Website Analysis: Vanity Fair












Vanity Fair, revived in the United States in 1983, is a current affairs magazine that targets a white, female, middle-upper class audience, of an average age of 45. Despite the middle-aged demographic, the magazine and website presents itself in a modern fashion, using a black background; this appears rather unconventional for a current affairs website, as most tend to use a plain, white background. The Vanity Fair logo is rather small, and located in the top left corner, rather than a header across the whole top of the screen, indicating their faith in their audiences' interests. The rest of the header/navigation bar features links to its sub-websites, a place to sign in, and a link to making a subscription. The lack of features such as ‘about’ suggests that the company are aware of their importance and status, and that their audience is already educated on who they are and how they represent themselves. The colour scheme is comprised of black, white, and blue, with an added touch of red by the subscription link. The shade of blue is taken from the cover of the current magazine issue, so it could be likely that this third colour changes to match with each issue. The website uses two fonts: a sans-serif, block capitals font to highlight the key information (such as article titles, contribution credits, etc.), and a serif font for the remaining text. The articles are typically presented with the article title, an image, credits, and text, which are separated with thin white lines, making it easier for the audience to distinguish the different articles, and they also draw more attention to the article titles. Links to Vanity Fair’s social media are presented in small white symbols underneath the main cover story: links are provided to Facebook, where they have 2.9 million likes; Twitter, where they have 4.8 million followers; and an email address. The large followings on social media platforms suggests that the brand has established a younger audience than perhaps some of the other brands. The website has a few sponsorship advertisements, placed in between sections of articles, perhaps to help separate the different themes/focuses and importance.   


















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