Questionaire Analysis

In order to convey a real newspaper, I asked a variety (15people) of people male and female of all age ranges, to give honest opinions of what they really buy a newspaper for, what they would like to see featured and what section they find most interesting etc. Here are my results.

Question 1 -My results may be more female orientated as I asked slightly more female than male. Although because I asked 33% of male this should not make too much of a difference.

Question 2-My results show that I asked a range of people of all ages although I found it difficult to cover the age ranges of 13-16, 27-30 and 61-70 although this should not make too  much difference because of the amount of people I asked where all spread out and not just in one particular section

Question 3-My findings show that more people (46%) purchase a newspaper once a month and only 40% purchased a local newspaper every week. This could be an indication that 54% are too busy to read a weekly paper therefore only buy it when they are interested in the content for a specific reason .

Question 4-Question four of my research was finding out why people buy local newspapers. I left this question as an open question as the people that were asked might, have had a more specific answer .I found that 13% of people asked bought a newspaper for a specific section, answers I got included family announcements and local sport .20% of people bought the paper to see coverage e of events such as weddings and school balls. Whilst nearly half (47%) bought a paper to keep up with local news. Those of who answered ‘local news/gossip/recent news’ were more likely to purchase the paper weekly (33% showed this)

Question 5-The 7% that stated that 90p was not a fair price for weekly local newspaper was because that they found it was too expensive .The person that stated this was between the ages of 41-50 showing that people who purchase the Harrogate Advertiser weekly, had nothing to do with age .73% of people that stated it was affair price gave reasons such as ‘fair price for a good read’, ’Its weekly so provides a good content’. The 20% of people that answered ‘depends’ stated it due to the content whether it was a good price.

Question 6-When asked where consumers purchase a paper the local shops (such as the co-op etc) was the most popular answer .The second most common answer was the supermarket with 27% with only 20% purchasing a paper from a post office and 7% getting a paper delivered .The reason I asked this question was to find out which retailers received the most purchases, with my results it shows that the paper will more likely to get sales if sold at a supermarket as it may be more convenient for future customers

Question 7-Both the photographs and the hard news is what tends to be a focus for the audience the most with 27% saying this. Entertainment and Events interested slightly less –people but still show the importance in why there are featured. Most male members of the public that were asked said sport was the favourite sections indicating this section is particularly important in getting male audiences to buy a local paper.

Question eight- was about finding out if the audience were happy with the current content of the newspaper in the means of font size, more on a particular section, cheaper price, and more photographs or other with a following section for the audience to elaborate on the question .Some of my audience chose not to answer this question so I presume they are happy with the overall content but those who did stated they would like more on a specific section (42%) some quotes reasons being  ‘more locals events such as schools etc...’ and  ‘a larger sports section’. Others said they would like more photographs (25%) and some even said a ‘cheaper price would be nice.’ Others said a bigger font because sometimes it was difficult to see, with one person selecting other because the paper would be a better size if it was like the tabloid size.

Question 9-A massive 60% of the people asked stated that they don’t think local newspapers appeal to all age ranges.’ More for the older generation and older ones were favoured ‘were just a few reasons. One person that was asked and answered yes stated that there was coverage for all ages in the news and events’. A reason some people stated yes could be down to the reason that newspaper cover events such as school balls and plays.

Question 10-I asked a closed question about the layout and only one person stated they would change the layout by having a smaller sized paper .With the majority over ruling this ,it is not something I will take into consideration when designing my papers as everyone else liked the layout or did not have a problem it.

Question 11-53% stated they would like more features in a local paper, they gave ideas such as ‘young people’s events rather than just proms’,’weather forecast for the local area’ ‘competition and reviews of local attractions’ ‘more offers on local days out/restaurants’. I feel that particularly more young people events would be an advantage because it would help show more positivity about that generation and the weather forecast was quite interesting in the regional paper ‘Yorkshire post’ and the Harrogate area might benefit from it.

Question 12-Finally I gave my audience a few lines to add any additional feedback in areas I have not covered .I had two comments from the fifteen people I asked with both of them stating the same thing of reducing the papers size as it is difficult when on the go .This would be something i would choose not to do as it would not convey as traditional local paper and would not be recognised as this as it would blend in with national papers and would not distinguish the paper apart.

Pie charts to back up my findings-