Don't waste a second of free airtime

According to William Bird of Media Monitoring Africa, this election saw the various major players getting equal treatment from the media - but did they take advantage of what was offered?

Dream opportunity

For instance, last week Redi Direko of Talk Radio 702 hosted a live broadcast from Johannesburg City Hall where each party, even KISS, was given an excellent opportunity to put their point across. This station with its broad listenership should be every party's dream opportunity to get their propaganda, sorry, I mean message, across...

At the start of the programme, Direko gave each party 90 seconds to introduce itself and what it stands for. Now admittedly this isn't long BUT looking at what you'd pay for a 90-second slot on this station you know one thing - don't waste a single second.

So what did virtually 90% of the spokespeople do? They used at least 10 seconds to say good morning to everyone and then thank 702 for hosting them. Waste of time. They then launched into their chosen rhetoric, mostly, obviously, unrehearsed patter. I use the word patter because almost without exception they targeted the same obvious areas - unemployment, crime, education, healthcare. Each one promised they would correct the wrongs that exist as a legacy from such terrible misrule, as they saw it. Some used their time simply to attack the ruling party without giving any indication of what in fact their own party stood for.

Very few had bothered to actually rehearse their 90-second free advert and were stopped-mid sentence by the host, which if nothing else made them look incompetent.

And let's not forget their supporters. They decided they'd help their parties by making the most racket in the hall, stopping any opportunities for their leaders to get their messages across and answer any questions asked by the audience.

Moral of the story

The moral of this story is: if you get an opportunity to sell yourself/your organisation/your company, don't waste a single second. Find out why you're being given an opportunity to talk, to answer questions, give your opinion - whatever. The most important thing is to make sure you use the time to your benefit, mentioning you or your company's name as many times as is decently possible - once in 90 seconds, twice in four minutes...

Don't bother thanking anyone for having you; they don't give a damn, you're not being impolite. Just make sure you get your key messages across clearly, quickly and HONESTLY... For a political party that might be a step too far!