radio news formats and reporting styles

Radio News formats and reporting styles

News is constantly changing and the news output for each radio station and each format will tend to reflect the way the listeners and target audience of that station, prefer to have their news delivered. There are many different types of news and many different sources. Possible types of news sources are: news agencies and conferences, reporters, press releases and politicians, Tip offs or local, national and international News. Generally, the smaller a radio station is and the more local listeners it has, the more likely it is that more local stories will feature. One of the advantages about a smaller station is that local listeners may find more interest in it because it is able to report news that would not be covered by bigger stations. The larger radio stations will focus on news that affects a larger audience and the style of each delivery for both stations will also vary.

Broadcasting the news in short one minute news bulletins demands a different style of news broadcasting to the more rounded rolling news or in-depth news format of a talk show. The kind of station and the format it is following will determine the style of the news broadcast. Every radio stations’ listeners, get the style of news and the news reporting they want. As news reports and the bulletins themselves become quicker and shorter, especially in music driven format stations, some stations add a music bed running underneath the news. News reporters on the scene can also add colour to a news bulletin. Radio listeners get their news from a variety of sources and some turn to their radio station for more detailed coverage whilst other listeners just want the headlines.

Radio terminology is used frequently in the studio and on air. Audio is a word used referring to a sound recording in any format. Atmos is atmosphere. Either to describe the ambience of a recording place, or an effect added subsequently to a recording. Cans are headphones. Mic is microphone. VO is voice over. FX are sound effects, these can describe sounds other than featured voices both recorded ‘Live’, on CD or from any other source. OB is an outside broadcast, like if someone is on an OB they’re not inside the station. When something is on ‘Cue’ it means it is ready to play, for example, a CD track can be on ‘Cue’ when it is ready to play. A ‘Clip’ is a selected segment of audio that has been taken from something. The term ‘Wrap’ is used when something comes to an end, for example. A radio presenter might say “That’s a wrap!” at the end of a radio show. A common concept in radio is the target audience. This means the types of listeners that you are trying to reach and not just the listeners you already have as well as the listeners you should have. Age group, gender, education and occupation usually categorize target audiences. The more competitors a station has, the more specialized the programming should be. A stations target audience alters the way in which the overall show is made. Radio 1 has a target audience mainly consisting of people aged 16 to 30. Radio 1 plays popular and chart music that would appeal to a younger audience on a large scale, also most of the presenting and the news bulletins have musical beds and are presented in a more colloquial manner. Radio 2 has a different target audience to Radio 1. Radio 2’s target audience mainly consists of people aged 40+ and this greatly affects its content. Radio 2 plays older music that isn’t in today’s charts, Radio 2 also has older presenters, does not tend to have musical beds and is generally more formal than Radio 1. Target audience massively affects a radio broadcasters content and reporting style.