5 Things You Can Do Today to Be a Content Superhero, Part 3

Consumers’ media consumption has changed. Listeners are distracted and scatter to many media outlets. We want to give air talent tools on how they can adapt and thrive in this new world, based upon decades of content research.

Welcome to Chapter Three of a five-part series called Content Superhero™. We introduced the Content Superhero™ series a couple of years ago in conjunction with Tracy Johnson Media Group. The team here at Strategic has analyzed the results of our moment-to-moment research of talk content, and based upon that research, we examine five key ways you can raise your game, engage listeners more and boost your ratings. We want to encourage personalities to change the way they prepare for their shows and each talk break. It is a new year and a new decade – we encourage hosts to challenge themselves and try new approaches to show prep.

Part One of Content Superhero™ looked at the importance of a strong “hook” at the beginning of a talk. Just as TV does now, start with the hook before anything like the name of the feature or station. Focus on engaging the listener, because you only have seven seconds in which to do it. That is the average human attention span today.

Let’s assume you’ve written a fantastic ‘hook’ and the listener has bought into the start of your content. Part Two discussed why you need new “chapters” to your story every 40 seconds, as listeners re-evaluate their behavior continually as they listen. The “40 Second Rule” helps keep your content moving forward.

This feature show below from one of our content tests shows what can happen when there are new chapters continually through the content. Listeners’ interest remains high and in fact higher than the average score of the music in the station’s library (shown by the horizontal red line).

These “chapters” do not happen by good luck or Disney magic. You need to plan them out in advance. That is where Part Three of our series picks up.

Storyboarding merely helps ensure that your content is the best it possibly can be. The days of opening up the mic and hoping it all turns out ok are OVER. Listeners want more, expect more, and get more with the myriad of audio choices out there. This is the time to step up your game.

Storyboarding helps avoid “off-ramps,” which occur when a discussion takes a detour and stops the forward momentum.

In the research results of the talk break shown below, you see that listeners head for the door when one of the hosts interrupts the reading of listener text messages to play “hold” music. It wasn’t funny and it got the show temporarily off-topic.

Eventually, the other co-hosts recovered and got back on-point, but the damage was done, as listeners tuned out.

Listeners are savvy, know what they like and are not afraid to articulate it. Here is what they had to say about this bit:

“Liked it somewhat but it began to drag on a little too much. More comments should have been read from listeners.”

“I like some of it, but it took too long. Short and funny would be better.”

“I like the concept… funny. But they spend too much time with the dumb sound effect, and I got bored.”

Here is another talk break and you can clearly see where the off-ramp occurs:

These types of interruptions are clear off-ramps; another common one is a circular conversation. Circular conversations occur when a host repeats a point said earlier in that break, mostly because he/she hasn’t prepared all of the “chapters” of the break in advance. It is a crutch.

A conversation turns into an argument when the discussion gets circular and the same point is being made over and over again. Listeners do not stick around to listen to arguments. Off-Ramp!

Here is what one listener wrote as to why they tuned out during an argument/debate between the hosts:

“It was going on too long. Same conversation over and over.”

You can avoid these off-ramps with scripting or story boarding, even the day before. When you break down your show, you have a finite number of breaks you need to fill with content. Focus on getting the most out of your ability and minimize the times when you are opening the mic hoping it all turns out ok.

This type of preparation process may be different and/or more laborious than what you are currently doing. It may be uncomfortable at first, but it will make your content stronger. Give it a shot and let me know how it goes.

Next month, Chapter Four will look at how focusing on your “One Thing” will help break success down into bite-sized chunks because you will narrow your focus and concentrate your force.