Demographics

Demographics is defined as the statistical information of a population mostly with regard to income, age and education etcetera. Media producers will tailor their products to appeal to certain groups of people through research into the demographics of their audience. For example, MOJO music magazine is a little more expensive than other music magazines because it is of a lot higher quality, both physically (through the actual materials it is made of) and through quality of the articles as they are written by high standard writers. MOJO music magazine can afford to charge this higher price as the majority of their audience are much older, towards 40 years old. This means that the majority of their audience will be well established, with secure jobs, years into their career and will therefore have much higher amounts of disposable income compared to that of a younger audience that are still in full - time education or at the very start of their career. For this reason, as my target audience are of the younger generation and towards the bottom end of the grading table, I will price my magazine at a cheaper rate and sell issues weekly. Similar existing products such as NME sell magazine's weekly at a cheaper price while they appeal to a similar target audience as mine.

It is important to understand the demographics of your audience because it is much easier to reach your target audience if you understand their characteristics, what they have in common, and what motivates them to buy/consume media products. You can tailor your marketing efforts/products so that they cater for the specific needs and challenges of your target audience. This make it possible to appeal to niche markets like for example younger people, towards the bottom of the socio-economic scale interested in the alternative music genre.