Inside NME and MOJO

• Contents pages will maintain the colour scheme established by the cover.

• Some magazines change their colour scheme regularly; others, like Q, tend to stick to the same one over a long period of time.

• Red, black and white are popular, sometimes with another colour thrown in – NME and Q frequently add yellow

• The cover of this issue of Mojo largely takes its colour scheme (and choice of font) from the classic album it features and the relevant section inside does the same.

• However, the rest of the magazine follows its house style of red, black and white, the fourth colour being a blue/grey

• NME – weekly magazine -retains the Indie values with Peace as cover artist, but there are story lines on Blur, Noel Gallagher, Kasabian and Arctic Monkeys – all NME favourites from the last two decades.

• Published by IPC.• Inside NME – ‘News’ section

featuring old favourites, like Morrissey, and new, like Milk Music.

• Round up of events this week in music – but those events appealing to its target audience (Gallagher and Albarn); festival news – SXSW – and indie festival.

• Use of colloquial language to help readers relate to the contents

• NME features heavily Illustrated articles, as do all magazines, some new, some with a historic perspective about bands who have been important to NME in the past – like The Smiths - and who have influenced current bands, thereby targeting younger AND older readers.

• As with some other magazines, like Rock Sound, the readers’ love of live music is reflected in the heavy use of images taken at concerts 

• Review section – Up to date and rated - doesn’t just concentrate on major artists and because NME is weekly, it is considerably more up to date than most of its rivals.

 

• ‘Radar’ section – heavily illustrated short features on ‘Future Stars, Breaking Scenes, New Sounds.”

• Still has the NME Chart• Uses occasional pun for a headline – “Water Disaster.”• In 1996 the NME started its award-winning website NME.com • In 2007 NME.COM was launched in the USA with additional staff• March 2011 - new focus on video content and user engagement, bringing

comments to the fore and introducing user ratings on reviews. In 2011, NME.com had over 7 million monthly unique users.

• May 2011 launched a sister site - NMEVideo.com; released NME Festivals smartphone app. Sponsored by BlackBerry, it featured line-ups, stage times, photo galleries and backstage video interviews, and was downloaded 30,000 times. The following month, NME launched its first iPad app, dedicated to Jack White.

• September 2011, NME.COM organised and live-blogged a real-time Nirvana, 'Nevermind' Twitter listening party to mark the twentieth anniversary of the album. The site also launched a new series of self-produced band documentary films, entitled The Ultimate Guide.

• NME Awards - held annually to celebrate the best new music of the past year. Nominations and winners voted by the readers.

• NME Tours - NME sponsors a tour of the UK by up-and-coming bands each year.

• NME Originals - In 2002 NME started publishing a series of themed magazines reprinting articles etc from the NME archives. Some featured articles from other music titles owned by IPC, like Uncut. Notable issues so far have featured Radiohead, The Beatles, Punk rock and Britpop.

• NME India - March 2012, IPC announced it had entered into a partnership with Pilot Ventures LLC to launch of NME in India. Local Indian website NME.IN launched in March 2012 - potential market in India is huge and Hollywood film companies are also targeting the country.

• Reader profiles are used by magazines like NME to convince companies that its worth placing advertisements in their magazine.

• It’s the advertising, after all, that effectively pays for the magazine, but companies have to be convinced that it’s worth it.

• Knowing the type of reader allows companies to target products advertising.

READER PROFILE• The target audience of the magazine is 66% males and 34%

female. The median age for the core buyer of NME is 23 years old. The social class of the core buyer is upper middle class (A), middle class (B) and lower middle class (C1). 35% of the readers of this magazine are students. There is a readership of 239,000

• The target audience of this magazine are obsessed with music and are strong users of their mobile phones – and there’s now an NME app to get all the latest news; they have spending power and enjoy live and recorded music, like to buy audio-visual equipment (including games) and they use the internet for approximately 19 hours a week.

