This week I have been very lucky and have gotten my hands on a full PDF of Conservative Teen Magazine. As I speculated last week, reading through the magazine has proven to be an interesting experience. Whether the articles are warning readers against the sexual content that they will find in mainstream television, or are exclaiming the greatness of America and its ideals, this magazine is not like the rest. Strewn throughout are cartoon comics featuring President Obama engaging in an activity that is perceived to be anti-American. It was interesting for me to contrast the topics of articles presented by the publication and the statistics (from Tuft University) about trends in youth voting. According to research done by Tufts University, President Obama was favored over McCain 2 to 1 by young voters. While the Conservative Teen has a strong focus on social issues, namely sex and interpersonal relations, protection for the unborn, and liberal media bias, it does not seem that these are the issues that teens and young voters are interested in. In fact, 59 percent think that the economy is the most important issue.
As with many readers of this magazine, I am curious as to understand the particular marketing ideas behind this product. Several people who I do not know have commented on my blog post in a similar quest to find the PDF of The Conservative Teen. With the masthead of the magazine at my fingertips, I now plan to research the individuals responsible in the production of the magazine. I am also looking into more statistics about the youth vote and the issues that are important to this group, as well as the best ways to approach this group of individuals.
The report from Tufts said: “The medium is more important than the message. Partisan and nonpartisan, negative and positive messages seem to work about the same. The important factor is the degree to which the contact is personalized.” I am going to look further into this.
mediacritters 