OSP: Teen Vogue - Audience and Representation

Audience

Although the brand name suggests a teenage audience, the typical Teen Vogue reader has evolved in recent years. The move to more political content has broadened the appeal and changed the genre – young women now expect more from their media.

The ‘Campus Life’ section in Lifestyle also suggests an older readership. However, the audience is still interested in celebrity content and beauty – which Teen Vogue addresses by featuring the ‘opinion leaders’ (two-step flow) of social media.

Generations

Generation X: Born between 1965 – 1980

Millennials / Generation Y: Born between 1981 – 1995

Generation Z (or iGen): Born 1996 – 2010

Teen Vogue: political positioning

Teen Vogue generally takes a liberal, left-wing political stance and positions its readers to become active in their support:

• Pro-feminist
• Pro-gender fluidity and gender identity
• Supports LGBT equality
• Pro-multiculturalism
• Supports Black Lives Matter
• Pro-environment (accepting science on climate change)
• Pro-choice (abortion)

Teen Vogue: audience interaction

How does Teen Vogue encourage audience interaction?

• Activism
• Social media
• ‘Clickbait’ and first-person headlines
• Events – Teen Vogue summit

Representation

Changing representations

Feminist bloggers and websites such as Rookie and liberal blogJezebel have been credited with changing the representation of women and feminism in the digital age.

This can be linked to Clay Shirky’s ‘end of audience’ theory with digital influencers changing the media landscape for women – and established mainstream brands like Teen Vogue are following to stay relevant.

Audience

Analyse the Conde Nast media pack for Teen Vogue. 

1)What is the Teen Vogue mission statement and what does this tell us about the target audience and audience pleasures?

• "educate, enlighten, and empower" 
• "create a more inclusive environment"
• "amplifying the voices of the unheard, telling stories that normally go untold"
• "providing resources for teens looking to make a tangible impact in their communities"

The key aspects of the mission statement clearly highlight the importance of creating an inclusive community to Teen Vogue. Teen Vogue's audience is progressive and have a voice that they want to be heard - they have great opinion on controversial and complicated issues in todays society. Teen Vogue focus on the concept of providing under-represented groups a place where they can express themselves and be given a voice. 

2) What is the target audience for Teen Vogue? 

Target audience:

• 63% Generation Z/millennials

Audience facts and figures: 

• 18.5m total audience reach
• Readers of Teen Vogue tend to spend $11b on fashion & beauty products
• #1 reaching influential activists

Platform information:

• Digital - 5.4m
• Social - 13.1m
• Video - 24.4m

Psychographic groups may include aspirers. This is because Teen Vogue typically has an audience that are very focused on impacting the world and making a difference in the future. May also include succeeders - Teen Vogue is a movement that encourages influential people to represent their views through Teen Vogue.

3) What audience pleasures or gratifications can be found in Teen Vogue? Do these differ from the gratifications of traditional print-based magazines?

• Personal identification - being able to see themselves and their ideologies reflected in the magazine. This is conventional of typical magazines aimed at teenagers; however, Teen Vogue attempt to reflect the less superficial aspects of teenagers/young people - i.e. allowing them to relate with things such as preparing for Campus life, rather than general fashion advice.
• Personal relationships - the ability to make connections with those who have similar views/issues to them - i.e. LGBTQ+ people being able to connect and discuss things with people who will be able to relate to them on a deeper level. This does however reiterate the concept of Echo Chambers - only their views will be expressed and then relayed back to them.
• Surveillance - learning about a range of opinions and perspectives so that the audience can be made aware of the issues present in their society. This highlights Teen Vogue as a "woke" brand

4) How is the audience positioned to respond to political news stories?

The combination of Teen Vogue's mission statement and target audience  shows that their audience are positioned to respond to political news stories in a reformist manner. They use 'first-person' headlines which encourages the audience to read, directly take in and have their own formed opinion on the articles as it presents the idea that the writers are speaking to them directly.

5) How does Teen Vogue encourage audiences to interact with the brand – and each other – on social media? The ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ section of the media pack may help with this question.

• They have new, refreshing designs and content - a mix of "street style storytelling and imagery." 

• Have multiple digital and video series to encourage people to interact on multiple platforms - series creates continuity and the concept of being able to constantly receive information and advice. The fact it has alternative views on things (i.e. "the history lesson that you didn't learn in history class) also implies that people will find these videos interesting and will tweet/discuss it further with each other.

Representations

1) What do the ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ (key events and features throughout the year) suggest about the representation of women and teenage girls on teenvogue.com?

