Cosmo online or in your hand




Which is better on a screen or in your hand, online or in real life? That’s a question that has been asked since computers and cell phones with internet access have become a household item. Some people believe that a print version of something is the best it can be, and maybe for certain things it is, but not for all things. Cosmopolitan, a widely known magazine and website. Now which is best. The online version, or the print version.
 
Cosmopolitan, It’s a women’s magazine focuses looks at beauty, style, body love. The website of this publication does look at more topics than the magazine does including parenting, and politics. Young women are the target audience for this publication. This
magazine/cite caters to style, beauty, and advice for women in their adult years. The magazine is mainly photographs with stories written around them here and there. The first couple of pages is only advertising, when it gets to the stories they are usually broken up with an ad or picture. The stories topics go from beauty, to body, to love and style. Each of those four topics is broken up into sections where the articles are placed. The website on the other hand allows the readers to scroll through and look at what stories they can read in more of a list format with small images next to the title. Heres the link to the actual site if you want to get a better understanding (http://www.cosmopolitan.com/  ).The ads in the print version are mainly targeted for women. Make up is one of the most common products being advertised and a few brands that I saw were Maybelline, L’Oréal, and Mary Kay. Online had an ad for cars, a hair dryer, popular T.V. shows, and many more things. While the print version of this publication has more ads that are targeted for women such as makeup and tampon ads. There are some games in the publication that you can do as well as questionnaires in both the online and print. The publication has a section on snapchat where you can go and look at the stories there as well as a facebook page allowing the readers to follow it and look at their posts there as well.
https://www.facebook.com/Cosmopolitan/ 

This particular magazine is known for its advice on sex and guys. When looking at the cover one of the largest words on there is sex. Its also a magazine that is mainly for women, although it does have a few articles from a mans perspective it is mainly tailored for women. One thing that sets this publication apart from the competition in ranking. Out of the top 100 magazines ranked by circulation Cosmo got 16th (http://www.psaresearch.com/images/TOPMAGAZINES.pdf ). This magazines main focus seems to be on women as a whole going from beauty to body and make up to style. Other magazines feature several articles about celebrities, but Cosmopolitan seems to have less of a focus on celebrities and more of a focus on its reader. 

There are many differences in the online content and the print content, but the three that I noticed were:
1.      Less ads online,
2.      There is more News online than in the print…. Only few stories and it’s mainly about celebrities, but more than in print.
3.      Online topics range from Career to parenting and the print copies are very limited.
After flipping through the magazine I noticed that on nearly every other page there was an ad of some sort and it was mainly targeted towards women. The ads online were less frequent and seems to be more of the ads that are targeted towards just about anyone. A few online ads that I saw were for bikes and cars. The amount of news in the magazine was very minimal if any at all, while online there is an entire section dedicated to politics it even discusses topics like President Trump. Lastly the range of topics online compared to the print version is outstanding. There is a section where you can pick a topic and read any one of their many articles about it. There are topics for college, parenting, career and much more allowing for a variety of articles.
Like many things there are strengths and weaknesses in the printed version and online version.
Strengths in the print:
     1.It does talk about taking care of yourself and gives you tips on how.
2.Its focus is on the reader not just celebrities.
Weaknesses for print:
1.The lack of variety in the topics
2.Majority of pages are used for ads.
Strengths for online:
       1.It has a huge variety of topics vs the print version.
                  2. Allows for readers to explore more than one article per topic.
Weaknesses for online:It was hard for me to even think of one weakness online. The topics range is huge, there are plenty of articles for each topic and it allows the reader to explore more than just one article per topic.
                  1. lack of article for men.
 This assignment allowed me to see that there is so much more than just the print copies of magazines that I never thought to look at before. After looking at both the website and print copy of Cosmopolitan I can say that in my opinion online version serves the readers better because its wide range of topics and access to so many articles that aren’t just for women. The online version goes beyond its usual audience and topics allowing their readers to explore more of what cosmopolitan’s articles have to offer them. 

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