RADIO BULLETINS

10 production tips

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Putting together a radio news bulletin is like serving up a satisfying meal that nourishes and prepares your audience for the day

It’s not about making you sound great. It has to be focused, digestible, easy to listen to and catch the attention of the audience

What is a radio bulletin? Nourishing the audience

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Think target audience. You need to know who is tuning in for the information you are delivering and what they need to know

Focus on the news stories and information that is relevant for your radio station’s targeted audience

1: Serving the audience Understand their needs

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Your top stories are not necessarily the biggest stories, but will be those that have the most impact on the lives of your target audience

These top stories will define how close your news organisation is to that audience

1: Serving the audienceAddressing their concerns

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

The audience will be listening for information that they can use

Your top stories must make up their staple diet of ‘must know’ information

1: Serving the audienceInforming the public debate

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Offer an information mix

News tends to be multi-coloured and multi-faceted, as is real life

Your job is to reflect the realities of the issues that most affect your audience

2: Variety The spice of life

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

If you are covering politics you must highlight how the issue impacts on the lives of your audience

Don’t dwell on the politics alone

2: Variety Issues not processes

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Always try to include the voice of those affected by whatever the story is highlighting

If you are covering a corruption story, it’s important that you talk to the victims and the man and woman in the street, not just officials

2: Variety Voice to the voiceless

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

A voice that pleases is important to ensuring the audience returns

Try recording a few of your bulletins and listen back to them

Would you like to wake up every day and listen to that?

3: Listenable Would you listen?

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Audio creates emotions An attractive voice that

catches the attention of the audience is important

The last thing you want is a grating voice that makes people switch off

3: Listenable Do you turn people off?

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Avoid the sing-song voice that plays the same tune for every sentence, going up in tone and down at the end regardless of what is being said

And never give the impression that you think you know more than the audience; there will always be someone listening who knows far more than you

3: Listenable Sing-song news

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Don’t rush. Make sure your audience can understand what you are saying

Reading too quickly could result in your audience not understanding what you are saying and not being able to absorb your information

4: Slow down It’s not a race

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

News readers often read fast when they are nervous or when they know that they are about to pronounce a name about which they are uncertain

If you know there is a foreign name coming up in the bulletin, highlight it and practice it until you are sure

Then approach it slowly, pause, and pronounce it clearly

4: Slow down Practice difficult words

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Is your bulletin fresh, dynamic, and stimulating?

Re-writing is essential Many people will listen to

several bulletins during the day

It's important they are not served up stale news that hasn't been reworked

5: Deliver fresh material Not stale news

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

When you come out of studio after reading the latest bulletin consider sitting down and rewriting all the top stories and refreshing the key points

Don’t just put the bulletin down and expect to pick it up again an hour later untouched and unchanged

5: Deliver fresh material Always rewrite

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

If you have a news bulletin at the top of the hour and headlines on the half hour, the headlines can’t just be shorter versions of the main bulletin

You will have to rework them and create a stronger headline that tells more of the story in fewer words in one short sentence

5: Deliver fresh material Always update

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

You may also want to use the half hour bulletin to add stories that you could not or did not want to include in the main bulletin

However, if you choose that kind of presentation format, make sure that you stick to this pattern so that your audience knows what to expect

5: Deliver fresh material Always reorder

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Don’t change your format randomly as this will confuse your audience

A confused audience may switch channels to a place where there is less confusion

5: Deliver fresh material Editorial justification

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Sound bites are important

A longer news bulletin becomes a lot more attractive for audiences if you include short sound bites

This can be a five- or 10-second audio clip from an interview or sounds from the scene of an incident

6: Radio needs sounds Not just your voice

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Such sound bites can make your bulletin easier to listen to, more authoritative, more credible – and more interesting for the listener

However, all sounds have to have an editorial reason for being there

You should not fill with sound clips that distracts

6: Radio needs sounds But only the right sound

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Write news stories as if you were telling the story to a friend

This means: short, simple and straightforward sentences

The majority will be listening on the move and won't be able to rewind the bulletin

7: Storytelling Short stories works best

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Crafting complex information into a simple sentence is a skill

Don’t obscure the essential facts with verbiage

Short, simple and straightforward sentences are required

7: Storytelling Avoid verbiage

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

The bulletin is a compilation of short, but powerful stories

This makes it much easier for people to grasp the information

Writing for radio is one of the most challenging journalistic disciplines

8: Writing style Avoid verbiage

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Long, heavy sentences may work for print but they don’t work for radio audiences

Remember subject, verb, object

Fact, fact, fact Don't try to be clever. Use

words that make most sense and can be understood by all

8: Writing style Small and effective packaging

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

If you are putting together a longer bulletin (e.g. seven minutes or more), you may want to end the bulletin with a brief recap of the main stories

This can help audiences recall the top stories and/or other relevant information

9: Concise Summing up the main points

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

If you don’t believe what you have written and what you are saying your audience won’t either

Make sure you are honest in how you describe situations and events

Don’t sensationalise; it will damage your credibility and integrity

10: Be honest Only broadcast facts

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips

Using material from a training module by Beat Witschi Media Helping Media

Acknowledgement Beat Witschi

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Radio bulletins – 10 tips