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Want learn how to do a radio link like a professional?
If you are new to radio presenting or did not go through good radio training before you became a presenter you might not know what a radio link is.
So before I show you how to do a professional radio link we first need to clear up what a radio link is.
Essentially if done right, every time you speak on radio as presenter or DJ you are doing a radio link. That is because your speaking is always linking one thing to another. These things that you are linking are things you personally are not doing. For example a song, the news, adverts, jingles or other co-host activities which you yourself are not doing or saying.
The distinction has to be that you are not doing it because you for example can easily confuse for example an interview as something to link to or even a competition.
The parts being linked are not you speaking live. It can be a recording of you for example doing an interview earlier that day.
So with that out the way, lets look at the structure of a radio link.
If you have watched my video on how to make a radio presenter demo you will have seen this diagram.
This is commonly referred to in the radio industry to as the Mexican bicycle. It has nothing to do with Mexico or bicycles but simply the shape of the structure.
There is not other connection to it than that. It’s simply a name for a radio link.
Now if we look at this structure what is missing is what is on either side of the Mexican bicycle.
These are the parts being linked to.
So it can be two songs, a song and the news, a song and an advert.
It can be from other things besides songs but the best practice for a radio station is to very seldom be linking from anything but a song. The reason is that the music is the most desirable thing to listen to and often people will wait for the news or adverts etc to finish so that they can hear the music. So it is often best to go straight from for example the adverts to a song. It is undesirable to do the opposite which is to go straight from a song to an advert.
At this point it is important to understand that this is a style of radio that works well for most listeners. It does however not mean you can’t do it differently. In many cases you may even be working on a radio station where the station manager or programs manger wants you to do something different. It’s always best to follow the direction of the managers as they are the ones who will have the biggest impact on your job and ultimately your career. So even though going straight form a song to an advert is not a good idea, it may be what the station manager wants. So it’s best to do what they say, even if It’s technically wrong to do.
The reason it is wrong is that the first part of the radio link is what is called back announcing. This is where you talk about what has just happened, such as saying the song name and artist. Even if your FM or AM radio station puts out what is called RDS which is data showing the song details or even a streaming station where the song name and artist are clearly displayed, the listener might not be looking directly at their screen. They might be hearing it over a PA system in a shop or driving so they cant look at the radio screen. If they hear a song they like and want to know the artist name or song name, they will be listening right to the end of the song waiting to hear you announce it. If you go straight to an advert, the listener can get very angry.
As a presenter you want your listeners to be as happy as possible. Now you don’t want to belabor it and go on and on about the artist or song. If the other listeners already know the song name and artist, they want you to move on. So simply say the artist name and song name and get into your content of what you will be speaking about. If you are not going to be speaking on any content, simply saying the artist name, song name and radio station name is enough to move to your linked item such as an advert or recorded program.
On most radio stations you often won’t be playing more than three songs in a row and on many commercial stations you will be lucky to play more than one in a row.
This is because the airtime is sold off for sponsorships and advertising. On smaller stations and community stations you might be playing many more songs in a row as there is not much more going on.
Either way it is best to announce all the songs played, not just the last one. The middle song of the three play might be the song name the listener is waiting for. If don’t have much to say in your content, saying all the song names also gives you a bit more airtime to speak.
To carry on learning about the radio link, click on this next video to see part 2.