This is why your podcast interviews suck

Nov 10

There is definitely an art to being a great interviewer and it’s a skill that takes quite some time to develop.

Anyone who’s done a bit of research can ask questions but often we’re not asking questions that prompt a meaningful response.

There is a huge difference between an "interview" and a "thought-provoking conversation". The latter of the two is the kind of podcast I remember and tell my friends about.

So how do you ask questions that will keep your listener interested, and achieve that deeper connection that you should be striving for?

In this episode, I share some hot tips on how to be an awesome interviewer. I talk about establishing a goal for your podcast, doing research on previous interviews and how to get more juicy information out of your guest.

How could your guest episodes be more interesting?

Are you asking the same old questions?

Or could you go deeper in some way?

Transcript:

00:00
Welcome to Pump Up Your Pod This is why your podcast interviews suck. Haha. Oh man that is such a clickbaity title for a podcast episode. Did you click on this episode because of that title? So what are we talking about here? Today we're talking about exactly that. Do your podcast episodes that are interviews suck? And if you're like, Oh, well, I don't really know. I mean, I think they're okay, then the answer is probably yes, they suck. No look, not necessarily.

But I'm gonna run through some things with you today that I come across all the time, I have been editing podcasts for almost seven years. In that time, I have therefore edited 1000s of podcast episodes, and a great deal of them are interviews. So I feel like I have a bit of knowledge that I could probably give you around what makes a really good podcast interview, versus one that kind of falls flat a bit, or it's okay, it's not groundbreaking, it's not going to make someone like think about you later, or the episode later, or tell their friends like it's fine.

Most interviews are fine, but they're not like earth shattering. And I really want to make you I really want to help you get the best out of your podcast interviews, because it's such a massive traction maker. If you have really good podcast interviews, then you're gonna have a really good podcast. So it's something to try and get right from the beginning.

Now, there is definitely an art to being a great interviewer. And it's a skill that takes quite some time to develop. So it's not something that you're going to be good at straight off the bat most of you. And that's completely fine. Unless you've done like a radio and broadcasting degree or a journalism degree or something like that, where you've really played with the way you form questions, the way you probe the way you get the best out of people and you've done serious work into that, then it's something that you're going to have to learn and it's going to take a while there is a massive difference between an interview and a thought provoking conversation. And what you're really looking for is creating a thought provoking conversation. It doesn't matter what industry you are, it doesn't matter what genre of the podcast you are, these things don't matter if you're having someone on your show, then you really want to be getting the best out of them to create a really quality conversation for whoever's listening, to get the best information.

It's definitely easy to interview someone, if you've done a bit of research, right? You have a list of questions, you ask those questions, and the podcast guest answers them. But are you asking those questions in a meaningful or probing way? Storytelling is at the heart of what podcasting is all about. And yet, we're often not asking questions that prompt any meaningful response. We want to be creating conversations that let the person that you're interviewing tell a story that makes you want to listen in once you asking more questions, making them feel like they're contributing something really valuable to your audience. So if you're not asking a question that can help them tell a story, then you're not going to get the best out of them.

So let's take for example, what is one of the most common questions that I hear and is often the first introduction to the guest? When you first get the guest on? You've done your little preamble, you've talked about the guest, and then you've been like, welcome to the podcast, Sam. So nice to have you. Most of the time. The first question is, can you tell us a bit about yourself? Or some form of that question? And so the guest will kind of be put on the spot a little bit and go, Hi, yes, hello. Well, my name is Sam and I have a coffee shop. We have a few locations, one in Bondi one in Parramatta, when in blah, blah, blah, you know, talking about the different places that they have this store or whether they are digital marketing company, or they tell you what their industry or their business is. And then they'll say something about probably their target audience or who they help because this is like their elevator pitch. And then they might put in some other information about themselves. So they might say, you know, I have a dog, I have a cat. I have two kids and a husband. And you know, I love the beach, things like that. So they'll give you like information about their life. If and also their name and those sorts of things. And it's just too open ended.

