Doing an interview is a brilliant way of presenting information. It is great social proof, highly useful for your readers and can lead to many good relationships.

Everett Bogue has been one of 2010’s blog success stories. And, in 3 Timeless and Simple Strategies to Connect With Anyone, he credited interviews as being the main reason for that growth.

The #1 reason that my blog has grown so fast is because I’ve systematically interviewed everyone who I admire. Interviews are the #1 way to make powerful people aware of your existence. Most people have time to do an interview, because it contributes value to both the interviewee and the interviewer.

The thing is, anyone with an email account can interview a successful blogger. In most case it’s a win/win scenario. However, very few people can conduct a compelling interview. In this post, I’ll show you how you can filter through the information to deliver an interview that people want to share.

Back to basics

In Chris Brogans post ‘How To Get Great Interviews’, he breaks down the process into five simple steps.

• Homework:
• Intent
• Brevity
• Rapport
• Posting and promotion;

I’ll be following the guidelines when talking about this but I’d like to add one extra step – getting the interview. This can be the hardest step, especially if your subject is high profile.

Getting the interview

Generally, you have two choices for interviews. You have the up and coming blogger or the established success story.

The rising star is more approachable. They understand that interviews will lead to more exposure and need that exposure to develop their brand.

They also will:

• be more likely to promote the article via social media
• Talk about you with their peers
• Have more time to research and network with you

The success story may be harder to get an interview with. The interview will provide you with social proof but may you may just get the standard responses. Usually, they will also:

• Have more practice and will give polished answers
• May not remember you later as you are a blip on their radar
• Do minimal promotion, if any

I find it’s best to get a balance of famous bloggers and rising stars. You are providing your readership with a diverse range of inspiring people.

Regardless of their level of success, many bloggers are often really busy. The following section will improve your chances of getting someone to agree to your interview.

How to get a really busy person:

One way to really impress the interviewee is give them a degree of control about the interview. I’m definitely more inclined to agree to do something if the interviewer is willing to work around my life.

Let them set the number of questions/time

I interviewed Chris Brogan early in my career and he seemed impressed at me asking how many questions would be best. I didn’t know how effective this was until I started screening interview requests for Dave on top of accepting interview requests for myself.

This technique is something that impresses both the gatekeeper AND the person you are seeking to interview. Most people will be more accepting of an interview when the person asks for a relatively small time commitment. It is even more impressive when the person asks the interviewee to choose how much time they want to commit.

This makes people feel like you respect their time and aren’t out to use them to further their own career.

Offer multiple time frames for a response.

One thing that really impresses me is when the interviewer offers multiple times for a phone interview. This allows me to see if I can juggle my schedule for the week and find a time that suits.

To make it easier, you can use a scheduling service like Tungle.Me. This eliminates a lot of the back and forth.

Give them choice to put it off until a more convenient time.

I had one person ask to interview Dave a couple of months ago. I asked them to contact around November, after an important launch and a conference.

She was respectful and waited, and even after that didn’t mind waiting a couple of weeks extra for a response. Her patience made me really want to help her be one of the few people I recommend to Dave during his busy periods.

Let them choose the method

In a comment on 6 Simple Steps to Killer Blog Interviews, Mandeep said:

“I usually just ask them “how they would like to do the interview?” Whether it’s phone, e-mail or Skype and whatever else. The point is they are doing you a favor, you should be willing to go by their rules.”

I prefer to interviews via email because it’s something I can do over a longer period of time. I prefer phone over skype because I occasionally have connection problems.

Everyone has their own preferred method. Letting them set the rules may lead to a better interview.

Resource: Five Ways to Do Better in Phone Interviews

Homework

Before you even think about the interview(ees), you should consider whether to do a group interview or an interview. Both have their benefits. Most people go for the solo interview but there is another type that is very effective for networking.

I’ll let Pat Flynn explain:

In his posts, 10 Blogs with Explosive Growth to Learn From and also 17 Traffic Building Tips From Some of the World’s Most Popular Bloggers, he not only includes a list of featured bloggers and a short paragraph about each, but he also includes an actual quote from each blogger as well. Having a quote from each of the people does a few extra things for Corbett:

It increases the social proof of the post.

