Research and planning: Textual Analysis of a Magazine Front Cover

I have chosen to analyse the connotations of the magazine ‘Teen Vogue’ as it is an extremely popular magazine aimed at the same audience as the college magazine cover which I will be creating. It will allow me to compare the different connotations in order for me to distinguish the techniques that I shall be able to use on my cover. 

The masthead is the name of the magazine which allows the public to easily distinguish between this magazine and any other brand. The magazine is a monthly issue and although the font, position and size of the masthead stays the same throughout, the colour scheme changes in order to suit the rest of the layout and the contents which is displayed on the front cover. In this particular magazine the masthead is a soft coral and pink colour, this connotes clearly to the audience a sense of femininity supported by the fact that the main image is of a woman suggesting that this magazine is aimed at a female audience.

Just above the masthead the date of the magazine has been located, this makes it extremely easy for the potential reader/buyer to identify when the magazine was released, in order to easily inform them. The barcode has also been placed on the front cover of this magazine, however in the bottom left hand corner. This is to inform the audience of a rather vital piece of information which is important for the buyer and the company as the magazine needs to show competitive pricing compared with their rivals.  By making the price easy to access it makes the magazine more appealing to buy rather than having to search throughout the magazine.

The taglines that are included on the front cover aim to be appealing to the female target audience, with tips on how to get ‘sexy hair’ and style tips this is stereotypically what females are interested in. The information that there may be certain pieces of ‘gossip’ about what is occurring in Hollywood for example is also stereotypically what females, especially young students are interested in, therefor they are likely to buy the issue.

There is also a coverline located in a pink circle on the front cover, this is to lure the target audience in to buying the magazine as it looks extremely appealing in the different shape and colour compared with the other coverlines.