Jack George's AS Blog

I began my investigation by researching into six separate health organisations and their official websites. The real media products I based my investigation on were The British Heart Foundation, Eatwell.gov.uk, Flora Heart website, GetFit.com, Smoke Free NHS and Breast Cancer Care. The purpose of my research was to analyse the forms and conventions used by each product and establish whether the conventions conform, develop or challenge the typical forms of real media products.

I began my analysis with The British Heart Foundation website. Some of the conventions I highlighted during my analysis, were also reflected in my own website. For example, the design of the website was consistent throughout. The clever use of the organisation’s brand identity colours (red and white), made the overall image of the website very appealing and eye catching. Easy navigational links situated on the left hand side of every page encouraged the visitor to browse the website with ease.

Other conventions I identified and took inspiration from whilst analysing the remaining websites included something as simple as a logo situated at the top of the home page. This is the first page a visitor will come across and so it is important to label your own media product as a production of yours. Three short videos, produced by myself, can be found on both the home page and the sub pages of my website. This particular convention was used in order to attract and sustain a visual interest from the visitor as they explore my website. A variety of colourful and appealing images are carefully placed on all pages along with a suitable amount of written textual information. This helped my product provide an informative balance between imagery and text, so that the visitor does not lose interest half way through my product.

A campaign’s purpose is to represent targeted social groups with help, support and solutions to a particular problem. A campaign’s success is determined entirely on the reaction from its target audience. Without any involvement from a specific social group, your campaign would lack awareness, popularity and most importantly - support. That is why campaigns are always designed with the target social group’s best interests in mind.

My target audience's demographics are as follows:

Male or Female although the design of the site is quite masculine because of the colour scheme and the representation of the audience through the images.

Age category. Between 13 - 19. These are the people who the government are currently targeting for healthier lifestyles.

Any ethnic background although I recognise that I have represented only young white males in my site.

The target audience must have access to the Internet in order to utilise my media product

My target audience's psychographic profile is as follows (VALS):

ACTUALISERS: Potentially Successful, wealthy, dynamic people for whom image is very important as a self expression of individuality.

MAINSTREAMERS: People who want to fit in with the crowd both physically and emotionally.

ASPIRERS: People who strive for an all-round bigger and better lifestyle.

My campaign is specifically dedicated to providing my target audience/social group with advice on how to eat healthily and how to stay physically fit. There is a wide variety of language used throughout my product. The style of language I have used includes short colloquial sentences, combined with factual and professional information. This provides the visitor with a sense of balance. The overall mode of address is informal. Professional information is represented to the audience using colloquial language. There is also a wide range in colour across the entire website which sustains the website's aesthetic appeal.

For example, if my product consisted of pages filled with extensive factual information, the visitor will immediately lose interest in my product. However, if there is a clear combination of short colloquial sentences mixed with a controlled level of factual information, you then have a balance which is very relevant to the interests and needs of my target audience. Images and video clips can also be used to help provide the visitor with a balance.

One of the main reasons why I chose to base my campaign upon health in general is because it is considered by the vast majority of us (including myself) as one of the most important aspects of a person’s life. Therefore, in order for me to successfully attract my target audience/relevant social groups, I had to try and relate with some of the issues and concerns the public have on their health. By obtaining a personal relationship with my target audience, I would then be able to successfully highlight exactly what they are most concerned about and why.

The method I used to obtain this information from my target audience was to create an online survey. I used a website called ‘www.surveymonkey.com’. This particular website allowed me to create my own personalised survey free of charge! The survey results proved a great success, as I was able to question the general public’s personal views on specific health related topics and isolate the ideal social group/target audience relevant to my campaign.

I represented the reality of the problems that can occur as a result of an unhealthy lifestyle by supporting my claims and suggestions with professional advice. People are very willing to change the poor lifestyle they have adopted when a professional confronts them with the various issues that can occur as a result of an unhealthy lifestyle. That is why campaign adverts are often intended to shock the viewer because sometimes shock is a necessary cost to ignite a change in people.

It is difficult to identify the types of media institutions who may distribute my media product. For example, television channels often distribute programmes. However, my media product will not necessarily need to be distributed in the traditional sense, but it does need to reach it's target audience via the Internet.

I conducted a research task which highlighted how advertising agencies often help or create campaigns for charity organisations. Also, during my website analysis of charity organisations, I identified who the websites were designed by and why the charity organisations chose to hire professional designers to create their websites.

The majority of website designers were practically unknown. The biggest company I found who created a campaign for the PDSA (People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals) in 2005 were called ‘SpaceCity’. Space City is an Internet based company who help charity organisations create campaigns in the form of television adverts. Space City claims they were contacted by the PDSA to create a television advert that would enhance the charity’s public awareness and monthly donations.

I do not require the help of professional web designers to create my media product because I feel I am perfectly capable of creating a website myself due to the extensive practice and knowledge I have gained whilst creating my preliminary task, ‘The George School’.

I also found a website with the domain name of www.whoishostingthis.com. This website was very accurate when identifying the online web hosting companies who were currently hosting every one of my six analysed charity websites.

