Some Decisions For My Music Magazine

This should only be a brief(ish) post on some of the decisions, I have made so far. As, I have decided to name my magazine Tuned In, I shall now (most probably in my next post) try and test out a variety of fonts that I could use for my mast head. Although I did come up with a variety of other names, I thought it would be best to take on board my target markets opinion and call my magazine after their preferred choice. I think it was a good decision to create a questionnaire, as it has helped me make several conclusions, which I doubt I would have come up without it.

As I have used myself as my model (not my first initial choice mind!) I thought it would be best to come up with a new name for the artist I am trying to create for my magazine. After much deliberation, I came up with “Mia Melloway”, (I have no idea where it came from) but I wanted to come up with something original and unique that it not similar to any artists currently, as well as having an acoustic feel to it, to fit in my genre for my magazine.

Another decision I have made for my music magazine is that I want my double page spread to follow the format of a Q&A interview with Mia Melloway. At the moment, I’m not sure how many questions, or what sort questions I will be asking yet, but I think it’ll all depend on which type of layout I choose and how much room I have to work with. One thing, I will do is to ask one of my friends to answer the questions for me, as I want unplanned answers where they think on the spot, which I can adapt to the type of style of writing you would find in an acoustic style magazine. Even though, the majority of magazines for this genre is rather formal, due to the age range I’ve chosen, I shouldn’t need to change too much as I’ll ask someone who fits in with my target market.

Looking back to the conventions of an acoustic music magazine there are several different cover lines on the front cover, which I shall try and incorporate on my magazine, however, I will have to take into consideration that, less maybe more for the age range that I am targeting. Acoustic artists are most definitely incorporated on the front cover, which I will definitely take on board and aim to put a few at least on it, to interest my target market to read my magazine. Additionally, I have noticed that quotes from the main feature article on the front cover are included and therefore, I have decided to try and stick to this convention too.

The general price of existing magazines from this genre is mainly around £4 as they are either accompanied by a “free” CD, guitar strings or a plectrum. I am hoping to offer a similar free gift with my magazine, however, due to my younger target audience I don’t think they would want to pay that much or even be able to afford it for every issue, so I’ve decided to go for a more reasonable price of £2.50. Another reason why I chose to have my magazine cost this much, is because my target market said they would be willing to pay £2.00 – £2.50, so their opinion means a lot to gain an accurate result to base my magazine upon.