The key word to success on the air is – connect. You must connect. You sometimes hear people on the air and think that person doesn’t have a very good voice, but they connect. Human to human. You should always imagine you are always speaking to one person, not a group of people. I never use the word “everybody” or “folks” because you are talking to individuals. People are listening with their own two ears. I’m always conscious what the people listening to me are perceiving. Have I been clear? Have I given them the details? Did I put the right emphasis in the right place?
I remember one time we got an email from somebody who said, ‘I feel like I’m at a party eavesdropping’. That devastated me. That’s not what I wanted. I think what they were referring to is we did something that was too inside amongst ourselves and the listener had no idea what was going on. It’s easy to fall into that trap.
– Roger Ashby, DJ, retiring after 50 years working in Toronto radio. Read the rest of the interview here.
