The 5 Subjects

I spend a lot of time coaching air talent in storytelling. As Paul Harvey best illustrates, most good radio is about STORIES, no matter how short. And 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.

A key from my friend John Frost: The more emotional the question, the more emotional the answer.

If you ask a listener, "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, 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 had 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 and asylum in running, 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. Think of every break you do as being about an EMOTION. (For instance, it can be about something as simple as a listener being happy to win a prize.)

What emotion is this next break about?