Questionnaire Results and Analysis

Before I began to construct my magazine, I created a questionnaire to receive audience feedback relating to music magazines in term of music genre, price, and age group. This would then help me determine what was included in my magazine and what audience it would be aimed at. I gave the questionnaire (figure) to fifty participants, half male and half female and five of both in each age group. I made sure they understood that their answers were confidential. Below are graphs showing some results of this questionnaire and what I concluded from them.

Question Two of my questionnaire, (What would you consider to be your favourite genre of music?), intended to find out what the most popular genre of music was in each of the different age groups. By doing this I could ascertain whether the genre of music I focused on in my magazine would be popular. I already had in mind an idea of my genre and audience, but the results of this questionnaire confirmed my intentions and developed a specific audience for my magazine. The results of this question show that within the age group 16-20 years, 4 out of the 10 participants’ favourite genre of music was rock music, and within the age group 21-25 years, 3 out of the 10 participants. This suggests that considering the vast amount of different genres of music, and I gave eight options to choose from, rock music is extremely popular in these age groups. After considering these results I decided that my magazine would focus on Alternative Rock music, a mixture of pop/Rock, Classic Rock and other combinations. This means that it will attract a wide audience who enjoy rock music the most, but with a twist. This would therefore allow my magazine to fit into the rock music magazine market whilst being developed to something more original.

This next graph relates to Question Four of my questionnaire (How often do you buy music magazines?). It implies that the age groups 16-20 yrs and 36+ yrs are likely to buy magazines once a month. In terms of the 16-20 yrs group, this may be because they are more interested in magazines at that age, and the 36+ yrs group possibly because they are more likely to afford it. Whatever the reason, these results show that for my decided audience of age range 18-30, a monthly magazine is most realistic compared to weekly or fortnightly, for which students and younger people may rather not commit to. I also preferred to have a younger audience as they would be easier to relate to compared to an older population.

Question seven of my questionnaire (In what price range are these magazines?) referred to what price the participants believed their preferred music magazine, or music magazines in general, were sold at. The graph below shows that Rock music magazines are mostly sold at £3-3.99, suggesting that to fit in and to compete with other magazines in the market; I should sell my magazine within that price range. It also implies that as those participants buy rock magazines at that price, it is not unreasonable to value my magazine the same.

Other questions in the questionnaire such as ‘What do you think are the most important things that should be included in a music magazine?’ (Question nine), produced qualitative data. The term ‘qualitative data’ is used to describe certain types of information that is presented in narrative form. They are in the form of words and descriptions rather than figures, often collected using open-ended questions, and are more difficult to compare, reproduce, and generalize. This, although harder to analyse compared to quantitative data, was helpful in giving me a general idea of what should I should show to be included in my magazine, for example what articles to promote on the front cover. The questionnaire certainly gave me an insight into a possible audience in the aspects of age range, price and music genre, through both quantitative and qualitative data. This audience feedback helped me decide on an audience, and the final audience I chose was mixed gender with age range 18-30, allowing for the younger generation and the slightly older, and for those who enjoy Alternative Rock music. Therefore, the results of my questionnaire were extremely useful in determining, developing and confirming aspects of my magazine so that I am confident it would be a success if it were available in the music magazine market in terms of audience and circulation.