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People have a variety of interests and needs

People’s interests vary

The strength of magazines begins with the fact that people have strong interests and needs, and these interests vary from person to person.

Even among those interested in a particular broad subject area there are distinctions between people in terms of the nature of their interest in the subject. These distinctions are much less obvious than those between broad subject areas. The gardening market furnishes an example. A survey conducted by Marketing Direction for EMAP Apex [1] used cluster analysis to segment the market in terms of attitudes and reasons for interest in gardening. Eight clusters were identified. Ranked in order of size, they were labelled:

  • Accomplished flower gardener
  • Leisure gardener
  • Maintainer
  • Developing Enthusiast
  • Culinary gardener
  • Second career gardener
  • Private hobbyist
  • Low budget gardener

These different groups have different requirements from gardening magazines. And the magazines serving them have developed varied characteristics, with many of them appealing to different shades of interest. The readers are in fact served by about a dozen mainstream gardening magazines and also a variety of very narrowly focused titles. This specialisation means that each magazine can get very close to the people with the particular attitude and focus which the title offers.

Nine basic media needs

The Henley Centre [2] has identified nine basic media needs, split into two main classes: informational needs and cultural needs. The nine are:

Information needs:

  • Instrumental: information for daily life such as weather, transport, traffic, sales, opening and closing times, etc.
  • Analysis: to understand the world, form views, have opinions.
  • Enlightenment: keeping up with the world, national and local events; being and becoming informed.
  • Self-enhancement: bettering ourselves, self-enhancement, knowledge for its own sake or for later application; acquisition of skills.

Cultural needs:

  • Ritual: media use which frames daily routines, such as getting up, going to work, relaxing after work, accompanying domestic chores.
  • Default: absorbing media because it is there or because others within the social context are using it.
  • Relaxation: passive absorption of media, unwinding.
  • Entertainment: keeping ourselves amused, keeping others amused, having fun.
  • Escapism: frees the user mentally from the immediate constraints and/or dullness of daily life, enabling him/her to enter into new experiences vicariously.