Establishing a difference of a local newspaper and a national newspaper

The Daily Telegraph

The Daily Telegraph is a national paper, a broadsheet. This newspaper is a lot larger than all of the local newspapers I have studied, it is twice the size. This newspaper has a fairly specifiic target audience, it tends to be higher class people and businessmen, as many of it's articles are business focused. This newspaper also offers freebees, as advertised at the top; "FREE CD". The audience of this newspaper are not for a specific area, as shown by now location in the name of the paper. 'The Daily Telegraph' is written in extremely large font, bigger than that I've seen in local newspapers, it is also completely centered beneath the advertisement at the top. Beneath 'The Daily Telegraph', 'NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR' is written. this attracts readers to the newspaper. If a newspaper was nominated this, then they would want people to know this, therefore encouraging them to buy and read it. The price is also a lot higher than the local newspapers that I have looked at. Most local newspapers that I have seen are around 40 or 50p, where as this is at £1. This also conveys the target market of the newspaper.

On the front page alone, there are five articles, one main titled 'Petrol Price Rises rake in extra £2bn for Treasury'. I have not come across any local newspapers that have any more than 2 articles on the first page. This gives readers a lot more variation on what to read on the front page and gives them a vaig idea on what to expect through out the rest of the newspaper. Suprisingly, there is only one photograph on the first page (exluding adverts and pictures not related to the articles.) And this photograph is actually relevant to an article on page 9. As it obviously doesn't relate to any of the articles surrounding it, people would be attracted to find out why that photograph is there, then reading the caption and very brief description of the article. But, there is also a small comic drawing relating to the main headliner, this shows the reader a variation in the newspaper.

The advert at the bottom of the page is for a national holiday company: Sandals. It advertises an offer to the readers: a discount for a holiday. Sandals is a fairly high class and expensive holiday resort, therefore emphasising the target audience to be richer and higher class. There are photographs in this advertisement, they show the high standard that Sandals offer; again, emphasising the target market.

The layout of this newspaper is almost completely different to the local newspapers that I have looked out. An example of this is the contents column, actually becoming a row along the bottom of the page, just above the Sandals advertisement. All of these articles that are mentioned in the contents section have a photograph, this attracts more readers, especially as they are in colour.

The Sun

The Sun is another national newspaper, quite different to The Daily Telegraph. This is an example of a tabloid newspaper. The Sun seems to appeal to a younger audience, as shown in research I have found:

61% of readers are between 15 – 44
91% of readers are C1, C 2, D, E
58% of readers are male

It seems that there is quite a variation of people who read The Sun, differently to The Daily Telegraph. It seems that The Sun is a far more celebrity focused newspaper, rather than what is happening in society and to the economy. A very good example of this is that the main headliner on the front page is about Katie Price/Jordon and her marriage: 'What Jordon told Alex'

"I WON'T HAVE YOUR BABY"

There is also two photographs, one of each of them at the beginning and then the end of the small article, related to the headline.

There is also another small article at the top left of the page, about keeping petrol prices down. This is just beneath the logo of The Sun, therefore attracting the audience firstly to the name of the paper, then to the article and the advert. This advert has no picture, photograph or image, it is just large, bold, cartoon font with the main focus of "HOLS FROM £10.50". this shows that the target audience are likely to be those slightly worse off, and this contrasts to the holiday advert on the front of The Daily Telegraph, along with the 70p price difference. More information on how to achieve this extraordinarily cheap holiday are on page 7, therefore encouraging readers to flick through to page 7 and read on, aswell as be interested by other articles on pages in between. I have also seen this kind of advertisement/encouragement in local newspapers.

The Sun is considered famous for page three. This is shown through the 'Miss Lacey Banghard' standing in her underwear on the left side of the front page, therefore encouraging readers to go to page three. This also perhaps explains why there are more men than women who read this newspaper. The name in itself is written yellow on pink, in large font, attracts the audience... just because of how weird her name is and perhaps how relevant it is to her being a page 3 model.

IN CONCLUSION...

After looking at national newspapers, I have realised that the target audience are a lot more obvious and perhaps specific than the local newspapers that I have looked at.

Something that local newspapers and national newspapers have in common is the articles/adverts that are continued onto another page, an example of this would be The Sun and The East Anglian Daily Times. I haven't actually been able to find a newspaper that isn't printed in colour. It seems that the price changes not because of a newspaper being national or local, but for the target market. Therefore once I have established my target audience, I will be able to pick a reasonable price.