(More) How To Do Traffic Reports (a rant continues...)

I continue to await a tidal wave of "smart traffic reporters" to immediately course correct and begin to stand out by using more powerful words after my two - highly-acclaimed if you believe the comments they attracted - blog posts last week (How To Do Weather Reports and How To Do Traffic Reports), so today's is probably more whistling in the wind.

However, here goes anyway. Yet another useless phrase that radio traffic reporters must expunge from their vocabulary forever if they hope to have listeners turn UP their reports rather than keeping them on "ignore."

"There are no accidents or problems; everything is running smoothly..."

You phoned all your usual sources. You checked the web cams and listened to the police scanners, so it seems perfectly logical to start your report with this phrase especially in the wee hours of the early morning when there's very little traffic on roads, let alone anything to be concerned about.

Every traffic reporter does it.

Which is exactly why YOU should NOT do it....until you hear a radio newscast start with the headline phrase "there's no news this morning and there's nothing to report."

PPM proves: when you have nothing to say, don't say nothing.

I rest my case.

How To Do Traffic Reports

Westwood One's Metro/Shadow Traffic is a trove of research on what listeners want from radio's traffic reports over the many years they've been doing them.

The #1 complaint? Folks hate it when a radio reporter describes a terrible tie-up in great detail and strongly recommends avoiding the huge bottleneck and only at the very end mentions the place where it is.

The radio listener's ears perk up, suddenly realizing that is the route they drive, but also very annoyed that they missed the information.

Ask any listener who relies on traffic reports: mention the place where the jam you're about to describe FIRST and THEN give the details.

Smart traffic reporters even promote that they always do it that way so that listeners always know they won't miss anything important.

Incredibly, the majority of traffic reports are still not done this way in spite of the fact that it has been conventional wisdom for many years, driven by Metro research presented in city after city over the years.

It's still possible to stand out as the most user-friendly traffic reporter in your market by simply giving the location first and then the details of the jam. Every time. No exceptions.