0477 - 8 – Know What The Desired Response Is Of That Audience

2022.04.22 – 0477 - 8 – Know What The Desired Response Is Of That Audience

8 – Know What The Desired Response Is Of That Audience[1]

So, you have the message and the person it’s being delivered to, but you also need to know the intention of what you are saying. Is the point of the message to inform them, drive them to action, amuse them, get them to sign up or buy, to change their habits, to tell someone else …?

Knowing the answer to this will help you direct your voice to them in a meaningful way.

Most news stories are to inform the audience as to what is going on – with others to amuse or entertain. But imagine your target listener, say a teenager, if you read them a story about an economic forecast? They may be confused, disinterested, distracted… Hmmm, not the response you want – after all the story may be of important to them even if it’s not immediately interesting. So, it’s up to you as a news writer and reader, to create that story in a way that will engage: the words and the presentation. That may be talking about the likelihood of getting a job, or a loan, or buying a first flat and so on, in a voice and style that’s similar to theirs.

Commercial reads often follow a format of setting up a problem that the listener may be familiar with, and then providing a solution for it in the form of a product or service. And you need to know what to feel at each stage of that short scenario, say, frustration and then relief, or anger followed by calm, to be able to give an authentic delivery.

[1] Which reminds me of the episode of Seinfeld where Kramer gets a line on a Woody Allen film, and the friends have different interpretations on how it should sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMe7mlRv8UE

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