It increases the chances of the article being shared to even more people. Because Corbett took the time to first contact each of the people, and then follow up after the post was written (I know he did this because The Smart Passive Income Blog had the honor of being included in these posts…thanks Corbett!), the authors are less likely to just pass over the post, and will most likely share it with others. If not through retweets and sharing on Facebook, then by posts such as the one I am writing now.

And most importantly, it takes the networking aspect of these posts to a whole new level. Corbett contacted me personally to ask for a quotation for both of these articles, and because of that I know exactly who he is, what his blog is about, and that it’s totally awesome. In the future, I’m sure Corbett and I could possibly work together on something, or exchange guest posts, or whatever – because of the trust I now have for him and his blog – all of which came from the initial contact and the quality of his post.

From How to Get Explosive & Targeted Traffic

Compilation posts – or shout out posts – are networking gold and are something I’ll be discussing in another section. However a compilation interview is just as effective. The only problem is that the spotlight will be shared and that it’s also a lot more work.

Compilation posts

If you are doing compilation post, you will be focusing less on the person and more on an overall theme. These have a greater chance of going viral but do require considerably more work.

There are two models that most people follow:

• Introduce the participants and ask a small number (6-12) a moderate amount of questions
• Ask a large group of people a couple of questions.

Both models have just as much potential to go viral.

Less people/more questions

This type of interview allows you to go really, really indepth on a topic. You can provide contrasting opinions and encourage discussion in the comments. There are two examples I’ve found recently:

• Group Interview: Benefits of Guest Blogging Revealed
• Interview: 12 Top Online Entrepreneurs Share How Hard They Work

This type of post follows a basic model:

• Write a brief introduction to give people context to the post

• Provide a list of the participants and give some background information – usually two lines. Provide a picture so people can connect to the people.
• Ask the questions and list the responses according to the same order as the participants are listed in the above section.

You can get a lot more out of this type of post then if you had tried to interview each people individually. The downside is that you can’t adjust the questions for each persons strategy, which may have provided better responses.

More people/less questions.

This type of post has greater viral potential but in most cases, less engagement. Most of the comments are thanking the poster for their effort and ‘luck’ in scoring some of the interviewees. I’ve recently been featured in two of these posts:

• Entrepreneurial Wisdom, Insight, and Inspiration from Some of the Best
• 36 Secrets the Productivity Gurus Won’t Tell You (But Our Heretics Will)

I liked being in these posts because they required very little time commitment. Also, because they were more viral, I found I got more emails thanking me for my responses.

The format for this one is simpler:

• Write a brief introduction. Mention why you were compelled to do this post.
• List each person, with their pictures and answers.

These are fascinating and well worth experimenting. However, I find my favourite interviews are the ones that focus on just one person. And, these often require considerably more homework.

The solo interview

Most people face the same questions when doing interviews. For some bloggers, it can be frustrating talking about the same thing repeatedly.

You can really get someones attention by showing that you have done some research. One way to do this is to go through previous interviews. You can make a real impression by pulling out a really interesting question and asking if their thoughts have changed since they last answered it.

You can also show that you have a basic understanding of their story by going through their archives. The good thing about this is that you can often repurpose this research. I did this by offering a post series called ’25 Lessons’, where I aggregated the information I’d learned into 25 separate points. It was great as a networking strategy and led to some pretty high profile interviews.

There are two further homework techniques you can do:

Tailor the questions to their specific work

It’s easy to tell when the interviewee is asking generic questions. It makes you feel a bit annoyed; that the person is focusing more on your name then your content. Most people won’t mind but it may lead to equally as generic responses. You can change this by tailoring the content based around their online presence.

I really enjoyed doing an interview with Ije Ude because she asked some very specific questions. I had so much respect for her for doing this and answered the questions as honestly as I could. This brutal honesty led to a really compelling interview – something that wouldn’t have happened if Ije didn’t care.

Basically, I was appreciative of the time she had taken to research the questions. I made sure I put the same amount of care into replying.

