What do women want? - a study of a local newspaper supplement in the form of a lifestyle magazine

Sammanfattning: Folkbladet is a daily newspaper in Norrköping with a strong local touch whose subscribers are mostly men interested in sports. In an attempt to broaden its readership, since 2009 Folkbladet publishes a magazine called Trend which targets women aged 20-50 years. This magazine in the form of a lifestyle magazine for women with a local touch is about fashion, beauty, interior design and travel. This free magazine is published four times a year and is distributed to every household in Norrköping and its surroundings. No target group analysis has been done to identify which content or design the readers would appreciate. Trend also lack a clear structure that could increase recognition and provide guidance through the contents. The objective of this paper is to examine what women aged 20-50 years in Norrköping and its surroundings ask of the content and design in a free lifestyle magazine, as well as to find out how well the magazine Trend meets these requirements and the established standards within the magazine industry. Based on this objective the following questions were formulated: What type of content does the target´group find desirable in a free lifestyle magazine? What does the audience ask of the design in such a magazine? How well does Trend magazine meet the target group’s requirements and the established standards that exist within the magazine industry? To meet the objective and answer the questions, the current content and design of Trend has been described, combined with a target group survey in which qualitative interviews were conducted with six respondents from the target group: women aged 20-50 years, living in Norrköping and its surroundings. The results of the current state description has been compared with the results of the target group survey, as well as with the established standards in the literature on magazine design. The analysis shows that Trend only partially meets both the target group’s requirements and the established standards. The content covers some of the areas demanded by the target group: fashion,m beauty, interior design and travel, and it has the local touch that the target group finds important. But the target group would also like to read about people with an interesting story, get information about local events, and find simple recipes in the magazine. To reache a larger share of the target group these topics should be considered as additonal content. Out of the already existing topics, interior design and travel are the ones most appreciated by the target group and should therefore be given more editorial space in the magazine. The analysis also shows that Trend needs to adapt both the content and design so as not to be perceived as entirely advertising. The editorial content is confused with advertising due to the way the texts are written and because the design of the editorial pages are not consistent. One way to create greater clarity about the different types of content is to structure the magazine according to a model with a front, a middle and a back section. These sections should have different types of texts of different lengths, and distinct design that distinguishes them from each other. Layout templates and style sheets are a great help for distinguishing the different parts. This is something that Trend currently lack and that should be implemented.