have the ability to contact them with any information I had. My focus group consisted of 10 females aged between 17-28 because this was my target audience. They also all came from Kent as this was where the magazine was being created for.I contacted my focus group in lots of different ways. The main way I talked to them was by creating a group on Facebook so I could ask questions and get answers straight away, but I also gave them questionnaires to fill out at the beginning of my project so I could get a basic knowledge of what they liked. I also showed them printed copies of my productions and asked them to point out things they would like to change and things they really liked about the product.It was also important to look at audience theory like Encoding/Decoding model and the Uses and Gratifications Theory before I started to produce my magazine because I wanted to make sure I involved as much audience theory as I could to make sure my target audience feel connected to the magazine making them more likely to buy it.

To work out what kind of magazines will appeal to my target audience; after I did my research into the magazines; I also sent a list of magazines with pictures of the front cover to my focus group for them to rate the magazines starting with the one that interests them the most. I did this because then I could check that my magazine was based on magazines that appealed to my target audience (who were the same age, gender and class as my focus group)

Most popular Least popular

This showed me that my target audience liked things like Absolute and Mayhem with female models on the front a lot more than things like Kent life which had pictures of scenery on it. So straight away from this research I new that I needed to have a model on the front of my magazine -not scenery.

The next stage of my production was to make some mock ups, so I could show them to my focus group to make sure they liked the rough idea of what I was going to create, before I started the time consuming job of making my final piece.I showed my focus group a drawn mock up first. I did this because I hoped I would get feedback with minor alterations and changes which would add more preferred shape to the magazine.

My feedback from my drawing mock ups was helpful when it came to my final production because people said they liked the layout; but not as helpful as I would have liked because people said they couldn’t imagine the final piece; due to lack of actual picture and colour so I then decided to make a photo shop mock up to show them.

This gave me much better feed back as the over all feel was that people liked the look of the mock ups so I decided to start working on my final production.

Having my focus group was very helpful when it came to my contents page and front cover because when I gave all of them a hand out of my original contents page I didn’t get very good feedback compared to when I showed them my advert. Here was some of the feed back I got from my first contents page:

Lauren Strich- “I like the editors column but the pictures don’t look right behind the colour background and I really don’t like the picture of the make-up”

Due to this comment I decided to change the pictures on my contents page and not put them on coloured background but keep the editors column.

Nicola Keefe- “ I like what the magazine is called and have the name of the magazine on the contents page but I don’t like the layout”

Due to this comment I decided to change the whole of the layout to my magazine, especially as this was a very common comment when I got my feedback.

Here are pictures of the copy of the contents page when I gave it to my focus group the first time; and the second photo shows all the changes I made to improve it. I then gave the contents page back to my focus group and I got very good feedback.

Emily Joslin- “I don’t like the picture of the model very much but I do like the layout of the magazine”

Jamie Keel- “I don’t think the lighting is very good on the photo, but I like the fact the model is looking into the camera.”

I have learnt from my audience feed back that the model on the front of my cover is one of the biggest features of the magazine and is the most important for my target audience as my focus group gave a lot of feedback about my model. Here was some of the feedback I got about my front cover.

Due to this comment I decided to keep the same layout but change my model as a lot of my feedback was about the model.

Due to this comment I was more conscious of the lighting when I did the photo shoot; however I made sure that the model kept the direct mode address as my focus group said they liked this quality in the magazine. I also wanted to keep the direct mode of address because its links to uses and gratification theory which means my audience will start building a relationship with my model because they feel like they are more involved with the magazine.

Once I found out how important the model on my front page was to my focus group; when I retook the photos with a different model I decided to show them a selection of the photos I took and ask them which one they liked the most before I decided to use that one on my final piece. These were the photos I showed my target audience.

This photo was the one my focus group preferred. So I decided to use this photo because then I definitely knew it would appeal to my target audience meaning they were more likely to buy my magazine.

I showed my target audience the first website I did but I didn’t get very good feedback. So I asked my focus group if they could all state one thing they didn’t like so I could try and improve it. Some of the feedback I got was…Emily Joslin- “The page looks very empty and doesn't have enough pictures on it” I learnt from this comment that I need to add more pictures to make the website more eye catching, so I did this and when I showed Emily again she said it looks “much better”

Sally Smith-”I like the layout but there is not very much on the website” I learnt from this comment to keep the same layout but put more on my website.

When my focus group saw my new website I got much better feedback.

When I showed my target audience my finial production I got very good feedback from everyone in my focus group; so that was when I new the my production was completed to a good standard.

Sally Smith- “I love the model and the layout of the magazine. I wouldn’t change anything”

Emily Gikkas- “The magazine looks very realistic and if it was in a store I would buy it”

Harriet Beasty- “The photography looks very professional just like the layout of the

magazine”

Nikisha MacBride- “the quality of all the photographs were very high making the magazine look great!”

Emily Joslin- “the layout of the contents page looks very professional and I love how exciting the page looks”

Jamie Keel- “the advert looks very realistic and is very eye catching”

Izzie O'Connor- “ The advert has a great pictures and I love all the colours used”

Nicola Keefe- “ the billboard looks very professional”

Molly Filmer- “ I love the layout, the use of colours and the picture of the magazine.”

Sally Smith- “I like the fact the website is easy to use and has lots of pictures on it to make it look interesting. “

Nikisha Mcbride- “ The website looks very professional and has a good range of articles and pages to look at”