Research Rationale

I have decided to choose the genre of my music magazine to be pop. The target group I will have access to will be teenagers between the ages of 14-19 whilst my target audience is 14-18 and due to them attending the same sixth form as me as well as having access to the lower school, I will be able to use this to my advantage by being able to conduct research. Whilst undertaking audience research I will be able to use the students in my focus groups as well as giving them surveys and questionnaires to complete. From this I will be able to get feedback from the target audience I am aiming at, thus being able to gain useful information on how to structure and to help influence ideas for my own magazine.

I aim to undertake market research through the means of deconstructing two magazine covers of the same genre of music which will allow me to pin point the successful conventions used in the magazine. This will allow me to create a magazine that is appealing for my target audience.  I will also conduct more in depth research of the genre of music magazine I aim to create as it will be helpful to have background knowledge. I would also like to go to a shop which sells music magazines and take a picture of the magazine section to allow me to identify which magazines stand out to me the most, why they do so and then implement it into the creation of my own magazine.

I will use a variety of research techniques which will include qualitative research for example recording my focus group. From this I will also be able to get more in depth responses due to the use of open style questions. I will also be using quantitative research for example through the use of questionnaires and surveys through the means of Survey Monkey.

The resources I aim to use for the research are web 2.0 to carry out my market research as well as uploading my focus group video to YouTube. I will need to use survey monkey to get responses to my questionnaires, I also found that by using this instead of paper questionnaires, it becomes easier for people to complete.  I will also need access to three different magazine covers of the same genre to be able to use and discuss in my focus group.