A contents page serves an important role in a magazine, acting as a menu to the reader from which they can navigate and choose what they want to know more about. Due to this, it is important that information is clear, easy and engaging to read, without overloading them with information in a massive body of text; since readers go to a contents in order to decide if and what they want to read, not having to read a massive paragraph before they can even make that decision.
Some technical conventions of a contents page include;
- A clear title of “contents” making it clear to readers what they are looking at and so that they can easily refer back to this page.
- A list of articles/features either chronological or sorted under subheadings of similar styles/themes for easy reading and finding specific articles.
- Page numbers shown clearly, often in bold or a different text colour for easy and clear reference.
- Enticing and clear article titles to let the reader know at a glance what each article is about, allowing them to quickly decide if it’s something they’d be interested in reading.
- Short summaries of articles to give readers slightly more information and further help them decide if they’d be interested in each article.
- Relevant photos often featuring the cover star to break up what is otherwise a body of text and keep the viewing diverse and interesting.
Possible Headlines;
- Band-At-First-Sight
- Breaking Down the Boundaries
- Album of the Month
- Top 10 Upcoming Bands
- Everything You Need to Know About…