“We want to hear the listeners experience”
Chante Schatz
Award-winning radio presenter Iman Rappetti discusses the importance of connecting with your audience. Picture: CHANTE SCHATZ
Power FM radio presenter Iman Rappetti discussed what makes her an award-winning radio journalist as she expresses her connection with her listeners during the Liberty Radio awards session at the first day of the Radio Days Africa conference.
Chief executive of the Liberty Radio Awards, Lance Rothschild, took to the stage to discuss and share how they pick what stands out in the radio industry to win an award. Rothschild, who was accompanied by 2017 award-winner radio presenter Rappetti, discussed what makes radio an award-winning element.
Rothscjhild noted that the need for creativity in radio should be unique in every way that it can be. “People make radio that people want to listen to”, he says. It is the excellence value in radio production that makes it award winning.”
There are four main elements that judges listen for when it comes to awarding, namely creativity, presentation, value to the listener, and lastly production. “We want to hear the listeners experience”, says Rothschild, adding that it is that experience that allows listeners to interact with the content.
Rappetti later took to the stage to account for her experience as an award-winning presenter by deliberating on how she finds her inspiration for her shows every morning. “I often feel that in our profession in the work that we do, we don’t have in that front of us the person we are talking to,” says Rappetti, adding that at the core of the profession is the audience.
The Power FM presenter discussed the importance of having a deeper understanding of the audience and allowing them to become part of the conversation as opposed to merely tuning in. She emphasises the need to have a conversation with her audience. “My ‘sermons’ are my way of making eye contact with my listeners”, says Rappetti.
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