And, to complete my research, I searched for the cheapest and most expensive web hosting prices that were available to me if I decided to have my media product hosted by an online web hosting company.

Web hosting is a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organisations to make their own website accessible via the 'World Wide Web'. They provide users with Internet connectivity and server space to create their own website. The types of hosting that are available include free hosting, shared hosting, clustered hosting, reseller hosting, blog hosting, guild hosting, image hosting, video hosting and many more. I will need to subscribe to a proffessional hosting company in order to have my website made accessible to the public. This could cost me from £3.99 a month up to £49 a month depending on what kind of hosting service I require.

A domain name is an identification label which defines individual website addresses. They can uniquely identify an organisation on the internet just by searching for one or more IP addresses which relate to a particular website. After conducting my own research, I discovered that the cheapest domain name available for my website would be 'www.livehealthylivelife.co.uk' and the company who provided me with this were ‘Namesco’. This domain name is perfect for my website as it specifically reflects the title of my organisation. This domain name would cost me £3.99 per year and it would be funded by my own investment.

The overall structure of my product was taken into careful consideration early on during the design stages. Simplistic features such as the placement of the logo and the sub page links have to be positioned and designed very carefully. I tried to represent the conventions taken from my previous website analysis into my own media product.

The main feature I used to attract my target audience on the home page of my website is the video. As soon as the home page is loaded in your Internet browser, the video automatically begins to play. The video itself is interesting to watch as it shows a number of hands picking crisps off of a plate to reveal the name of my website as a written message at the bottom. However, this particular technique is very commonly used by the large majority of other health campaign websites because it successfully captures the visitor's attention on the very first page. Once the visitor has viewed the home page video, they are immediately curious to see what the rest of the website has waiting for them.

The intermedial nature of the website coincides effectively with the various navigational links situated across the website. The visitor's experience begins on the home page when they are instantly caught by the video. The various red and white theme colours combined with appropriate images and a black background sustain the interest gained initially by the video. Various other images and two videos on the final page of my website coincide effectively with the monotonous theme colours and consistent page structures used across the healthy eating page, the un-healthy eating page and the physical fitness page.

The software package I used to create my website was 'iweb'. iweb is a software programme for apple computers which allows you to create and design your own website. At first, I found iweb very difficult to use having had no past experience of the programme before. The various options and features that come with the programme were overwhelming. However, I feel the preliminary task really helped understand the programme in greater detail. I was able to practice utilise iweb's full range of both basic and advance tools to create my preliminary task and the progress I have made since creating my preliminary website, 'The George School' is vast. I am now extremely confident when using the iweb programme.

During the production stages of my website, I also used another software programme called 'Photoshop'. Photoshop is a software package that can be used on Microsoft computers and Apple computers. I used this programme primarily to edit my photography used on my website. For example, my favourite piece of editing is when I carefully cropped the logo of a pack of chocolate digestives and a box of twiglets. The logos can be found at the bottom of the unhealthy page of my website.

To create a successful website, I must first identify and isolate my specific target audience. By doing this, I will obtain relevant information which will allow me to construct my website upon the needs and interests of my target audience.

The method I used to research my target audience was an online health survey. 'SurveyMonkey.com' is a website which allows members to create their very own personalised survey free of charge! I also managed to collate the results retrieved from my survey into a variety of charts which are shown below.

The feedback I received from my online survey gave me a detailed insight into the views and opinions people have about health related issues. For example, question 3 asked the audience whether or not they felt that the media had influenced their health in anyway. The response was a resounding 'yes', as 100% of the people who answered the question agreed that the media HAD influenced their health in some way.

However, the simple but limited answer of 'yes' is very general and broad. So I decided to include an 'Explain your answer' option at the end of most questions. This not only allowed the person to explain his/her answer, but encouraged him/her to expand on their views.

Referring to the results I gathered from my online health survey, I can conclude the specific demographic of my future website's target audience.

My Target Audience's Demographics:

Male or Female although the design of the website is quite masculine because of the colour scheme and the representation of the audience through the various images.

Age category between 13 - 19. These are the people who the government are currently targeting for for healthier lifestyles.

Any ethnic background although I do recognise that I have represented only young white males within my website.

Annual income: You must have a percentage of disposable income available.

Social class: My product applies to social classes A, B, C1, C2 or D.

Education: Specific educational standards aren't required.

Location: My target audience must have access to the Internet in order to fully utilise my media product.

My Target Audience's Psychographics:

Modern day audiences can be very complex. So, there is another method that can be used to analyse any target audience in greater detail. This particular method is called the VALS system. The VALS system considers an audience's VALUES, ATTITUDES and LIFESTYLES.

The following VALS are relevant to my target audience:

ACTUALISERS: Successful, wealthy, dynamic people for whom image is very important as a self expression of individuality.
MAINSTREAMERS: People who want to fit in with the crowd both physically and emotionally.
ASPIRERS: People who strive for an all-round bigger and better lifestyle.