I watched from the sidelines one morning as a DJ I knew talked with a listener on the phone. He had returned to the station after being away for the better part of a year, and listeners were calling in to welcome him back. I noticed that the CD he was playing was about to end, and he risked having dead air. I thought, "I'm not on the air here, it's not my responsibility, and I have almost no time to mention this, but should I wave my arms and point to the CD player? Should I hold up a note?"
My concern wasn't necessary. The song ended while he was still talking to the listener, so he turned on the microphone and finished the chat on-air, saying, "Thanks for calling. Goodbye." He then said the call letters, turned to another DJ in the studio, and talked on-air about how he hadn't answered that particular telephone in months.
I learned something that day about connecting with an audience. Starting an on-air break by ending a phone conversation was unorthodox, but it worked. The announcer talked between music sets about everything from enjoying "a big old shaker of salt" on all types of food--even apples!--to his car with the three-cylinder engine that he joked became a one-and-a-half-cylinder engine whenever the air conditioner was turned on.
After sitting in that day, I thought, "That's something to keep in mind. An announcer doesn't always have to talk about just the music and the weather. That guy has been in radio for over 20 years, and his on-air approach clicks with the audience--so much so that people have been calling the station all morning to ask how he is and how life has treated him since he was last here."
It's worth remembering; if you want an audience to listen to your show, do your best to be more than an announcer. Relate to your listeners as a human being.
