Okay, you’ve got a story you want to tell.  Great.  Tell me the story… but leave half of it out.

Yes, I’m serious.  Too much detail, unneeded side roads, too many words to express a thought, too much setup, more than one “punch line,” or “backing and filling” because you’re not very well-organized… those things make even the best story incredibly tedious, and not worth the Listener’s time.

To be a great talent, you have to develop discipline and get concise.  Great storytellers hold people every step of the way, from beginning to end.  And remember, you’re not paid by the word; you’re paid by the Connection.

(Yes, I’m sure there’s an exception you can think of, some show in your city that gets away with doling out overly long drivel and has high ratings in spite of it.  But that’s not the norm, and their time is coming to an end.  The world is getting used to 140 characters being all they have time to read.  Listening habits will eventually reflect that, too.)

Let’s make this one really simple:

With your Content, you can engage the brain, or you can engage the heart… or you can engage both.  What you SHOULDN’T do is only engage the brain.  That’s boring.

If you need help with this, get some coaching, do an aircheck session with your PD, or maybe swap ideas with some of the other people on the station.  Because if you don’t understand how to do it… and do it well… you’re going to save a lot of time by NOT thinking that it’ll somehow just magically “come to you.”

It’s like that scene in “The Odd Couple” when the slob, Oscar Madison, tells his finicky roommate Felix Unger that he thought gravy just “came with the meat.”  As Felix said, “No, it doesn’t.  You have to MAKE it.”  Sometimes we need help to make it.

One of the biggest challenges these days (as always) is Content.

There are lots of questions that help you put it together – Is this top of mind?  Does the listener actually care about it?  Do you have anything to offer on this subject that’s unique, and not just what everyone else will do?  Where are you going with it?  Is there a chance that it could lead to listener feedback, or is just a one-off thing? … etc.

But these leave out what I consider to be the most logical question to ask yourself:  Is this something you’d say at a barbecue to a person you just met?

If not, why are you saying it?

This will not only quickly cut to the chase as to whether it’s valid Content or not, it will also (hopefully) shape the LANGUAGE that you use, how you get to it, how you edit it, and most importantly, keep you from sounding like a disc jockey and more like a real person.

No one is enjoying hearing people read crap off a computer screen or someone’s stupid Facebook post on the air.  Dig deeper if you want to be great.

This is a follow-up to the “Less is More, and More is Too Much” tip from a couple of weeks ago…

Thirty seconds is a significant amount of time.  Companies literally pay millions of dollars for ONE 30-second ad in the Super Bowl.

The latest research is showing that millions of Gen Xers and Millennials go to You Tube to see a video, and if doesn’t have a “Skip this ad” thing after just a few seconds, they won’t stick around to watch it at all.  That’s the mentality we’re dealing with.

You owe it to the listener not to waste his or her time.  You owe it yourself as a performer to develop the skill set of refining and editing what you do so you don’t waste words, repeat things, or take unnecessary “side roads.”  Sixty seconds is a LONG time, and two minutes is an eternity.

Yes, of course, an occasional longer break is fine, but automatically thinking “you have two minutes” (or more) is wrong.  You don’t… unless you EARN it.  You want more TSL?  Try not being tedious to listen to.

Your show, no matter what format you’re in, has a dual purpose:

First, to talk to the person who just tuned in; and second, to talk to the person who’s been listening to you for a few minutes.  Their needs are different.

If I hear two breaks in a row on the same subject (like a reset to get into a phone call), I don’t want to hear redundancy or repetitive wording, because that’s boring.

And if I only hear ONE break, you can’t just abruptly continue something you did in the previous break, because I DIDN’T hear that one.

So it’s all about the reset – specifically about the language you use.  You can’t just use the same “intro” you used the first time, or the listener who heard the previous break will just think you’re on autopilot.  And you should word it so NO prior knowledge is required for someone who just joined your show to understand what you’re talking about.

It’s an art, and one of the main things I work on with people I coach.  You’d be surprised how many people don’t even hear themselves blathering out the exact same setup in a follow-up break – or even worse, they DO hear it, but just take the easiest, most mindless road possible.  That’s a good way to lose listeners.