These are notes from Valerie Geller's presentation at the Academic Innovation Exchange at the National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, TN, Feb. 6, 2009.


Valerie Geller - Creating Powerful Radio

Radio,

Pictures are now a part of radio with the internet. Understand that radio has better pictures because of the use of the imagination. You don't do radio, you do life; radio simply gets it out there.

Our job is to inform, entertain, persuade and connect people to life.

Three rules for radio
1. Tell the truth
2. Make it matter
3. Never be boring

How to accomplish following the three rules:

Speak Visually:

Speak visually as you speak. Brain science has shown us that men are visual. Women like the visual, but men need the visual. Women open up with emotion. Use both to touch the audience. Speak visually and connect with emotion.

There are no boring stories, only boring story-tellers. Telling the story, with the visual and the emotive, you can make someone care.

The ugly curse, everyone can talk therefore people think anyone can do it. We know it is not easy. We need to speak, communicate, with passion. Everyone can get better, let's lift up a level.

Brain science again, it takes 1000 times of repeated behavior to make it a habit--to rewire the brain. You have to work consistently to change a behavior.

If you speak visually, you will build listeners.

Start with your best material, Start strong

Think about your first date, what did you do? Listeners are very fickle,
Questions: Is it relevant, will it matter, does my audience care? Do I care?

Listeners hate the feeling of "Now another topic to fill my schedule."
Do you really care about it? If it matters to you…then you can work with it.

Story Tell Powerfully:

Less is more. We are oriented to story, we are tribal, story junkies. The key is that the storyteller knows me. Know your audience.

Example of short storytelling-- "For sale, baby shoes, never used"

Research: what people would always watch?
Health-safety
Heart-emotion, feeling
Pocketbook - money or power
Transformative topics

Fourth Category relevant to Christian Media - transformative topics, how your life can be better from something you have heard today.

Never let anything go too long.

Listen to your station

Ask: Why would someone want to hear this?
Hey Mom, guess what…
Before anything goes on-air, ask "so what?"

Address each listener individually, use "you."
Involve the listener. "Involve me and I'll understand."
The personal is universal, the private is boring. Talk it about it with using the word "you". Private is I, I, I, Me, Me, Me, Personal is universal and inclusive.
Be real; be willing to talk about what is going on. Human beings connect to truth and humanness.

Do engaging transitions and handoffs
You don't do breaks. Tell them what's up next, give them meat. Give them a reason to stay with you.

Brag about you stuff

Stay curious, relaxed, and let humor happen.
Through laughter we can deal with substantive subjects. Sometimes humor is in the most unexpected places. Humor has physical brain responses.
When you are on the air, it is a relationship.

Be who you are on the radio and television
Give people a chance to know you.

Take risks, dare to be great.
It is easy to be average, great means you try things

Questions:
Examples of taking risks:
Going personal and telling your own stories. E.g. A man who opened up about struggling with alcoholism. Another person talked through his mom's dying and death. Observing life through your own experiences. Observe life, take one thing you've overhead, then a piece of news that you would actually talk about to someone. Be original.

Do you think radio drama is dead?
It is actually coming back, and it wasn't really dead, just moved to NPR. What's exciting now is that it is coming back through the internet etc. We are story junkies. Think of the public as a story consuming dragon. Powerful radio is there to make sure the dragon is well fed.


THIS MATERIAL IS USED WITH PERMISSION FROM VALERIE GELLER AND IS EXCERPTED FROM CREATING POWERFUL RADIO - GETTING, KEEPIN & GROWING AUDIENCES - (Focal Press 2007) www.creatingpowerfulradio.com
or www.creatingpowerfulradio.com/textbook
for more www.gellermedia.com