I train alot of entrepreneurs and small business owners over the phone on how to create their podcast strategy. On one of my recent teleclasses, one of the callers said that there needs to be some podcasting etiquette, rules on how to do an interview the right way.
So here’s my list of do’s and don’ts when it comes to podcast interviews, specifically focusing on how to make your guest look like a star (or thought leader).
If you’re the podcast producer:
- Do research on the person you’re going to interview. Prepare some questions, get their bio and write down all the things that make them great.
- Do get the spelling and pronounciation of your guest’s name correct before you start recording (This happened to me once where the person kept calling me Lee-za instead of Lee-sa through the 30-minute podcast interview).
- On the scheduled day and time of the interview, don’t leave your guest scrambling to figure out how to contact you. Since you arranged the interview, you call or skype your guest.
- Do send interview questions at least a week before the interview. The day before is no good.
- Do remind your guest that the interview is being recorded. This will put your guest at ease and help him or her to relax.
- Do let your guest do the talking. He or she is the expert, so let their expertise shine through. I was on a podcast interview once where it took the podcast host about 4-minutes to introduce me, his thoughts on the subject and how excited he was to have me on his podcast. Four minutes!
- Do edit all the verbal clutter your guest makes. This will cause you extra work, but doing so makes your guest sound polished and articulate.
- Do follow up with a thank you email and a link to the podcast interview that your guest appears in.
- Do provide instructions on how the person can access and download their interview (not everyone is well versed on how to listen to a podcast).
- Do provide listeners with a URL to your guest’s website on your blog under a special section called Show Resources.
- Do provide a blurb that your guest can copy & paste and send off to their colleagues, network and/or mailing list. This helps you to grab more listeners and gain additional subscribers by using your guest’s database to promote your podcast.
What else would you add?
Technorati Tags: podcasting
Hello 2 all. Really Nice site. I will begin creating my own site in some days. Hope it will be as good as yours.
I let my guests know that they can tell me during the interview if they think maybe they should not have said something and I will be sure to pull it out.
My interviewee’s income can be dramatically impacted by what they say on my show. Unfortunately this impact will only be negative, never positive. Therefore I set them at ease by telling them a story of when one interviewee made an innocent comment that I felt might be damaging. I just made sure that comment did not survive the final edit.
In other words, let them know that you are on their side and you will try to protect them. At least that is true on my show. I only interview people in the same field as me and of whom I am supportive.