Audience
1) Analyse the Conde Nast media pack for Teen Vogue. What is the Teen Vogue mission statement and what does this tell us about the target audience and audience pleasures?
The key aspects from the Teen Vogue mission statement are the following:
2) What is the target audience for Teen Vogue? Use the media pack to pick out key aspects of the audience demographics. Also, consider the psychographic groups that would be attracted to Teen Vogue: make specific reference to the website design or certain articles to support your points regarding this.
Target audience:
3) What audience pleasures or gratifications can be found in Teen Vogue? Do these differ from the gratifications of traditional print-based magazines?
4) How is the audience positioned to respond to political news stories?
The brand is consistent across all of the Teen Vogue platforms - creates synergy and ensures that there are no contradictions between the content of Teen Vogue and their ideologies. They also use 'first-person' headlines. This encourages the audience to read the articles as it presents the idea that the writers are speaking to them directly.
The audience are positioned to respond in a positive way and to engage with the news. They may share what they have read on their social media or take a more active approach. For example, the news story on black teens fighting for gun reforms may encourage them to also start campaigning and protesting.
5) How does Teen Vogue encourage audiences to interact with the brand – and each other – on social media? The ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ section of the media pack may help with this question.
I think that in some respects Teen Vogue is both. Trump's presidency has definitely given them more content to cover and it led to their iconic news story which got them a lot more recognition. On the other hand, females have been becoming more influential in the media and I think that this will only continue to grow - especially with Teen Vogue spreading knowledge and keeping their audiences as conscious of the issues surrounding them.
1) Analyse the Conde Nast media pack for Teen Vogue. What is the Teen Vogue mission statement and what does this tell us about the target audience and audience pleasures?
The key aspects from the Teen Vogue mission statement are the following:
- "educate, enlighten, and empower"
- "amplifying the voices of the unheard"
- "Telling stories that normally go untold"
The key aspects of the mission statement clearly highlight the importance of creating an inclusive community to Teen Vogue. It also emphasises the fact that Teen Vogue focus on the concept of providing mis/under-represented groups a place where they can express themselves and be given a voice.
This tells us that the target audience are young (aged 16-24) and are well educated and enthusiastic about learning more about the world and making a change themselves.
2) What is the target audience for Teen Vogue? Use the media pack to pick out key aspects of the audience demographics. Also, consider the psychographic groups that would be attracted to Teen Vogue: make specific reference to the website design or certain articles to support your points regarding this.
Target audience:
- 63% Generation Z/millennials
Other key details:
- 18.5m total audience reach
- Readers of Teen Vogue tend to spend $11b on fashion & beauty products
- #1 reaching influential activists
Platform information
- Digital - 5.4m
- Social - 13.1m
- Video - 24.4m
Psychographics include-
- Reformers- Teen Vogue readers support changes to make a better society and aim to make a difference themselves too.
- Aspirers- Teen Vogue readers are interested in fashion and are inspired to be like the celebrities they read about.
- Succeeders- Teen Vogue features succeeders (like Hillary Clinton) and they are encouraged to share their views.
- Surveillance - learning about a range of opinions and perspectives so that the audience can be made aware of the issues present in their society. This highlights Teen Vogue as a "woke" brand
- Personal relationships - the ability to make connections with those who have similar views/issues to them - i.e. LGBTQ+ people being able to connect and discuss things with people who will be able to relate to them on a deeper level. This does however reiterate the concept of Echo Chambers - only their views will be expressed and then relayed back to them.
- Personal identification - being able to see themselves and their ideologies reflected in the magazine. This is conventional of typical magazines aimed at teenagers; however, Teen Vogue attempt to reflect the less superficial aspects of teenagers/young people - i.e. allowing them to relate with things such as preparing for Campus life, rather than general fashion advice.
4) How is the audience positioned to respond to political news stories?
The brand is consistent across all of the Teen Vogue platforms - creates synergy and ensures that there are no contradictions between the content of Teen Vogue and their ideologies. They also use 'first-person' headlines. This encourages the audience to read the articles as it presents the idea that the writers are speaking to them directly.
The audience are positioned to respond in a positive way and to engage with the news. They may share what they have read on their social media or take a more active approach. For example, the news story on black teens fighting for gun reforms may encourage them to also start campaigning and protesting.
5) How does Teen Vogue encourage audiences to interact with the brand – and each other – on social media? The ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ section of the media pack may help with this question.
- They have new, refreshing designs and content - a mix of "street style storytelling and imagery."
- Have multiple digital and video series to encourage people to interact on multiple platforms - series creates continuity and the concept of being able to constantly receive information and advice. The fact it has alternative views on things (i.e. "the history lesson that you didn't learn in history class) also implies that people will find these videos interesting and will tweet/discuss it further with each other.
Representations
1) Look again at the Conde Nast media pack for Teen Vogue. What do the ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ (key events and features throughout the year) suggest about the representation of women and teenage girls on teenvogue.com?
Offer empowering, alternative representations of women. they capitalise on the idea of women being influential leaders, rather than passive people in society. They focus on the idea of encouraging women to recognise how much they can eventually impact society in the future.
