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I'm just a dude who likes to talk about nerd stuff and entrepreneurship.
Hello everyone.
And welcome back to
the Oren Cohen podcast.
Today's day 20 of my 30 day
challenge, where I am posting
one podcast episode a day.
In today's episode, I want to talk to you
about five tips for better interviews.
I started writing about.
My interview style and maybe
some tips because I am.
Planning to make some kind
of product, maybe an online
course about interviewing from.
What I've learned so far
in the last few years of doing this.
And I noticed it on my Twitter.
There were some people who asked
questions about how to interview better.
So in this little episode, I
want to give you five tips.
That I learned to make
my interviews better.
They might work for you.
They might not.
In any case, I just want to
share them so you can experiment
and see what works for you.
Outside of all of these,
we are all different.
And for me and the energy I bring into
interviews, these work perfectly, and I
got a lot of good compliments from people.
That I interviewed so well.
So without further ado, let's
get right into the first one.
So the first tip I have for
you is to set expectations.
When you start a call with your guest.
You don't jump right into the
topic of the conversation or
the recording or whatever it is.
I personally use Riverside.
I used to use zoom in the beginning.
And.
What I would do is.
Set the zoom call to record
automatically as we joined.
And that's bad.
Like you don't want to be,
think about the other side.
You don't want to be a
guest entering a call.
And figuring out that, you
are being recorded as you
dropped into the video call.
Don't do that set expectations
with your guests before you
actually started recording.
Talk about what the call will cover.
Talk about, the boundaries that you
have, Talk about their boundaries.
If there is something that
they don't want to talk about.
What do you do next?
You just skip.
Is it live?
Is it recorded?
You need to be prepared to talk about all
of the things and give a rough outline
of where you want the conversation to go.
And, by doing this, you
set your guests at ease.
That, they will feel, they know what to
expect, and it's not just a big unknown
that they just have to walk through.
And, emerge on the other side.
And another thing in the set expectations
phase is to make sure that your guest
is up for the interview sometimes.
We have a commitment and we
don't really feel up for it.
And, we go through it because
we feel it's like an obligation.
But your interviews don't have to
be an obligation for your guests.
If a guest enters the conversation
and feels like it's an obligation
they must fulfill right now.
Then the interview will suffer for it.
You will have a less good
conversation that people would feel.
Is not the best version of that
guest that they could have gotten.
If you didn't identify there
that the guest is not feeling
well or up for the interview.
So keep those in mind and
let us move on to number two.
So the second point here, the second
tip is to always have pen and paper.
This is so important.
I've seen this.
Work for me so many times,
whenever you have pen and paper.
If you're on YouTube.
You can see that I just
raised my own pen and paper.
And I'm doing a solo episode.
It's not even an interview.
But having a pen and
paper is so important.
It will make sure that whenever
something in the conversation rises.
And I called those golden nuggets.
Then you can write it down instead
of lose it to the conversation.
So many people will say something
as part of answering your question.
And that would leave you speechless.
And you don't want to gloss over
those moments in conversation because
your audience won't gloss over
those moments and they would keep
wondering, wait, but they said X.
And the interviewer did not even
try to understand more about that.
And it's so important that you follow
through, not just because of your own
curiosity about what the guest said.
But because you are being.
The voice of the people when
someone listens to your conversation
with a person they love.
The interview is not about you.
It's about facilitating.
Their questions, their desires,
to understand more about your
guests than it is about you.
It's never about you in an interview.
The spotlight is always on your guest.
So don't miss those little moments
and always have pen and paper ready.
And write down notes.
And that way.
You can come back to the
conversation and I want to get
back into and reiterate something.
I answered Chris.
My friend who is also doing
this challenge with me.
How you dig deeper into something
without interrupting your guests?
And one of the suggestions I gave on.
And when I responded to that tweet.
Or that post was that you
could write down your question.
And then when your guest
finishes answering the question
you can take him back to that
moment because you are the
leader of the conversation.
You are the interviewer.
You could say something like, I want to
take you back to what you said, a few
moments earlier and dig deeper into that.
That's fine.
That's okay.
You are the leader.
You are the interviewer you can do that.
It's allowed.
And your audience will appreciate you
when you dig deeper into those moments.
Okay.
So the third tip that I have
here for you is to have a plan,
but to be open, to explore.
And that's a direct continuation
to what I discussed earlier.
Which means that when you
have a conversation with your
guests, And you probably have
a plan of what you want to ask.
Sometimes they will say something
that's interest to you and you
want to go down that road with
them, but it's not on your plan.
So, what do you do?
Sometimes that will make that if
you have a tight schedule and you
have a lot of questions to ask.
For example, if you curated fan
questions, like I usually do
for some interviews of TV shows.
