Research Task - Institutions

Different institutions produce and distribute different styles of magazines that target different groups of people and target audiences. The reasoning for this targeted distribution would be due to the fact that some institutions will be better at targeting certain people than others, so it is important for me to research available institutions and consider their target markets, their efficiency of distribution and the types of magazine they cover in their business. 


IPC Media

Claiming "over 60 iconic media brands", IPC Media reach almost two thirds of UK women and 42% of UK men - almost 26 million UK adults. They pride themselves on their ability to offer some form of media for anyone, with a focus on three "core audiences" which are 'men', 'mass market women' and 'upmarket women'. 

From my research of their magazines listed, they seem primarily to provide more lifestyle and fashion orientated magazines, examples being 'Country Life', 'Horse & Hound', 'Rugby World', etc - all examples listed under their men's portfolio named IPC Inspire. Their other two portfolios focus entirely on women and mainly fashion/showbiz news - 'Look' 'Now', 'Chat' and 'What's on TV', etc. While these appear unrelated to my magazine's selling points and genre, they do however target "1 million music fans a week" with their music magazine 'NME'. 

EMAP Limited

Focusing mostly on business-to-business magazines, EMAP sell magazines such as 'Drapers', 'Health Service Journal', 'Screen International' and 'Local Government Chronicle', etc. EMAP, Standing for 'East Midland Allied Press', was formed when the company realised that their printing presses were spending time being unused and useless and they decided to launch and print a magazine on them in these times of disuse, called 'Angling Times' - which was quickly joined by successive magazines and the rest of the companies history consists of constant selling of its divisions, buying up of other companies, etc. 


Seeing as my magazine doesn't have a business focus and is mostly laid back and informal, it would seem that IPC media are more appropriate for my magazine as they specialise in lifestyle magazines that are a far more reasonable category for my magazine than the business counterpart.