Research and Planning: Magazine Cover

I decided that in order to create my own magazine cover, it would be crucial for me to understand what a cover has to have to encourage their target audience:

• The masthead, written in a modern colour and style, shows the reader that it is a college magazine as the masthead both says college and is the same colour as all the other titles to the stories linked to college students.
• The target audience is also shown by the image of a student and to make sure he looks like a college student, he's carrying textbooks.
• The cover has stories that college students can relate to with titles such as "Thank God It's Friday's" which appeal to college students as its highlighting the end of the week.
• The main colour scheme, green, white and black, links the entire cover together.
• The cover also contains a barcode and price, an issue number and a slugline.