By now you’ve probably put together your resume reel and posted it on YouTube or elsewhere online.  And, if you’re like most others hunting for reporting jobs, your reel begins with a series of stand-ups that showcase your on-cam capabilities.

“The montage at the top of the resume is the standard,” says  WKRC  news director Kirk Varner.  “It got started because news directors didn’t want to wait through half a package to get to the first stand-up.”

Dave Cupp, a long-time former news director turned educator, says research shows that most news directors watch the montage for approximately seven seconds before deciding if a candidate has what it takes.

So how do you make those stand-ups sizzle?

“Don’t rush – explain – you need to speak as if everything you’re saying is the most important thing you’ve ever said,” Cupp says.

Watch what you’re wearing.  Varner says you need to look like you understand how professional journalists dress.  For example, news director Jeff Houston’s station, WTVA in Tupelo, Miss., has a strict dress code.

“My advice?  Dress to make your mom happy,” says Houston.

For Varner and Cupp creating “interactive stand-ups,” those that reference your location, involve props or purposeful movement, are critical.

“If you’re standing in the middle of a corn field, you’d better have an ear of corn in your hand,” says Varner.  “You have to be aware of what’s around you when you are on camera.”

After the stand-ups?

“Don’t put your anchoring on there if you’re right out of college,” says Houston. “Showcase your storytelling ability.”

Cupp says you should put your best story right after the stand-ups, regardless of whether it’s hard news or a feature.

“Then shake it up, show your versatility,” Cupp adds.

Varner encourages students to find creative ways to simulate a live shot.  He described how one candidate delivered a story on camera for more than a minute without a single edit or any video relief.

“It gave me a sense of what he could do live, even though he didn’t have access to a live truck,” says Varner.

Other advice?

According to Varner, a recent grad’s biggest challenge is that he or she is competing against working professionals.

“The number one strike against you is your youth,” Varner says.

Cupp says, though you can’t instantly grow older, you can sound older.

“The instant way to sound more professional is to articulate clearly,” says Cupp.  “Just pronounce every sound in every word you say.”

For Houston, the advice is even simpler.

“Don’t make it complicated; make sure the  link to your resume works.”

Bitly, a popular URL shortener, used its own data to find the the optimal days and times for posting links to social media.

On the Poynter website, Jeff Sonderman summarized the results.

• On Twitter, the best window is 1 to 3 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays.
• Facebook was hot at 1 to 4 p.m.
• Tumblr is a night owl, with posts doing best after 7 p.m.

He also created charts to visualize the data, like the one below for Twitter.

A quick note on how to read these charts: Links posted during the darker blue periods received more average clicks over their following 24-hour lifespan. So this is showing when it’s best to post a link, not necessarily when the clicks will occur.

This kind of research is invaluable for journalists.  The more we can understand the social media audience, the better we can serve it.

Houston’s station just recently aired its first live shot using a TVUPack. The system uses multiple wireless modems to put out live or video feeds of higher quality than what you can do with a typical smartphone or through Skype.

ABC News used the TVUPack to broadcast a live shot from a moving train, which opens up all kinds of possibilities for literally taking viewers along for the ride on stories.

This and other new technologies such as LiveCast and LiveU are already changing the news business, according to journalism professor Mary Rogus at The Ohio University.

“Feeding the demand for live has diminished the meaning of ‘broadcast quality,’” Rogus says.

Whether you think this is good or bad for the business, Rogus feels viewers are much more accepting now of lower-quality live shots and video segments.

TV stations like the low cost.  According to Rogus, the TV station she worked with this summer paid LiveU $2500 per month for 40 hrs. of cell time per unit.

Houston says stations are adopting this new, cheaper approach to live shots like “gangbusters.”  In addition to being much cheaper than a microwave truck, the backpack live requires fewer people resources, too.

“One person can do a self-contained live shot,” Houston says.

Attention reporters — get ready to add setting up and producing your own live shots to your already long “to do” list!

Askins says these are tips you can “practice now, so you feel more confident on your first days of work.”

Step 1.

After you have made it through the gauntlet of checking out a camera, start a timer on your phone. Try to shoot all your interviews and b-roll in 45 minutes max, then immediately go to the lab and upload all your footage.

Step 2.

After your footage is on your computer, listen to your interviews.  Pull your favorite sound down to your timeline.

These clips of your best sound should range between 5-12 seconds. (No 20+seconds SOTS……ever.)  If you have a fabulous LONG sot- break it up. Then type out your sound bites. I color code different people in a Word doc, just to help pull the story together faster.

Step 3.

