If you are a public speaker, or if you are a professional who has a strong viewpoint on a particular topic, then you no doubt have considered interviewing with your local newspaper, radio or TV outlet so that you can get your viewpoint out, and so you can generate some sales and/or sales leads for your business. And while all the different media would certainly be welcome, you may not have the time or the energy required to do them all; thus we'd like you to focus on just radio interviews. Here are the reasons you should consider pursuing radio only:

INSTANT FEEDBACK: Only the broadcast media can give you instant phone calls (either to the studio, or to your own number) or instant traffic to your site. This makes tracking much easier since you can tell immediately what show/station is pulling best for you. With print, you may end up with several pieces circulating at once, so finding out which one is working (and which one is wasting your time) can be difficult.

CAN BE DONE ON THE RUN: Since you probably are a person heavily involved in other areas besides media, stopping everything you are doing so that you can go through a one or two hour TV or print interview can be difficult to say the least. Radio is the only medium that allows you instant feedback WHILE you are on the run (although, a cell is not the best for interviews... land lines are best); no stopping by a TV station, and no meeting with a print reporter.

THE MOST OUTLETS: In any city or town, there are more radio stations than TV stations and newspapers combined. This becomes very important once you have gotten good at doing your interviews, and you then want to make the best use of the approach you have developed. Also, once one of the media (say, radio) sees that you are doing a good job interviewing with them, others in that same medium will want to follow suit; thus you'll want to stick with the medium that has the most outlets. Here are the rough numbers of radio stations in the U.S. and Canada...

2,400 Country (all styles)
2,070 Oldies (1920's to 1980's, all styles)
1,910 Religious (including Christian, Gospel, and Ministry)
2,000 News/Talk/Sports
1,709 Adult Contemporary (all styles)
830 Rock/Alternative
665 Variety
456 Top 40
300 Urban (all styles)
730 Non-English
228 Classical/Jazz
50 Kids
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13,348 Total

These numbers include all possible broadcast stations, whether the stations are commercial or non-commercial, large or small, or AM or FM. They do not include any non-broadcast (i.e., cable or internet) stations, because of the low listenerships of these types of stations.

SEVERAL CAN BE DONE IN A ROW: Since there are so many radio stations, you can make good use of your time by scheduling as many phone interviews in one day as possible. Since you are live-on-the-air, stations have a vested interest in not wasting your time or theirs; you'll be off talking to the next station before you know it.

NO MAKEUP IN THE STUDIO: This applies to men also. Unless your topic or area of interest requires visuals (like maybe hairloss or juggling,) then you are going to love being able to do live-in-studio radio interviews without putting on makeup for the camera.

GOOD PRACTICE FOR YOUR OWN SHOW: This is one of the best reasons to stick with radio for your interview medium. Many folks do their interviews with the long-term goal of starting their own radio program. This is very feasible in radio; your own TV show, however, is going to be quite a stretch, and your own magazine or newspaper probably isn't going to happen anytime soon. A weekly half-hour radio show, or even a 2-minute special, is easily done even by beginners, and learning to syndicate it is a logical next step.

Next topic: Which Radio Stations to Choose?