Firstly I will need to consider the following criteria:
- Who is my audience? I have decided to target my magazine to Sixth Form students who are mainly aged 16- 19.
- How will I attract my audience? The image I use on my front page will be crucial to the impact of my final design, it must be strong to promote a professionally edited final outcome. Elements such as colour and text choices will also be carefully chosen to be appealing to a young adult. The language on my front cover will have to be chosen appropriately for the age range, it must be eye-catching and interest people from the offset.
- Will my magazine be gender specific? With a magazine, that if produced would only be circulated to a small demographic, I think it would be foolish to ignore half of the consumers by making my magazine gender specific.
- The contents of my magazine- What is my magazine going to be about?
- My cover photo- This image must sum up the entire contents of my magazine simply.
- My house style- What colours, shapes and fonts will remain constant?
- Text for front cover- How will the text accompany the image? Minimal or maximum text? What type of language will I use: informal, colloquial, slang etc?