• NME readers enjoy watching films both at home and at the cinema. The average reader of NME buys a new DVD every month, which is higher that the average national.

• Ads – tours and releases; ads for IPC stable mate Uncut; Farah, who sponsor the NME awards, so they are promotional partners; Phones 4U – target audience obsessed with new technology.

• Gig guide – city by city – readers are invited to submit notice of gigs to the website three weeks in advance.

• Crossword and fan mail section• Use of colloquial language and taboo words to

relate to target audience

• Fan mail page has twitter and Facebook links and a link to the website which is further promoted by having highlights from the website section, including some responses from readers. Letters also include reader-submitted photos of readers with artists, humorously entitled ‘Stalkers’.

• Self-promotion – subscription ads with offers; ad for IPC stable mate Uncut; Uncut Special featuring the Smiths, a band that appeals to the older members of the NME target audience; double-page ad for NME Showcase, highlighting appearance of NME-promoted artists at H&M stores, offering chance to win tickets to the events and H&M gift cards – promotional partnership. Both companies will benefit. To find out more and win tickets readers have to go to NME.com. Why H&M? Fashionable store with stock affordable for young NME readers.

• Mojo – Beach Boys cover artist, but story lines refer to older and newer artists talking about the band e.g. Flaming Lips; plus story lines referring to new bands that musically allude to bands that Mojo readers will know – Beach House. This issue has stories about bands across the decades – Beach Boys (60s and 70s), Rush (70s), Public Image (80s), David Bowie (70s-now); features on classic albums, classic artists and newer artists whose style alludes to the classic artists that appeal to Mojo readers.

• News section, What Goes On, often refers to older artists e.g. Stone Roses and My Bloody Valentine.

• Review section – new and re-released music, categorised in places (Urban, Americana etc); Live Reviews and Book reviews on the work or lives of artists appealing to the Mojo reader.

• Mission Statement• At MOJO we cover the good stuff. Our award-winning editorial team prides

itself in delivering a magazine that is packed with insight, passion, and revelatory encounters with the greatest musicians of all-time, be they established or emerging musicians. The magazine is loved by its readers and artists alike because it engages them on the subject they love the most: music itself.

• Every month MOJO brings you a definitive cover feature on an iconic act; a bespoke CD (especially compiled by the editorial team or a major musician in MOJO’s world); and our famous reviews section, the Filter, which brings you 30 pages-plus of the best of that month’s music, both classic and contemporary.

• MOJO’s previous guest editors range from David Bowie to Tom Waits via Noel Gallagher and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, showcasing the magazine’s breadth and iconic status among musicians. From The Beatles to The Black Keys, from Led Zeppelin to Laura Marling, from Fleetwood Mac to Flying Lotus.

• MOJO is not only Britain’s biggest selling music magazine, it is an immersive experience. At MOJO we invite you to lose yourself in music every month. Join us at www.mojo4music.com for a daily download of what’s going on or to simply find out more about our magazine.

• Adverts for tours and concerts – older and newer bands relevant to the target audience – Springsteen, Tom Petty, Squeeze and Laura Marling. Hi-fi equipment; albums from older artists like Bob Marley and newer artists whose music appeals to Mojo’s demographic, like Beach House. Full page ad for Q – promoting another Bauer product.

• In-depth articles from respected writers and from artists themselves. Respectful tone – towards the artists and the readers.

• Subscription ads with cheap deals and gifts to encourage the readers; crossword with musical prize relevant to the month’s issue (box set etc); letters page.

• Two full page ads for website mojomagazine.tumblr.com – promising exclusive streams and review; stories and music related to this month’s featured artists – updated constantly; a link to the website, www.mojo4music.com where you can sign up for a weekly newsletters which will feature ‘all the essential links’. Page also features Facebook and twitter links.

MOJO4MUSIC WEBSITE

• 209,000 unique users• 460,000 page impressions• 18,000 email subscribers• 49,600 Twitter followers• 32,000 Facebook fans