After you have typed out all your sound, you have the bones of your story down on paper. The hard part is almost over. Now all you have to do is connect everything together with your track (voice-over).

Start by writing an anchor intro FIRST. Then weave your sound bites together with simple sentences that help advance the story. And don’t forget nat sound.

(I usually like to start with an establishing intro sentence— a little nat pop—another sentence- then a great sot. You will develop your own style over time.)

Step 4.

Print your script and track your story.

Girls: Put away your cute little baby voice when you track.
Boys: Don’t let the Southern frat star pop out.

You will NEVER get a job if your voice sounds like you are just a 21-year-old college kid. Believe me. That is the reason so many people do not get hired.

Save your sound on a thumb drive and get back to your computer before someone else tries to get on it! RUN!!! Don’t lose your momentum!

Step 5.

Now all the hard logistical parts are over!  Stop and start your clock again. You now have 45 minutes to edit your story together.

Look at your script and simply lay down all your sound. Then you will know the total run time. If it is over 1:30- trim it down… cut something… please. You may bore everyone to tears if your story is over 1:30- AND it will only make you spend more time in the freezing cold editing lab.

Watch your timer. Make FAST decisions. Don’t waste time watching parts you’ve completed or are proud of over and over. Keep moving.  Try as hard as you can to finish as fast as you can without making errors.

Step 6.

YOU’RE DONE! Check the clock. Write down (or remember) the time and next time beat your total time by 10 minutes.

“Here’s an extra tip,” says Askins.  ”When writing your script, don’t bother putting it in all capital letters. This will save you time on your Web story.”

Of course, there will be days when you get the opportunity to take your time to truly craft a good story, but more often than not, local news reporters are under the gun and the ability to put together a story quickly will make you a real asset to your newsroom.

“I got three responses and two of them were no,” says Dotson.

In the decades that followed, Dotson has produced thousands of stories and won dozens of awards.  He’s also learned quite a few things about storytelling.

“Start every story as if no cares,” says Dotson.  “Then structure the story to make them care.”

At the Broadcast Education Association Convention in Las Vegas, he built on that concept and shared his four elements of great stories.

1.  Start with a scene setter — Dotson says you have to tell people where you are — where the story begins.

2.  Include foreshadowing — Make sure your audience knows something is going to happen in the story.

3.  Develop characters — Introduce us to and build characters throughout the story.  TV news often does this through illustrating conflict.

4.  Provide a resolution — Take us someplace in the story; think about where you will end the piece.

“If you know where to get off, you know how to get there,” says Dotson.

And when it comes to ending stories, Dotson says, don’t rely on sound bites.  He wants to hear a line of narration instead.

“You become a surrogate for your audience,” Dotson says.  “Just react to [the sound bite] if you don’t think you can top it.

Dotson’s American Story airs on NBC’s Today Show and his pieces are linked on the segment’s Facebook page.

Sometimes you won’t be popular
Some folks will get annoyed
But if you seek the truth and write it,
you’ll always be employed!

Words to live by. Enjoy!

“I believe the value of a tease on mobile is much more valuable than a video tease during an afternoon show,” says Rich Murphy,  senior Web producer for myfoxdc.com, the website for WTTG-TV in Washington, D.C.  ”Maybe more valuable than a tease during prime. I think it has more of a chance of being paid attention to on mobile than the white noise within a program’s commercials.”

Murphy points out that, during the day, few people are sitting at home watching television, but plenty are checking their smartphones.

News promotions may also be a little easier to produce now, thanks to mobile newsgathering.  Where once a promotion producer had to beg for the information and video needed to tease a good story, now sending information back to the newsroom is routine for journalists at stations like WTTG.

“Is it becoming common practice for crews to email us photos and short summaries during the day.  We use it to update myfoxdc and keep our viewers updated on developing news,” says Murphy.

Of course, social media play a role in promoting content and the story updates end up on Facebook and Twitter, as well.

For the website itself, search engine optimization (SEO) remains a critically important part of driving traffic, and your headlines are at the heart of an SEO strategy.

“Rule of thumb is to make sure your headline has the 5 words people would use to Google the story. Cute, tricky headlines do not accomplish that,” says Murphy.  ”Also putting ‘photos’ or ’video’ in the headlines is a good thing for when someone may Google ‘Oscars, fashion, photos.’”

Still, Murphy says mobile is the big focus right now.

“Mobile is the number one growth area. For many stations more people are accessing content from smart phones than computers. Mobile penetration is growing much faster that PCs.”

