Prepping For Radio Interviews: Using Story To Engage Listeners

Photo by Martin Krolikowski (Creative Commons)

In preparation for a radio interview, it's customary for recording artists and their publicists to provide the DJ with a list of talking points, topics highlighting the artist's career and upcoming projects. But remember artists, if you want to hold listeners' attention and keep them from changing the station in the middle of your interview, you'd better have an interesting story or anecdote for each talking point on your list.

For example, don't just ask listeners to follow you on your social media sites. Tell the story (or even just a teaser) about one of the funniest or craziest photos they'll find posted on your Facebook Fan Page. This will drive them to your sites more than you just saying, "Go 'Like' my page."

Always give them a reason to follow you. And don't think that just having a free download of your song on your site is reason enough for them to go to your sites. Tell a story about the song, whether it is about the experience that inspired you to write that song, something unique that happened during the recording of the song, etc. Paint a picture for the listener.

If you do this, not only will you gain more of a fan following, you'll also be more likely to get invited back to that radio station for future interviews. In fact, I have one artist client I recently did some media coaching with before he embarked on his radio tour. He's increasing his followers and fan base significantly and the various DJs consistently comment on how much fun it is for them to interview him.

Got a TV interview or a radio tour coming up? Let us help you prepare! Shoot us an email and we'll help you get started.

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