Word Wars – Podcast Interview Technique

Make no mistake, a podcast interview with a guest can be war. Odd learned behaviours, battles for conversational supremacy, promotional and conceptual agendas – they all come out. Your mission is to extract a compelling narrative and the unique information that you think your guest possesses. Sometimes you have to work at your interview technique, so here are some pointers to help you to get what you want and make your guest sound great.

Wordplay

People are strange – and most adults have unconscious behaviours that you’re about to have to work with in order to extract the (hopefully) awesome content for your podcast.

These are not hypothetical situations, they’re ones that we hear on a daily basis when editing podcasts.

Here are a few interview behaviors that you’re going to have to overcome:

• Guest cutting off your question
• Guest talking over you
• Guest raising their voice when you try to come in with a question
• Guest needing repetition or clarification of your question
• Guest going off track, mid-response
• Guest replying with a response that is not relevant to your question
• Guest moving away from the microphone/camera

When interviews are conducted without visual cues, the missing body language can make it difficult. This normally gives us important signs about when someone wants to speak, and when the other party is ready to finish. Skype doesn’t give us the best audio quality but there’s something to be said for you and your guest being able to see each other in order to pick up subtle conversation cues.

Interview Technique – Take Control

Most people wont be aware of their speech habits or the format of the podcast interview. Don’t be afraid of taking control and telling people how it works. Share your questions in advance so your guest feels prepared, but don’t be afraid to improvise and go off script if the mood takes you to explore topics further. Make sure yours and your guests phones are OFF before you hit the record button. We don’t want the flow of the conversation interrupted by your SO asking what you want for dinner.

For serial Over-talkers, you can be explicit with them. Use technical reasons as your excuse if you like but anyone will be able to understand that listeners wont be able to clearly understand people talking at the same time. The sub-text can also be “and its MY show, buster” – with a smile of course, but IT IS, so don’t let someone else’s habit wreck YOUR interview.

For Microphone-dodgers, just explain that they need to be at least 6″ from the microphone or their voice will sound too echo-ey/quiet/off-mic. See how Joe Rogan deals with it in his interview with carnivore diet proponent, Dr. Shaun Baker. Simple, to the point and the guest doesn’t stray from the mic again! Similarly with visual interviews, you have to direct the guest to frame themselves in the camera – don’t ignore this! You don’t want a guest looking like a newb with their phone camera in portrait mode while the rest of the video world is landscape, or with the angle set so only the top of their head is in the picture.

No one knows about this stuff unless they’re a production insider. Here’s a great summary of How to Frame an Interview from the How To for Dummies series. Get to know the Rule of Thirds, nicely illustrated in this article from Rocket Productions

Phrasing

Choosing a spot to come in with your next question can sometimes be a challenge, but when you do make sure you commit to the question and phrase it clearly. Your guest will want to listen, as they need to respond. Voice raisers and Question cutters need commitment to the question from you. Drop it when you feel that the answer has been delivered. This one needs good ears – as another very common habit is for people to deliver their answer but then continue talking, reframing the same response but with little added information.

Whatever you do don’t come in with a sound which can be misheard or not understood. You know I’m looking at you Err, So…., I wonder…., Mmmmmmm. Be clear that you are moving the interview forward with a well framed question e.g. “Could you tell us the background to….” “What do you think about the ethics of ….”

Holding the Interviewee

Some people will feel exposed and un-confident in the interview. You’ll get to know to gauge this, but your job is also to hold them and make them feel that you won’t let them fail. Relaxed interviewees give better responses, and this is the gold we are digging for.

I’ve written a Pre Flight checklist of points to make sure you agree with your guest a the start of the interview.

We all have moments where our competing impulses make us lose our way when explaining a complex topic. Tiredness, hunger, beer all compete with our intellectual thought so there are lots of basic elements in play as well as the pressure of “red light fever” when the record button is pressed.

Reassure less confident guests that nothing is wrong and everything can be fixed in the mix. Which of course it can quite easily. If a question needs a “take 2” for the guest to formulate their answer, they’ll benefit from knowing that you’re happy to let them present their thoughts and will support them to get the best result.