Evaluation - Question 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

I decided before I started to create my magazine that my target audience was going to be men and women aged 16-24 who liked the indie/alternative music genre, so I then needed to think about how I could make my magazine appeal to this market. Based on the ideal buyer that I talked about in evaluation question 4, I made conscious creative decisions whilst designing the front page, contents and double page spread on how to appeal to this type of person.

Firstly, when I took the photos that appear in the magazine, I was very aware that the model couldn't be happy/smiling too much as the genre dictates that 'indie kids' are generally portrayed as being serious about the music, not necessarily about being the most popular artist. This is why I decided to take photos of Scarlet playing a guitar, as it is the most common instrument for an indie artist to be playing, and it also fits perfectly with the name of my magazine - Frett - which is a term used by guitar players that my target audience would know about.

I also took photos like the one below as it portrays a slightly different rockier, edgier look but still maintains the indie clothing and persona to attract the potential buyers.

Whilst I was writing my double page spread article I made sure to keep it to a tone of address that was appropriate to my age bracket, by using slang that they would understand and wrote in an informal manner that seemed friendly and funny, like the real interview below:

"The interest from the public and the media is immense...

JK - We went back home in the car just now, we dropped us mate off and it came on Radio 2. On 'way back just before our mate got in the car it were on Radio 1, and when he got in the car he goes 'I've just seen you on MTV'... it's too much though man, it's a bit daft.

Has the popularity freaked you out?

JK - Yeah, some things do. I don't normally get recognised so I'm alright, I don't mind it that way, I don't want it ever to get really big."

I kept the interview conversational and tried not to ask to many structured questions and just let the interview flow naturally.

For example:

"Now recently, solo singers have been creating elaborate stage names for themselves, like Marina and the Diamonds and Florence and the Machine, so why did you just decide to stick with your real name?

I don’t know how to break this to you but my name isn’t actually Scarlet!

No way! So what is your name?

My real name is... Wait (Calls to manager) Kev, am I allowed to reveal this yet? Yeah? Okay then, here’s an exclusive for you, I’ve never said it in an interview before. My name is actually Charlotte, but I’ve always thought it was a bit posh; I wanted something a bit more edgy. I’ve got a scar on my head from when I ran into the corner of a wall when I was a kid, so Scarlet just seemed pretty appropriate!"

I think that if I had made the interview into one long piece of prose, then the readers would have lost interest and become bored, but because mine is split into short bite size questions and answers, my younger target audience will be able to read it easily and take it all in. I also did use swearing occasionally in this interview, but not too much so that it became offensive, just casually dropping it into the conversation like this:

"I was so shit scared that I played about 2 songs and made a speedy exit!"