If you only have 10 or 15 minutes (or less) of actual content, don’t stretch it. It doesn’t make it better, it only makes it longer. And you know what? That makes it worse. Don’t expect your audience to fast-forward when they’re bored. Chances are they’ll just turn it off.

If your show has a specific thing its meant to accomplish, say, a review of a film, cut out the preamble. Your audience knows why they’re watching you, they don’t need to be told what you’re about to do. Get right to the point.

I’m not saying you should cut out your witty banter. We all know that Diggnation wouldn’t be entertaining at all if it weren’t for Alex and Kevin’s brilliant chemistry. But they rarely digress far off of topic, and they’re funny while they’re talking about their subject. They’re able to cover the stories quickly and still be funny, without digressing into uninteresting subjects.

WebbAlert is another perfect example of keeping it short. In less than five minutes she’s able to cover all the news stories for the day that she wants to, and she doesn’t bore the audience with preamble or extra at the end.