This issue is presented by: ​One of these 3 shows... but which?​

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1,092 WORDS | READ TIME: 4.1 MIN

Hi friends,

When I sent out the newsletter on Monday kicking off a new mini-series on what it means to be a “good interviewer”, I was a little nervous.

I was half-expecting a flood of annoyed emails telling me how ignorant I was for overlooking some rich canon of uber-practical interviewing education that was relevant to the typical podcast host.

Instead, I got a flood of emails and comments from people saying that they too had looked everywhere for useful interviewing resources and come up short.

Glad it wasn’t just me.

If you missed Part 1, you can find it here.

Now, let's dig deeper.

When embarking on any journey, it always helps to have at least a general idea of your destination.

Our quest to uncover what it means to be a truly great interviewer is no different.

So before we zoom into the specific skills, traits, and techniques employed by effective interviewers, it’s worth zooming out to assess the final product.

Specifically, what makes for a fantastic interview episode from a listener perspective?

I’d argue great interviews have 7 specific traits in common, the first four of which we'll cover today.

1. Great Interviews Have a Guiding Vision

While great interviews often have a casual, conversational feel, we as listeners also have the distinct sense—from the first minute onward—that the episode is going somewhere.

Scrappy Podcaster Erin Scott, host of Believe In Dog summarizes this desire perfectly:

Angelique Lusuan, host of both The Italian Escape and The AI and Digital Transformation Podcast echoes the sentiment:

Listeners want to know that they’re in good hands with the host and that their time and attention is being respected.

To that end, great interviews are built around a clear, pre-determined vision encompassing:

1. Why this guest is being invited on in the first place
2. The intended outcome the interview is working toward delivering for the audience
3. The framing for the interview that contextualizes it in the listeners' lives
4. The specific questions being asked and the purpose of each

This isn’t to say that great interviews don’t branch off in unexpected but interesting directions.

In fact, that is one of their hallmarks.

But in the best interviews, those side journeys are always tied back to the main theme, creating cohesive episodes that build and maintain momentum toward the promised destination.

2. Great Interviews Offer Listeners Something Novel

This novelty can take many forms, but the most common are:

Novel Insight, Ideas, or Information — Which allows the audience to learn something new that they haven’t encountered anywhere else before.

Novel Anecdotes — Or, getting the guest to share something they've never shared before.

These take on added importance if your guest has been interviewed widely before, as, over time, your ability to consistently elicit original anecdotes can become one of your primary differentiators, and the reason people choose to listen to your interview of a specific guest versus any of the dozens of others.

But original anecdotes aren’t only valuable when interviewing well-known, widely interviewed guests.

Mediocre interview shows in every niche are filled to the brim with largely interchangeable guests sharing generic, same-y, anecdotes that not only fail to connect with listeners but drive them to boredom.

Regardless of the guest’s level of fame or recognition, great interviews surface interesting original anecdotes that are particular to the lived experience of that guest.

In other words, they feature stories that only that guest could possibly tell.

Erin Scott, of Believe In Dog articulates this desire for novelty clearly:

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3. Great Interviews Leave The Listener Changed

The best interviews create a clear before/after moment in the listeners.

That change may be as drastic as a listener wholly reconsidering their life priorities and trajectory after listening to an interview.

Or, it may be as small as reconsidering a topic they thought they knew and taking on a new, deeper, or more nuanced understanding or appreciation of it.

Regardless of the scope of change, listener transformation is at the heart of the most resonant (not to mention recommendable) interviews.

These are the interviews we remember for years, relisten to multiple times, and talk about with everyone who will listen.

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4. Great Interviews Connect with the Guest’s Humanity

Podcasts are a fantastic way to absorb knowledge and information.

But their real strength (and advantage over more efficient knowledge transfer mediums like writing) is their ability to infuse information with emotion, humanity, personality, and nuance that creates content that is both useful… and deeply connective.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of podcasts ignore this opportunity entirely.

Hosts may keep the guest at arm's length for any number of reasons, including concern about crossing a line into uncomfortable personal territory or veering off course from the show and episode’s topic.

Regardless of the cause, however, the absence of humanity creates flat, forgettable episodes—even when those episodes are filled with useful information.

Note that connecting with the guest’s humanity is not simply about recounting their life story.

It’s about pushing into the messy, potentially uncomfortable, human emotions, struggles, and conflicts that underpin their, your, and your audience's experience with the topic at hand.

Nick Korte, host of Nerd Journey identifies this desired feeling of connecting to the guest as follows:

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What Else Makes For Great Interviews?

Tomorrow, we'll cover an additional three traits of great interviews.

But in the mean time, hit reply and let me know:

• Who is one of your favourite interviewers and what do they do better than others?
• What’s a common trait you see among great interviewers?
• What's a bad trait or habit on the part of an interviewer that reduces the quality of an interview?
• What makes for a great interview episode from a listener perspective?
• What makes for a bad interview?

Be sure to include the name of your show so I can give you a backlink :)

Stay Scrappy, PS. If you have a show that has potential but is stuck at under 500 dl/ep, here's the step-by-step playbook to build momentum and reach that milestone. ​ Is it possible to build a billion dollar creator business? ​

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