What can I say? It’s just this natural gift I have with women….
(Third in a series)
A Loyal Reader Asks:
“How can you teach young jocks to ‘be real’ — to break out of the ‘I’m a DJ’ persona and become communicators?”
Have them picture the one person who needs the info most and deliver it just to that one person.
Tell the results of the big game to the die-hard fan who, having just undergone open-heart surgery, missed his favorite team’s performance for the first time in 20 years.
Slowly awakening in post-op he asks the nurse, in a weak, rasping voice:
“Would you turn on the radio? I want to hear who won the game!”
Offer the day’s projected High Temperature to the guy who has secretly been growing tulips to surprise his wife on their anniversary, and he needs to know whether to give them extra water he leaves for work.
Yes, some jocks actually place someone’s photograph atop the console to help them achieve that “one-to-one” feeling.
Although you might suggest this, I do not recommend insisting that your young jocks do so.
When I was on the air, I always had some vague, amorphous image of that “one person” I was talking to. Being required to limit that image to one specific person would have constricted me.
North American radio traditionally has committed malpractice in the way it discharges its professional obligations to its clients.
All the time and money go into sales training, and nothing is invested in hiring & training the people who are charged with the task of making the client’s investment pay off.
Especially on the local level, businesses do not come to you with “advertising needs.” They come to you with their dreams.
To them, their businesses are not your “accounts.”
That restaurant, that hardware store, that supermarket, that automobile dealership, that real estate firm — all of them represent someone’s dream.
Someone dreamed of having the best pet store in the world. Of making tasty snack foods that their fellow diabetics could enjoy. Of helping struggling young families buy their first homes.
Your clients come to you with their dreams and say, “Help make my dream come true.”
They put their trust in you (because you told them they could trust you).
And yes, Reach and Frequency and Targeting can help. But you don’t need much training to be able to see if your audience matches the client’s consumer base or to make sure they schedule enough commercials.
On the other hand….
Writing and producing a radio commercial that motivates the targeted listener to act…that sells, rather than simply entertains or annoys or is ignored or not heard….That’s a serious responsibility.
How seriously does your station or agency take that responsibility?
We just concluded our Voiceover Demo Secrets teleseminar.
Running time: 2 hours, 13 minutes
This posting is for the people who attended it “live” (or who soon will listen to the mp3 recording) have to say about it….
(Second in a series)
A Loyal Reader Asks:
“How can you teach young jocks to ‘be real’ — to break out of the ‘I’m a DJ’ persona and become communicators?”
Help them identify what they want to share with listeners.
What they want to communicate = ideas, emotions, perspectives, information.
As both a writer and a performer, I try to communicate a perspective. This blog doesn’t offer “information;” it attempts to elucidate my perspective on personality radio.
What they want to share = the parts of themselves they are willing to expose to help maximize the communication.
If you were to read through all of the articles I have written for this blog, looking for clues to my inner identity, you would be able to piece together an incomplete yet still revealing representation of who I am as a human being.
Before your staff members can share themselves with your audience, they need to deteremine which aspects of their personalities and their lives they are willing (and allowed) to share.