So they don't know how to answer it other than like, kind of saying what you've already said in your introduction, but then giving you a bunch of info that the listener doesn't really care about, you know, and that might sound harsh, but a lot of the times it's true, like, they don't really care too much about those little bits of information. So it's kind of a waste, like that question is a bit of a waste, can you tell us a bit about yourself is like, go for gold, you know, and that's not enough. Like that's not probing enough to actually get somewhere.

The other thing to note here is asking a question like that, can you tell us a bit about yourself? From a listener perspective? When the guest answers it, the listener is going to very quickly decide whether they want to listen to this episode based on what that guest is saying. So if the guest is like, yeah, hi, my name is blah. And then just saying, basically, what you've already said in the introduction, there is a pretty small window of a listener going, Yeah, cool. This person sounds fun, I really want to listen to what they say versus get to the point. You know, what, what is this? I've got 20 minutes, like, get to the point. So when you ask that first question, it should be framed in a way that is interesting and probing.

So you go, Hey, Sam, I have you on this podcast today. Because you are really kicking ass in this or you are an expert in this thing. Can you tell me why you feel that you've really started to excel in the last three months? Instead of like, can you tell us a bit about yourself? It's, hey, this is why I have you on the show, because you're really good at this thing. And now here's a specific question that I have about why I have you on the show.

07:00
So it gets through that barrier of the noise of the introductions of the things like that, because you've already done the introductions. And the person that's listening doesn't need to know that person's life story, or too much about them. They clicked on the episode based on either the fact that they know the person because they've seen the guest name. And they've been like, oh, yeah, I love that person. And they clicked on it because of that. So they already have baseline information about that guest, or they've clicked on it because of the title of the episode, which means they care less about the guests, but more about the title and what that information is that you're providing in that episode.

How do you ask questions that are going to keep your listener interested, and achieve that deeper connection that you should be striving for? Well, first of all, when you're thinking about your guest, when you're going to have them on establish the goal of the conversation. So what is that guests really good at? Why do you want to have them on? And then once you've established that, think of five questions that are relevant to that goal? What is it that you really want to learn from this guest because you are often your target market. So shifting the conversation to something that you've been dying to ask them a burning question, something you've been wondering about, that helps deepen that connection is really going to help you ask better questions.

I'd also ask you and entice you to look at other podcasts that the guest has been on. If they have transcripts available for these other episodes that they've been on, then that's awesome. That's a quick way for you to see what kinds of questions that guests have been asked before. But if they don't have the transcripts, you know, it's going to be a little bit painstaking, maybe about a VA or something that can listen to a few of the podcast episodes, so that you can get a feel for what that guest has already been asked because you do not want to ask those questions, you can ask a few of them. And you know, there's going to be some overlap and that sort of thing, because what you think the listener might want to know will line up with other episodes that a guest has been on. But if you are going to ask the same questions or similar questions, how can you go deeper with that question? Or how can you frame it in a different way? And when you think about that, especially if a guest has been on a lot of podcast episodes, why would they share yours? And that might seem harsh, but if they're on a lot of shows, so let's say for example, you happen to get Gary Vaynerchuk on your show, Gary Vee, why would he share your show? If he's been on a lot of podcast episodes, and your questions are similar to other shows that he's been on, he's got no reason to share it because his audience isn't going to learn anything new from that podcast. So it doesn't make sense for him to want to share it. So if you're asking questions that are different that are more probing that I'm Interesting that shine a different light on that person, then the guest is going to share it because they're gonna go, oh, yeah, that was a really good conversation and I really shared things that I don't normally share.

Don't just expect that if you have a big guest on your show, they're going to share it, because it can just be that it's just the same like cookie cutter info that they've provided on every other episode. And you've got no real point of difference. So always think about that, when you're forming the questions that you want to ask. And also, then, with this conversation, is it the kind of conversation that you would want to be eavesdropping on? There's got to be something juicy in there. And it doesn't have to be a long conversation, I would say err on the side of a shorter conversation. But ask interesting questions.

And it's gonna take a while for you to get good at that. But this is definitely a skill that you should be working on, you should be working on it every week, every new episode is a new opportunity for you to try and hone those skills more and ask more interesting questions the same way that if you were at a dinner party with someone, you would very quickly run out of the what do you do for a job? You know, these kind of just boring questions that they have these same answers to, if you really want to have a good conversation with someone, there needs to be a connection there.

