Planning the best broadcast for your audience

Kenny Smith

Samford University

University of Alabamawww.kennysmith.org

www.twitter.com/kennysmith

Know your audience

(They aren’t always exactly just like you.)

Journalism's basic questions

WhoWhatWhenWhereWhyHow

The classic news values

ImpactTimeliness

ProminenceProximity

Bizarreness Conflict

Currency

Impact

The number of people whose lives will be influenced in some way by the subject of the story.

Timeliness

Recent events have higher news value than earlier happenings.

News versus history.

Prominence

For the same occurrence, people in the public eye have higher news value than obscure people.

Proximity

Stories about events and situations in your community are more newsworthy than events that take place far away.

Bizarreness

Dog-bites-man is pretty routine.

Man-bites-dog is bizarre.

Going to school every day is the norm.

School closings over swine flu is not the norm.

Conflict

Strife is newsworthy.

Currency

More value is given to stories covering issues in the spotlight of public concern.

Swine flu vs. the sniffles.

Football vs. overdue library books.

Removed vending machines vs. new cafeteria trays.

The benefits of the medium

Visuals

Soundbites

B-roll

The disadvantages …

People get intimidated by cameras

Deer in headlights

Formulaic reporting

Brief reporting

Know your circumstance

How much time do you have?

How many elements are you trying to air?

What are the competing interests?

Improving

Practice.

Critique yourself.

Invite the local media for a critique.

Watch their work for success and failure.

Writing.

Writing.

Writing.

Keep it simple

Remove long words and tedious explanations.

Don’t get bogged down in procedure.

Keep it simple

Print: Students in biology teacher Joe Blow’s class did a complete examination of the pig’s digestive track.

Broadcast: Biology students studied the pig’s stomach.

Keep it short

Shorter than print.

Longer sentences are often more difficult for the ear to understand.

Keep it short

If your sentences run on too long with too many details organized in one thought then your run on sentence becomes painful for others to hear as your announcer begins at enthusiastic, moves to monotone and finishes with hyperventilation.

Keep it short

One sentence = one breath.

Keep it short

School superintendent John Smith and school board members sought to ease teacher concerns about reduced classroom budgets by meeting with the faculty senate and promising to consider some of their recommendations.

Keep it short

School superintendent John Smith says he’ll consider teachers’ ideas. They are upset about his plans to slash classroom budgets.

Keep it conversational

A speech or a convenient chat, as opposed to a script someone is reading.

Keep it conversational

Our mascot, Bumble the Bee, now has a YouTube channel. His football pranks can be found there, as well as clips from his appearances around town. The Spirit Club says it is another way for Bumble to reach his audience.

Use the active voice

The windows in the main office were broken last night by vandals.

Vandals shattered the main office’s windows last night.

12 words vs 8 words

Write a lead-in

“There’s more bad news on the hardwood.”

Fairly general …

The entire news item

There’s more bad news on the hardwood. Point guard James Tucker was lost for the season after Tuesday night’s game. Head coach Tucker James says the star player hurt his knee when he slipped on a snow cone. The coach says he’ll experiment with his roster to cope with a thin lineup.

BBC’s 5-shot rule

http://www.bbctraining.com/modules/5915/video/1.2.2.htm

Sequentially shooting give shots:

1. Close up on the hands

2. Close up on the face

3. Wide shot

4. Over the shoulder shot

5. Creative shot

Advice

Break the habit of talking exclusively to your friends and fellow reporters.

Seek out people with different interests and learn to listen, not to talk.

Practice your writing.

Advice

Be patient. Comfortability with a camera and microphone take time to develop.

Volunteer. Intern.

Start small. Be annoyingly helpful. Ask questions. Ask why. Ask why a lot. Make the occasional suggestion.

Questions

What is your broadcast team’s mission?

What’s your style?

How does your mission fit with department and school goals?

Questions

What are your broadcast strengths? Weaknesses?

What technological conditions do you have? Do you need? What can you maintain?

Can you work with other departments? Local business? Local media?

Planning the best broadcast for your audience

Kenny Smith

Samford University

University of Alabamawww.kennysmith.org

www.twitter.com/kennysmith