LO2: Proposal to support pitch

PURPOSE: 

The purpose of my business magazine is to inform readers about The Sheffield Chamber Of Commerce and business in Sheffield and to promote The Chamber.  

 

FORM AND GENRE 

Form: My magazine will be citywide and aimed at business owners within Sheffield, this is due to the Chamber promoting only operating within Sheffield, as well as the brief requirements asking for a magazine aimed at a Sheffield audience. This means that some of my articles will need to entice the people of Sheffield with important or interesting information they might need to know. I could do this by including images of recognizable landmarks within Sheffield.  

Genre: The genre of my magazine will be business in order to meet my genre I will need to create a magazine that is formal and professional so that it is taken seriously by clients and makes the magazine more reliable. If the magazine is presented as more informal, this could lead to business owners not trusting my source and taking the large step that would be joining the Chamber. 

 

CONTENT - M GRADE 

My magazine will be themed around business in Sheffield. It will include information on The Sheffield Chamber of Commerce as my primary aspect to draw in readers.

TARGET AUDIENCE: 

SUIT is directed at primarily male 25-40-year-olds (average age of reader is 35) who are looking for a magazine that updates them monthly on everything Business in Sheffield. They have an average-moderately high spending power and are in the B social grade as the magazine directly targets people with a secure and professional job. To target this audience SUIT will use a primarily blue colour scheme as it fulfills genre expectations and connotes calmness, security and trust. This is helpful for my business magazine as SUIT targets a variety of people involved in business, whether they are just starting in the world of business or are a veteran, the magazine offers something for anyone interested in business in Sheffield.  

 

 

RESOURCES AND PERSONNEL 

For my magazine I will be the editor, graphic designer and photographer. For creating this magazine, I will need hardware such as: a computer, monitor, mouse and keyboard. This computer setup will be important as the computer will be where I do all my written work and most of my preproduction and planning. This is a must have for creating and completing the documents, without it I cannot produce barely any of the magazine. As well as this, I will be using a laptop to complete any of the same work outside of lesson. I will also use a pencil, ruler, paper and pen to create other preproduction documents such as visualisation diagrams for each page of the magazine. Software I will use includes: ‘Photoshop’ for creating and editing the pages themselves, ‘Blogger’ to store and organise all my work in one place, ‘Edexcel’ to create gantt charts and production schedules, and Word/PowerPoint to create and edit written work before uploading it to blogger. 

 

DISTRIBUTION AND MARKETING METHODS – M 

Due to my magazine being about Business, I have a niche audience that I need to market to in order to sell the magazine. To reach this audience, I have to use below the line advertising techniques as they are cheaper than above the line advertising and are effective at targeting my audience. A radio advert on Sheffield live will be a great form of advertising as Sheffield Live are known for advertising small brands on their station for a reasonable price. This is important as I do not have a large budget for marketing the magazine as this is the first issue of SUIT magazine and isn't an established brand yet. Radio adverts target my audience as people involved in business travel a lot, so a radio advert will be able to reach my audience who travel by car. Another below the line marketing method I could use is using my client's socials to advertise the magazine. Due to my magazine being the first issue, I don’t have an established brand to reliably advertise my magazine online. So, using the clients social media page will allow me to advertise in the online space effectively where there's already a market and audience. The radio ad and social media posts (on both the SUIT official social media and The Chamber social media) will use similar talking points/pull quotes, creating synergy in my advertising across the multiple media. 

The circulation of my magazine will be 100, whilst readership will be around 400. These will be distributed at train stations, town halls and in offices/waiting areas. This is because my audience travels a lot between offices, home and events, meaning they are likely to pick up the magazine in high traffic areas of travel and waiting areas in office buildings. Readership is higher than circulation as copies of the magazine get passed around amongst friends/family, meaning more people will read the magazine than copies bought. Circulation and readership are not as high as that of a professional, well-established magazine as I do not have the large target audience, developed over time like other magazines of the genre have, so I will have less overall printed copies to save money as I do not have the audience for a large amount of copies, especially for a magazine that is for the local Sheffield area, compared to worldwide brands of the same genre. 

 

 

The size of the magazine is a very important aspect that has been well thought out so that it is beneficial for my audience and targets them effectively. Firstly, the size is that of a typical magazine within the business genre, making it recognisable to my target audience when they are looking for a magazine to read. As well as this the larger size provides enough space for the information/contents of the page. Due to business being a very detail heavy genre, the large amount of space ensures that the information required can fit on the page/and content doesn’t have to be cut from each feature, but not too large to inconvenience the reader whilst fulfilling genre expectations. Finally, the size is beneficial during marketing as it helps it stand out on shelves/amongst other smaller magazines, as a small size draws less attention to passersby/people looking to browse a magazine whilst in a seated area/waiting area. All these factors benefit the magazine and helps it become more appealing to read to potential audiences.