Exam Question - What techniques do your chosen texts use to effectively target and maximise their online audiences ? ( 30) Refer to both Zoella and Attitude.
Zoella’s overall target audience is predominantly females aged 13-24 with the demographic of BC1C2. Zoella targets all of these audience categories in different ways. Her female dominated audience is targeted through her use of stereotypical female based activities. A lot of the content she creates is based around makeup, fashion, relationships and beauty which are all topics deemed more interesting to women. This reinforces more traditional stereotypes of women as Zoella never really moves away from this type of content. The other side to Zoella’s content is the emotive side. Zoella suffers from anxiety and is very open about this. This creates verisimilitude as people can really relate to this and it’s a very real, serious topic. She often expresses her feelings and emotions on any day to day problems she faces. Again, whilst this reinforces stereotypes it is more likely for women to engage with this particular content due to women traditionally being more emotional and somewhat more mature when it comes to speaking up about mental health problems.
Zoella’s vlogging channel shows a lot of everyday activities such as shopping, day trips to restaurants with friends/partners etc. By incorporating this into her content narrative she is creating connections with the 13-24 target audience as they can relate to thoroughly enjoying these activities. Zoella also has audiences on multiple platforms. Her strong use of social media such as instagram, twitter and snapchat resonates a lot with 13-24 year olds as this age range tend to be the heaviest users of these social media sites. By taking to these social media apps not only is she promoting her YouTube career but she’s creating a more personal relationship with her audience and a way for them to keep up with her daily. More recently the age range of Zoella’s audience has probably increased due to her recent pregnancy and more grown up content in regards to living with her partner and moving into a new house.
Her demographic BC1C2 audience is targeted through her partnerships with high end fashion brands (ASOS, Topshop etc) in which she promotes a lot of their clothing along with many other brands similar to these. These companies target a very similar demographic to Zoella which makes their partnership a very good way to entice this target audience. To have this audience demographic of BC1C2 also brings in more revenue for her due to more popular advertisement tie ins. Zoella also speaks in moderately formal language which can be said to mirror lower middle class/upper middle class values and educational background. Zoella’s psychometric is an aspirer - she is always on trend and following the latest fashion styles and her vlog lifestyle/YouTube career is something a lot of people would see as the ideal job.
In contrast, Attitude magazine targets an audience of men aged 26-55 with the demographic of ABC1. These categories are also targeted in different ways, similarly to Zoella. The male audience is targeted through the use of short paragraphing and high image to text ratio as typically men are less likely to read magazine articles and so attitude adjusts to this by including less text and more images. Also the text used includes more statistics and is more factual which is typically more intriguing to men than women.
The target of 26-55 year olds is very noticeable. Firstly the heavy use of FaceBook and Twitter gives it away as these are the primary social media sites used by this age group. There’s also a lot of political stories included in this magazine which is very indicative of a more mature audience, furthermore it’s just more likely that people of this age range will be more interested in political stories. Some of the stories/articles include a lot of retro culture and reference times like the 90s in which this audience will relate more to as the celebrities discussed will be ones they are familiar with and grew up with.
The highly formal and complex language of this article suggests a demographic audience of ABC1. The stories that are written and the way they are written are clearly aimed at a graduate/professional audience with direct reference to ABC1 professions such as managers, designers, teachers etc. Realism and relatability for this demographic is created through the activities and competitions incorporated in the magazine, such as theatre, arts and cultural events, premium lifestyles and five star holidaying. The partnerships this magazine has created with companies like Calvin Klein and Jaguar who advertise premium products is also a strong indicator of the audience demographic.
The psychometric for this magazine is the reformer and the aspirant. It’s acts as the reformer through the ways it covers political narratives, mainly LGBTQ+ orientated, but other issues too such as women’s and voting rights and homelessness. It seeks to enlighten people on these subjects and encourages compassion. The type of journalism in the magazine is heavily journalism that tries to effect social change. It’s the aspirant in the way that it’s secondary focus is looking good, materialism and brand awareness. It references a lot of premium brands and promotes them in a way that suggests people need to have them. The travel section also has a budget travel topic which would intrigue anybody. Allowing ways in which people can travel on budget really aspires people to want to travel.
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