Use the introduction to provide context

In many cases, people are asked the same questions at the start of an interview. This can waste their time, especially when you only have their attention for a short time. If you are doing a written interview, I’d provide the relevant background information in the introduction so that you can jump straight to the good stuff. If doing a podcast, I’d ask the blogger to introduce themselves and provide a link for people who want to learn more about them.

Intent:

When discussing intent, Chris Brogran said:

“It’s amazing how people giving interviews don’t realize that they follow the same arcs as stories. Your interview should have some sense of a beginning, middle, and end, and try to service a great story.”

As an interviewer, it is your job to get that story. This can be difficult. However, you can let the story unfold over the course of the conversation.

You can make your intent very clear by running the interviews as part of a series and regularly link back to the announcement post for those that need context. You can also provide your intent by including some background information before starting the interview.

Example

In her post announcing the bad girls guide to business, Traci Love made her intent very clear:

These women have built successful companies and believe in the importance of teaching and helping other women to do the same. They have overcome (or never internalized) the kinds of “good girl” habits that are holding other women entrepreneurs back.
And they reject the notion that women have to look, act, or be a “certain way” in order to be successful. “

When people read that interview series, they know what they are going to get. She has already told part of the story or at least let them know the basic premise.

Rapport

Rapport isn’t necessary with most interviews. This is usually only needed when you are conducting a live interview – either in person or an audio one.

One way to build instant rapport is to have done your homework. Yaro was really impressed with the research Dave had done for his mastermind calls which led to a very well conducted interview.

Another tip is to remind the interview that you are having a conversation. Srinivas Rao, who has interviewed myself, Dave and many of our friends, said the following in a guest post on Daily Blog Tips:

When you get too formal then you become unnatural and it’s really obvious to the people listening. The interview is an opportunity for everybody to eavesdrop on your conversation. If you are really formal, nobody will really want to eavesdrop. One of the things we love as human beings are stories. Let the interviewee tell a story. It’s a conversation, not an interrogation.

My favourite interviews are the ones where both people have good rapport. I feel like I’m part of the conversation and it’s a guilty indulgence. It’s not necessary, but it’s a solid way to engage with your audience.

Posting and promotion:

This is the area that most people fall down in. They assume that the interview in itself is enough work, and will rely on the blogger to send the traffic.

Yeah. This sometimes works, but isn’t that effective.

If you are trying to let the blogger know that you are a peer and someone worth watching, then you should make sure to convey that authority during this process. There are a number of ways you can do this.

Provide context before posting the interview

Context is part of explaining your intent, but it can also be a way of making the interview more engaging. Reading a standard question and answer post is boring. Sometimes, the answers are interesting but work better when they are part of the story. You can help create that story.

Explain why you chose to interview the person. Provide enough background so you can launch straight into the interview itself without it seeming jarring.

You don’t have to explain everything. Some content can be added either as commentary or at the end of the interview. However, this can be a way to make your interview considerably more memorable. An example is Srini, from Blogcast FM. He always explains why he chose to interview a person and allows the listener to understand the story behind the questions.

Format the interview

Many people just whack up a slab of text without worrying about how it looks to the reader. This is fine however most interview questions aren’t answered as concisely as a blog post.

Add relevant images at select points. Format the headings so that the reader has a break. Focus on turning the interview into an experience.

Encourage the conversation

You can really get in the interviewees good books by encouraging conversation around the interview. Ask people to comment about specific aspects and to share their own experiences. Find ways to link the interview to issues that your readers are facing.

Another way to encourage conversation is to provide an incentive. Sometimes, the host blog will offer a relevant product to the person who provides a certain type of comment or shares the interview. This can work, but also can lead to shallow conversations.

Promote the interview

Relying on the interviewee to do all the promotion is very bad form and can damage your relationship. It shows that you were relying on them to put all the effort in rather than supporting them. You don’t have to do a huge campaign however it’s worthwhile demonstrating that you care about getting their words out there.

This goes beyond sending a few tweets. Email people who you have mentioned or think could get some use out of it. Add it to your media page, mention it in your newsletter and encourage conversation.

It doesn’t have to be a massive effort. You just have to demonstrate that you are willing to help the interviewee as much as they helped you out.