Christine and Salt, 965 TIC-FM, Hartford Going Deep on An Interview
You might be doing lots of interviews with the Covid issue. Compelling and interesting story-telling with experts and listeners really resonate with the audience. But, you don’t get there by accident and certainly cannot make it happen without prep. There is a very compelling TV commercial featuring a nurse at a Hartford-area hospital (here). It is immensely powerful and paints the picture of a day in her life for viewers. Christine and Salt, 965, TIC-FM, Hartford decided they wanted to talk with Nurse Sophia, considering how moved they were by the commercial. A good first step in doing an interview is that you must be moved. What aids this interview is that they are curious people – not on the surface (i.e. tell us what time you wake up, what time do you get to work – these are the kinds of questions that signal you never prepped to figure out how you’d explore her story – so Nurse Sophie could expose her true life past what we see in the spot). As you will hear in this interview, the team probed about what it was like to be in a room with a Covid patient and what her life was like when she went home after experiencing that each day. They went deep and you must, too, if you will do an interview that will be impactful, emotional, memorable, and lasting for the audience.
We’ve all done the same half dozen Mother’s Day ideas for years, right? Karson and Kennedy, MIX 104.1, Boston developed a new idea this year called Iron Mom. It’s the pretty simple bit where listeners call a voicemail line to tell them about what makes their mom special – what elevates this idea is the frame (they are creating a club of Iron Moms, which is powerful) and what they are asking listeners to share when they call. The brilliance of this break is how they debuted the feature. Where many shows would just promote the number, keeping the idea in listeners’ heads as they explained what they wanted, the team left their own mock voicemails for themselves and then played them for the audience. As you will hear, the examples both defined the show’s cast for character development but also gave those inclined to call what they are looking for. Each was both touching and funny and they moved the audience to feel the idea so listeners knew what to leave on the voicemail line for airing – which is smart.
There are stories all over the place of the odd things happening to people around the coronavirus topic. While you should start transitioning to other kinds of content now, this topic is still relevant, especially if you’re telling a story and having fun. Charles Calvin got what he thought was an $8-million stimulus check from the federal government instead of his expected $1600. David, Sue, and Kendra, Magic 106.7, Boston had to hear the story. What makes this break great is that they let him tell them the story. Knowing all the details because of prep, they helped him move the narrative forward to its conclusion. When interviewing anyone, I am listening for many things (is it a well-told, interesting story? Will the audience laugh at it? Has it been edited well?). Chief among the things I am also listening for is how much the talent talk and how much the person being interviewed talks. I hope for more of the latter than the former.
A challenge for every show, regardless of market size, is getting phone calls early in the program. We all have smaller audiences then and listeners are less inclined to call a show and participate in any game or phone topic you might have. What could help is focusing the phones on a specific type of listeners. Two Men and a Mom, WRAL-FM, Raleigh know that, while most of the audience is getting up and ready for work or school (when in session) at that early hour, they are not inclined to call. But an audience on the road and more ripe to participate in a radio show is truckers. So they direct this occasional phone topic at them, asking truckers to call to tell them what they’re hauling. It’s a simple way to generate some content early in the show on the phones – the win comes in the conversation, then the payoff of finding out what’s in their truck and where they’re bringing it.
One quick way to get phones is to ask the audience to help you solve a dilemma. That’s reflected in this week’s 
To truly resonate with the audience, we must understand where they are emotionally. We need to really connect with where their lives are in the middle of the coronoavirus crisis. In many respects, that’s easy if you have a life like them. Worlds get smaller when there is something like this. One of our jobs is to communicate to the audience who won’t call (98% of the them) that they are not alone in their experiences. Lots of phone calls do that. Let regular listeners come on to talk about what’s going on with them – their wins and frustrations – and that will talk to everyone else. This is a simple, but very powerful break from John and Tammy, KSON, San Diego, who let listeners come on who are over being stuck inside with their kids. Hear the raw emotion in the callers voices as they tell their stories and how John and Tammy connect with them to tell theirs – all leading to fun conversations that say to the audience, “we’re all in this together.”