Get Your Own Radio Show Talent Tip: Storytelling

As a valued visitor to www.getyourownradioshow.com member, we’ll be sending you occasional ‘talent tips’ to help sharpen your on-air performance and get you ready to host your own show.  This week’s deals with the basic tenet of being a GREAT interviewer or interviewee…it’s the art of telling a story, or getting an interview guest to tell a story.

I spend a lot of time coaching radio show air talent on the art of storytelling. As the late great radio broadcaster Paul Harvey illustrated brilliantly with his REST OF THE STORY commentaries (are you familiar with him?  If not, stop what you’re doing right now and find audio on Paul Harvey), the most sticky aka memorable radio is about STORIES, no matter how short.  Thinking of content in terms of how stories are constructed (a beginning, a middle, an end) is essential to sounding interesting on the air. But that’s just the “left brain” description of the assembly process. The more emotional “right brain” has to be engaged, too.  The more emotional the question, the more emotional the answer.

If you ask someone you meet, “How did you meet your husband?” the response will be information. But if you ask, “Do you remember the moment you knew you were in love?” the response will be a story.  When you ask for information when doing an interview, that’s likely to be all you get. But if you ask something that has an emotional connotation, you’ll almost always tap into the part of every person that wants to share the emotion of whatever it is you’re talking about.

One of the most “lay an egg” moments ever in television sports was after Dallas beat Miami in Super Bowl VI, at the end of the 1971 NFL season. Dallas running back Duane Thomas, known primarily for being a “sphinx” with the press (he hardly spoke to them at all that year) was interviewed by CBS broadcaster Tom Brookshire after the game, in which Thomas was a star, with 95 rushing yards and a key touchdown. Brookshire asked, “Are you really that fast?”

Thomas answered, “Evidently.”  End of interview.

Had Brookshire said something like, “I had no idea you were that fast, Duane. It seemed like you always have another gear to shift into. Could you give us a little insight into that?” he might have found out that Thomas, a troubled man who spoke little because he doubted his ability to communicate, found an almost transcendental peace in running.  He spent hours literally running miles and miles every day as an escape from the world. (Thomas wrote a book about this years later.)  Instead of just a response, Brookshire might have gotten a story.

So, think of every on air topic you do as being about an EMOTION.  When you ask or answer questions, talk to the FEELINGS that listeners  experience.  When you quote numbers or statistics, put a face with them to paint the picture.  Breathe life into your shows within the time constraints you have, to go from being a forgettable time filler to a radio pro that listeners will remember and seek out.

P.S.  If you’d like excellent hands on media training, our Media Mastery Weekend 3 day in studio event is coming up in Washington DC October 22-24^th; find out more (and get a FREE radio interview) at www.publicityseminar.com.