Then you would probably have to miss
out on some of those questions in favor
of digging into a richer conversation.
Have a plan.
know, what you want to ask your
guests, but if they take you down
a road be willing to explore a bit.
And if it becomes a rabbit hole, sure.
Let's move back to the main conversation.
But sometimes.
It will be so beneficial for you to
dig deeper into a little rabbit hole.
With a guest because not only is it,
does it feel like the audience gets
to know the person a little bit more?
It also fosters a relationship, a
deeper relationship between both of you.
So be willing to explore,
but have a plan and,
that will serve you well
in your future interviews.
Okay.
The fourth tip that I have here for
you is to respect your guests time.
I noticed.
A lot of the time, it
happens to me that I usually.
Schedule.
An hour on my guests calendar.
And we usually go over that
hour by maybe 15 minutes.
And that's not even when I have
fan questions, sometimes it's
just because the conversation is
interesting and we want to continue.
And.
Whenever that happens.
My go-to would be to be like, okay.
I see.
Because I'm paying attention.
As I'm talking to my guests, I'm
also paying attention to the clock.
That there are 10 minutes before the
conversation is supposed to end and I
free my guest to continue their day.
And what I want to do is wait for
the end of an answer from my guest
and say, okay, before we continue,
I want to respect your time.
And I want to let you know that.
There's about 10 minutes
before our time finishes.
Are you able to keep going or
should I start wrapping this up?
And that's something that you
can say and your editor or
yourself, if you edit your videos.
Or Podcasts.
you can remove that part
of the conversation and.
Stitch your conversation so
that it appears that this
little thing never happened.
But.
In the moment you need to
respect your guest's time.
And ask them.
Okay can you continue?
I had one guest.
Which I really love.
Who said,
I freed up two hours for this.
And I'm like, okay, sure.
And sometimes I did have a few, two
hour interviews and those are very fun.
Usually though after a two hour
conversation, I need to crawl
in bed and have a quiet moment.
But it is very fun.
Once you have.
that permission from your
guests that you can continue.
Maybe they'll tell you.
Okay.
I can have 30 minutes more.
I can I need to finish in 15 minutes.
Once you have that permission, you
know how to plan ahead, but you
need to be sure that in your time.
You still respect your
guests and ask them.
How they want to continue.
And if they say I have a hard stop,
then you should probably sacrifice.
The things that you planned to
do and start moving into direction
of ending the conversation.
And you should consider that the
fifth point that I'm going to talk
about now still needs to happen,
even if you're on a tight schedule.
So let's go and talk about the fifth tip.
Okay.
The fifth tip is to.
End the recording before you end the call.
And what that means is that.
Sometimes, a guest answers a question
and in the moment as you're recording,
they won't say much about it.
But when asked after the conversation
ends and the recording ends.
They would say, I'm not really
happy with the way I answered X.
Can you cut that out?
And that's something that you should dig
for because you want your guests to be.
A hundred percent comfortable with
the conversation you just had because
you're going to share it around.
You're going to be presenting it.
You want to tag them and you
want them to share it as well.
If your guest is not a hundred
percent happy, With the conversation
they just had with you, they
won't share it to their audience.
What you want to do is end the
conversation and the recording the way
you would normally end your interviews.
And then tell your guests
okay, I'm stopping the recording.
Now let's talk about what just happened.
Are you happy with
everything we just discussed?
Is there anything you may want me
to take out and redact or change?
And they would say, if they're
completely happy or they do have changes.
They would say how they feel.
And that moment.
Aside from being respectful to your guest.
That moment is also a bonding moment
for both of you, because now you have
a moment to speak to your guests.
Without recordings without filters.
And have a conversation.
And recently I had an interview with
one of my favorite creators on the web.
We almost talk an entire
hour outside of recording.
And we said we would do this again soon,
and I plan to invite this person again.
But it was so fun to have
that deep conversation.
Which is not an expectation
to be shared around.
It's just for me and the guest.
So that's something that
fosters friendships.
And if you do this.
Outside of being respectful to your
guests, you also enable an opportunity
to form a friendship between you
and the person you are interviewing.
So let's recap.
The five tips I have for you
today is to set expectations.
Have pen and paper.
Have a plan, but be open to explore.
Respect your guest's time.
And end.
The recording before you end the call.
I hope this helped you.
And if you have any questions,
let me know if you want me to
dive deeper into this topic.
I also have a content creation
focused newsletter where
I publish a lot of advice.
You can find that in the description
of the episode, if you had any
questions or feedback about this
or other episodes, please feel
free to comment below the episodes.
If you're on YouTube or
maybe just send me an email.
If you're listening to this as a
podcast, thank you so much for watching.
And listening and I'll
see you in the next one.
Bye for now.