2) How are issues of gender identity and sexuality represented in Teen Vogue?
These issues are addressed in a progressive way. They do not treat it as an issue that should be ignored; rather, they acknowledge the fact that there are underrepresented groups and they make the point of trying to represent them.
3) Do representations of appearance or beauty in Teen Vogue reinforce or challenge traditional stereotypes?
They challenge traditional stereotypes of beauty. I think that Teen Vogue very much focus on the idea of not trying to fit in, but instead making your differences something that actually make you even more unique. For example, having Skai Jackson sporting her afro proudly during a photoshoot reflects this idea of afroccentric beauty and embracing styles that are typically shunned in Western society.
4) What is the patriarchy and how does Teen Vogue challenge it? Does it succeed?
Patriarchy is the idea that men dominate society and that females are subordinate. However, in Teen Vogue, they represent the exact opposite. They do not view power as equal to gender, but inspire young people everywhere to have the confidence to campaign against something that they believe deserves attention.
5) Does Teen Vogue reinforce or challenge typical representations of celebrity?
I think that for the most part, Teen Vogue subverts typical representations of celebrity. The celebrity news that they do report tends to fit/suit the ideologies of the magazine in some way. For example, the story about transgender fashion models.
However, they do still rely on some click bait style headlines/articles to generate a buzz around their brand. This means that they do still include some seemingly irrelevant stories (like news about Bella Hadid's coat).
Feature: how Teen Vogue represents the changing nature of media aimed at women
Read this Quartz feature - The true story of how Teen Vogue got mad, got woke, and began terrifying men like Donald Trump - and answer the following questions:
1) How was the Teen Vogue op-ed on Donald Trump received on social media?
It was well received and actually generated a lot of attention for the Teen Vogue brand as a whole. This is because it was unexpected that a brand like Teen Vogue would speak openly about something so political/serious/controversial like their opinions on Trump's presidency.
2) How have newspapers and magazines generally categorised and targeted news by gender?
Women's news has typically been limited to topics like fashion; lifestyle; parenting advice and the arts/literature. On the other end of news coverage, newspapers aimed at men typically covered topics like business and any political news/things relating to the economy.
3) How is this gender bias still present in the modern media landscape?
I think that this gender bias is still present in some conventional magazines that are designed to target a predominantly male/female audience. For example, magazines like Cosmopolitan are unlikely to feature news about economics over parenting advice. However, on the whole, I think that gender bias is being targeted and gradually resolved - slow progress.
4) What impact did the alternative women’s website Jezebel have on the women’s magazine market?
It combined the typical soft news (like fashion and entertainment) with hard news like politics and economics. In doing so, it created a model for modern approaches to women's media - making all of the content a lot more diverse.
5) Do you agree with the writer that female audiences can enjoy celebrity news and beauty tips alongside hard-hitting political coverage? Does this explain the recent success of Teen Vogue?
I agree with the writer that female audiences can enjoy both hard and soft news stories. Teen Vogue is a prime example of this, because it not only covers things like fashion tips and general lifestyle advice, but they also cover hard-hitting political issues like police brutality and Trump "Gaslighting America."
6) How does the writer suggest feminists used to be represented in the media?
Suggests that females used to be represented as:
- Overtly sexualised/sex objects
- More focused on soft news stories
7) What is the more modern representation of feminism? Do you agree that this makes feminism ‘stereotyped as fluffy’?
I don't think this makes feminism "fluffy" I think it just means that females are willing to discuss topics beyond the range that they were originally limited to.
8) What contrasting audience pleasures for Teen Vogue are suggested by the writer in the article as a whole?
The contrast between "fluffy" topics like beauty etc, and the "serious journalism" covering politics and news. The article expresses the idea that women are capable of forming opinions about both sides of the news, and aren't just limited to one.
The contrast between "fluffy" topics like beauty etc, and the "serious journalism" covering politics and news. The article expresses the idea that women are capable of forming opinions about both sides of the news, and aren't just limited to one.
9) The writer suggests that this change in representation and audience pleasures for media products aimed at women has emerged from the feminist-blog movement. How can this be linked to Clay Shirky’s ‘end of audience’ theory?
End of audience relates to the idea of mass communication and the concept of audiences no longer solely consuming the media, but also producing it as well. The feminist-blog movement highlights the fact that consumers can add to the content circulated in the media by projecting their own opinions.
End of audience relates to the idea of mass communication and the concept of audiences no longer solely consuming the media, but also producing it as well. The feminist-blog movement highlights the fact that consumers can add to the content circulated in the media by projecting their own opinions.
10) Is Teen Vogue simply a product of the Trump presidency or will websites and magazines aimed at women continue to become more hard-hitting and serious in their offering to audiences?
I think that in some respects Teen Vogue is both. Trump's presidency has definitely given them more content to cover and it led to their iconic news story which got them a lot more recognition. On the other hand, females have been becoming more influential in the media and I think that this will only continue to grow - especially with Teen Vogue spreading knowledge and keeping their audiences as conscious of the issues surrounding them.
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