Podcast Interviews 101: The Best 3 Tips for Your Guest Interviews

Hosting podcast guest interviews is probably one of the best adventures you've embarked on or are on your way to embarking on.

You know what they say: with great power comes great responsibility!

Podcast interviewing is a lot of fun, and the reasons to onboard guests to your podcast are far from few. But that format of podcasting is specific and needs some extra prep.

1. Make sure they have a quiet location for the interivew.

Always consider whether your guest is experienced in podcasting (e.g., they have their own podcast; they have experience as guests on other people's podcasts).

If your guest does not have experience with podcasting, they probably don't have a ready-to-go environment for conducting an interview.

If that is the case, you can prepare a nice document or simply put all the information together in an email where you list Best-Practice tips. You can make it a checklist with checkboxes. That way, it will be fun and interactive for your guests without sacrificing audio quality. 

Here is a checklist you can use for your guests:

• Please prepare a quiet location for your home with no distractions.

• Please consider pets walking around or barking, spouses asking questions or watching tv too loud, children asking questions or arguing in the background, baby monitors

• Turn off your phone ringing and vibration

• Make sure your computer programs/email notifications are silent.

• If you don't have a room full of furniture, carpet, and books, consider recording inside a closet - the acoustics are good because the clothes absorb any echo

• If you don't have a "sound set up", get headphones/earbuds with a microphone built-in. Otherwise, you can use headphones and the mic from your computer or an external mic.

• They MUST wear headphones - one in one ear and one out will allow your guest to speak at a normal level. This simply prevents audio from coming out of your computer speakers

At the end of the checklist, make sure you let them know if they have any questions, they can always get back to you.

2. The best preparation for tomorrow is doing your best today.

We've all seen how easy and seamless it looks when a gymnastics performs a back handspring or an NBA star shoots nothing but net, but we know what looks easy to the eye of the spectator takes careful preparation.

The same goes for podcast interview formats. You want your audience to feel like you are just having a casual, friendly chat with your guest. 

To achieve this effect, you need to consider a couple of things.

a) Your guest interviews should bring value to your audience 

Every person has something distinctive to share and add value. Your job as a podcast host is to find the unique angle in each guest and to take it out for your audience. You will have repeat listeners when answering the listener’s question, “What’s in it for me?”

Find what your guest does differently. What unique and unexpected challenges they overcame? What will your audience learn, and what can they implement? A common format is to end your episode with those takeaways like a quick recap. 

b) Prepare a list of questions

Ensure you prepare a list of questions and send it to your guest in advance. It's always good for them to have clear expectations of what is going to happen throughout the interview. 

In the list of questions, you can inform them that you want this to be fun for both of you and improvisation is inevitable at some point. You want to keep your thoughts organized, this Consistency Worksheet will keep you on track during the interview. You just have to put your bullet points you want to make sure to discuss on it and have it available while on the call! This will also aid in keeping your guest on track in the event they go down a rabbit hole that doesn’t pertain to the interview topic and your listeners. 

Explain to your guest that the list of questions is the skeleton of the interview but that probably follow-up questions will emerge, and those cannot be prepared in advance.

You can also let them know that the podcast interview is a safe space where they can be their authentic selves.  Let them know it’s all editable so any misspeaks or loss of thought is ok. 

If you have a guest interview with someone inexperienced with podcasting, reassure them that this is a recording that will be edited upon release and that if they don't want something they said during the interview to be publicly shared, they can say it during the interview, and you will have it removed. 

c) Test the equipment prior to the interview

If your guest is new at this, make sure that you have enough buffer time for troubleshooting.

You can even ask them to jump on a call another day to test the equipment quickly.

3. Have fun!

It will help you create an environment of trust where the other person has time to prepare their general answers, and both of you will enjoy the conversation.