A news bulletin is often the first thing that the public hear on their radio or television and it can make a lasting impression on the listener. It’s important to remember that your listeners will be expecting a balanced bulletin with some heavy and some light items and stories about major political events as well as those of an ordinary nature. The format of the bulletin will also vary according to station type; a serious national news bulletin is likely to be heavier and slower in pace whilst a youth-orientated music station will be brighter and shorter.
The first step in preparing a good bulletin is to rank the stories in order of importance. This allows you to see how long each item will take and create the right balance of the bulletin. It’s a good idea to look at the stories again once they have been ranked as this gives you a chance to cut or push some of them forward to improve the flow of the bulletin and create a better pace.
When writing the stories it’s important to keep them as short as possible and to craft them into simple, concise sentences. This is not an easy task and it takes practice but is a vital skill. Listeners will not respect a news report that obscures essential information with verbiage and will quickly switch off if they feel that the presentation is lacking in credibility.
When running actuality it’s important to include sound bites – either short audio clips in the form of a voice report or a short audio grab accompanied by a picture. This makes the bulletin more interesting for listeners and it can help to increase audience engagement.