Lewis’s charming letter encourages the aspiring young writer not to worry too much about grammar. “There are no right or wrong answers about language in the sense in which there are right and wrong answers in Arithmetic,” he writes. “Good English is whatever educated people talk; so that what is good in one place or time would not be so in another.”

He then adds a five-point list of what really matters:

1. Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn’t mean anything else.

2. Always prefer the plain direct word to the long, vague one. Don’t implement promises, but keep them.

3. Never use abstract nouns when concrete ones will do. If you mean “More people died” don’t say “Mortality rose.”

4. In writing. Don’t use adjectives which merely tell us how you want us to feel about the thing you are describing. I mean, instead of telling us a thing was “terrible,” describe it so that we’ll be terrified. Don’t say it was “delightful”; make us say “delightful” when we’ve read the description. You see, all those words (horrifying, wonderful, hideous, exquisite) are only like saying to your readers, “Please will you do my job for me.”

5. Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don’t say “infinitely” when you mean “very”; otherwise you’ll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite.

Simple and spot on. Take them to heart and your writing will improve overnight. I promise.

Here’s the advice we’ve offered in Advancing the Story on how to do them well:

• Use the scene, don’t just stand with it behind you.
• Show the audience something they might have otherwise missed.
• Demonstrate how something works.
• Be sure that whatever is coming out of your mouth directly relates to what you are doing  with your hands, feet and eyes.

But nearly everyone who does these active stand-ups shares a word of warning — don’t over do it! Check out the stand-up in this story sent to us by Ole Miss journalism professor Nancy Dupont.

Reporter Dave Summers from WKYC-TV in Cleveland demonstrates how an 82-year-old woman ran down a purse snatcher, complete with the sound of his pounding feet on the pavement and out-of-breath delivery.

Take a look and then tell us what you think? On the mark or over the top?

Speaking strictly for myself, I like it.   It’s a memorable moment and it drives the point home — this is one tough lady!

After years of losing both audience and revenue, local stations have some reasons to celebrate. Viewership for both morning and late newscasts on network affiliates was up, on average, for the first time in five years. Audience growth was astronomical at 4:30 a.m. as the number of stations airing news that early doubled for the second year in a row. Quite a few stations pushed their start times even earlier, to 4 a.m., and said it’s paying off.

[WXIN-Indianapolis] News director Lee Rosenthal…credits the early start with improving ratings for the rest of the station’s newscasts, including doubling viewership for the 4:30 a.m. half-hour compared to the year before. “We’re producing more news and that’s added to our credibility and exposure,” he said. “The earlier we’ve gone on, the more we’ve gained off of it.”

A number of stations even had success adding news at 4 p.m. to replace Oprah. And independent stations gained viewers in every time slot except midday.

Digital audience

Local TV stations aren’t just growing audience for their on-air offerings but also for their online and social media products. In most of the biggest markets in the country, newspaper websites still outdraw local television sites. Greensboro, N.C., (DMA #46) is a rare exception where all three TV sites do better than the local paper. But change could be on the way.

In Albuquerque, N.M., where the local paper put up a paywall in 2001, KOAT now reaches twice as many adults online as the newspaper. Hofstra University’s Bob Papper, who surveys stations annually for RTDNA, says that’s a sign of things to come.

Newspaper paywalls are going to make that increasingly common, and TV stations are poised to be the biggest beneficiaries of those paywalls.

Financial outlook

Local TV makes the vast majority of its money from broadcast advertising, and in 2011, stations made less. The decline was predictable for a non-election year and the forecast for 2012 is substantially brighter, with spending on both candidate and issue ads expected to set a new record.

Other sources of revenue for local stations are growing year after year: retransmission fees and online and mobile advertising. According to one study,television stations enjoyed the highest growth rate in online advertising of any medium. All of these revenue sources are still relatively small, however.

Worrisome signs

So is everything coming up roses for local TV? Not entirely. The one-time “newscast of record” in the early evening keeps losing viewers, on average, although the rate of decline has slowed. Across the board, the largest audience gains were in time slots with the smallest viewership. And a troubling trend appears to be continuing: share is outperforming ratings in early evening and late time slots. In other words, stations are drawing a larger share of a smaller audience, because fewer people are watching television at all when the news is on.

The long-term outlook isn’t entirely upbeat, either. As the economy improves, overall viewership could decline. “People in recessionary times watch more television,” said Jerry Gumbert, chief executive of the consulting firm AR&D. “We’ve seen that over 40 years.”

[Full disclosure: I'm the lead author of the local TV chapter in the 2012 State of the News Media Report.]

 Sourced from: NewsLab