It offers an empowering, alternative representation of women. They capitalise on the idea of women being influential leaders, rather than passive people in society. They focus on the idea of encouraging women to recognise how much they can eventually impact society in the future.

2) How are issues of gender identity and sexuality represented in Teen Vogue?

The issues of identity politics are addressed in a progressive manner as Teen Vogue identify gender identity and sexuality as a controversial issue that should not be ignored. They acknowledge the fact that there are underrepresented groups and they make the point of trying to represent them in the most accurate and true way.

3) Do representations of appearance or beauty in Teen Vogue reinforce or challenge traditional stereotypes?

Teen Vogue challenge traditional stereotypes of beauty. They very much focus on the idea of not trying to fit in, but instead making your differences something that actually make you even more unique. For example, having Skai Jackson sporting her afro proudly during a photoshoot reflects this idea of afroccentric beauty and embracing styles that are typically shunned in Western society.

4) What is patriarchy and how does Teen Vogue challenge it? Does it succeed? 

Patriarchy is a more traditional societal ideology that men are dominating and hold the power whilst women are subordinate and largely excluded from this. In Teen Vogue they do not view power as being defined by gender and traditional gender roles but instead inspire their audience to have the confidence to campaign against something that they believe deserves recognition and ultimate change.

5) Does Teen Vogue reinforce or challenge typical representations of celebrity?

For the most part, Teen Vogue subverts typical representations of celebrity. The celebrity news that they do report tends to fit/suit the ideologies of the magazine in some way. For example, the story about transgender fashion models. However, they do still rely on some click bait style headlines/articles to generate a buzz around their brand. This means that they do still include some seemingly irrelevant stories - e.g news about Bella Hadid's coat.

Feature: how Teen Vogue represents the changing nature of media aimed at women

Read this Quartz feature - The true story of how Teen Vogue got mad, got woke, and began terrifying men like Donald Trump - and answer the following questions:

1) How was the Teen Vogue op-ed on Donald Trump received on social media?

The Teen Vogue op-ed on Donald Trump was well received and actually generated a lot of attention for the  brand as a whole. It was unexpected that a brand like Teen Vogue would speak openly about something so political/serious/controversial like their opinions on Trump's presidency as they are originally a fashion brand.

2) How have newspapers and magazines generally categorised and targeted news by gender?

Women's newspapers/magazines have typically been limited to topics like fashion, lifestyle, parenting advice and arts/literature. However, newspapers aimed at men typically covered topics like business and any political news/things relating to the economy; they tend to cover more serious news and topics.

3) How is this gender bias still present in the modern media landscape?

I think that this gender bias is still present in some conventional magazines that are designed to target a predominantly male/female audience. For example, magazines like Cosmopolitan are unlikely to feature news about economics over parenting advice. However, on the whole, I think that gender bias is being targeted and gradually resolved slowly.

4) What impact did the alternative women’s website Jezebel have on the women’s magazine market?

It combined the typical soft news (like fashion and entertainment) with hard news like politics and economics. In doing so, it created a model for modern approaches to women's media - making all of the content a lot more diverse.

5) Do you agree with the writer that female audiences can enjoy celebrity news and beauty tips alongside hard-hitting political coverage? Does this explain the recent success of Teen Vogue?

I strongly agree that female audiences can enjoy both hard and soft news stories. Teen Vogue is a prime example of this, because it not only covers things like fashion tips and general lifestyle advice, but they also cover hard-hitting political issues like police brutality and Trump "Gaslighting America." which engages conversation and a response.

6) How does the writer suggest feminists used to be represented in the media?

Suggests that females used to be represented as:

• Overtly sexualised/sex objects
• More focused on soft news stories

7) What is the more modern representation of feminism? Do you agree that this makes feminism ‘stereotyped as fluffy’?

I don't think this makes feminism "fluffy" I think it just means that females are willing to discuss topics beyond the range that they were originally limited to.

8) What contrasting audience pleasures for Teen Vogue are suggested by the writer in the article as a whole?

The article expresses the idea that women are capable of forming opinions about both sides of the news, and aren't just limited to one. It highlights the contrast between "fluffy" topics like beauty etc, and the "serious journalism" covering politics and news.

9) The writer suggests that this change in representation and audience pleasures for media products aimed at women has emerged from the feminist-blog movement. How can this be linked to Clay Shirky’s ‘end of audience’ theory?

The feminist-blog movement highlights the fact that consumers can add to the content circulated in the media by projecting their own opinions. Clay Shirky's end of audience theory relates to the idea of mass communication and the concept of audiences no longer solely consuming the media, but also producing it as well.