The other thing that I would say is that it always really helps drive an interview, drive a conversation further if there is a personal relationship. So as if you don't know this person at all, you need to make them feel more comfortable, which means you need to put more of yourself into your questions. So if you're trying to get a bit deeper with them, then you have to ask something like if framing it in a way that it's something that you've personally struggled with, give them like a case study of something that's going on in your life, you go deep first, you're vulnerable first, which allows them to be vulnerable as well. So if I gave an example, let's say I was talking to someone about self confidence, and I would go when I was growing up, I had really bad acne. Now this is a true story. I had really bad acne, like terrible cystic acne all over my face when I was around 20 years old, just horrendous. I want to know how you can have confidence within yourself when you feel everyone's looking at you. Because you have, you know, a horrible disfigurement whatever right. Now, this is a personal story. This is something that is vulnerable, it is about me, is it experience that I went through? And then I'm asking you a question about self confidence based on the vulnerability that I've just shared. And then it allows that person, they don't know you. But they instantly want to help you, they instantly want to give you the information because you've just been vulnerable with them. You don't need to share your deepest, darkest secrets, but you need to have a personal example of something that you feel is going to help that drive the conversation forward. So that's the way to share something.

So no matter what industry you're in, no matter what topic it is, you know, it's marketing, let's say for example, you run a business. And the vulnerability that you want to share is you can say, you know, one time I did a launch, and I launched to crickets. I spent all this money I spent all this time it was a lot of effort. And I got like two people in the door and it felt horrendous. It felt so bad. I cried. And then you go, have you been in a situation where that's happened to you? And how did you deal with that? Personal story vulnerability? Ask them a question that frames it in a way that they want to help you they want to deliver different information to you based on a personal connection. Do you see how that really helps? Spend some time really think about what your goal is, for every episode, really think about the personality of the person that you are interviewing, and how you can best display that personality and make them feel like you've really done a bit of research that you want to get to know them on a deeper level. They are my thoughts on what really creates a powerful and impactful podcast interview.

If you do these things, then you are going to have guests that want to share your show. This means your show will grow this means there will be better word of mouth. This means that you will have more interesting titles that you can create because you Got a more interesting podcast that you've created around it. And it all comes from you taking the time to do a bit of research, and really think about who you're interviewing, what you can ask them, and how you can help them get their word out, and also help your listeners learn something as well. That was a really flippin good podcast episode, I hope you learned something, you would have had not to have been listening at all to learn nothing there. So pretty good.

If you want to learn from me further head to the pod lovers.com. That is the free community that I have which I share this kind of stuff. Every now and again, and I curate other information in there. There's also just a group of members in there. They can ask questions, I can answer them. Sometimes I have clients that ask me questions, and I answer the questions within the community as well. So it helps everyone out. You don't have to have a podcast to get in there. You can be wanting to start one and you can jump in there. I'll be launching let's get launched in the New Year, which will be where you can learn how to launch a podcast and strategy around launching a properly and that sort of thing, graphics, theme music, all the kinds of stuff that goes into it and doing it really well. Because you really have one shot of launching a podcast. Yeah, you can relaunch it, that sort of thing. But let's try and get it right the first time. And I can help you do that. So that's going to be launched from within the pod lovers community. So jump in there, get ready for that.

There's also going to be a premium experience within that community as well. That's coming in the New Year, which I'm very excited about, which is for those that already have a podcast and you want to learn how to grow it. And this is going to be me jumping in doing trainings and getting really deep into what makes a podcast really grow. Sponsorships ads, like all that kind of stuffs going to be coming in there as well. It's going to be pretty sweet. The pod lovers.com If you need us to do anything for you video, audio production wise, you want to be a client you want him to have a personal relationship. You can also do that that's through Bamby media.com and you can contact us there booking or how to get started consult and go for it. I hope you have a lovely lovely day. And this has been a bit of a bitch lap type episode. I've been very forthcoming with my do this type info, and I hope it has really helped you out.