How to interview someone for a blog post

In a world where AI writing tools are taking over, you have to work very hard to deliver quality content and keep your articles original. This way, the right customers or your readers will always find a way to come back to your site for inspiring content.

Interviewing experts for your articles is a way to provide quality with unique examples and give actionable advice. So, let’s understand how to interview someone for a blog post.

1. Make a list of potential interviewees

The first thing you will need is to make a list of people to interview. This step depends on the purpose of the interview. So, before making your list, ask yourself:

• Are you interviewing this person because you need specific concrete examples to include in your content?
• Do you want to interview an expert and write a full blog post based on their opinions on a particular topic or topic?
• Would you like to include the opinions of multiple influencers in your article to make a point and have them all share it to expand your reach?

Depending on your goal, create a list of people to contact and provide their contact information. However, emails are the best way to contact someone, especially when making an enquiry. This helps them make a decision at their own pace and react—hunter.io is a wonderful tool for finding people’s email addresses.

However, avoid emailing your prospects upfront. Instead, do your homework first:

• Follow them on social media.
• Browse their website, read their about page, some blog posts, and subscribe to their newsletter.
• Find out if there’s a new project they’re working on that you can talk about in your email, such as a new book, course, volunteer program, etc.

This way you will get an idea of ​​who they are and what they do. However, don’t spend more than half an hour on this research, you still don’t know if they will agree to talk to you.

2. Reach selected people

Once you have enough information about all the interviewees, send them an email. Fair warning: you may need to send more than one email if you are contacting people who are already busy, i.e. follow-up emails.

Make sure your email covers these points:

1. Your introduction and the information you found in your pre-email search. The latter will hook your potential interviewee with the email.
2. Your interview request and its purpose.
3. A description of the duration of the interview. Be sure to tell them it won’t be long and will only take 30 minutes of their time.
4. An advantage for them. Explain why they should say yes to the interview. What’s in it for them?

You can also use this template.

Once they agree to take some time to talk to you, research them thoroughly to conduct a professional interview. You might consider listening to the podcasts they are featured in, watching their previous interviews or videos on YouTube.

3. Prepare for the interview

To make sure the interview goes smoothly, you need to have a system in place. Especially if you are doing it for the first time.

Here are some things you can do to prepare for the interview:

• Prepare your questions for the interview in advance.
• Prepare your introduction and how you will start with the first question if you are nervous. Most people feel anxious before an interview. So here are some beginner tips you can use to be more confident:
  • Be sure to record the interview and let him know. Recording can help you remember answers later easily.
  • Use high quality headphones.
  • Make sure your internet connection is strong and have alternatives ready if your Wi-Fi stops working for some reason.
  • Begin the interview by greeting the interviewee.
  • Thank them for joining you and start with your first question.
• Make sure the first questions you ask are easy to answer. This will help both of you get comfortable with the process, and gradually it will work out seamlessly.
• End the interview by asking them if there is anything they would like to add to the interview.
• Thank them when you’re done and say goodbye.

Apart from that, you also need to take care of a few other things on your side:

4. Questions to ask

When writing interview questions, ask yourself these questions:

• What are the weak points of your audience?
• What answers would your readers be interested in knowing about this topic?
• Is there anything specific that the interviewee succeeded in doing that you can discuss?
• Ask the expert if there is anything they want to talk about in particular.

In addition to that, you can also help yourself with some of the questions below to get started:

1. How do you spend your day or what does an ordinary day look like for you?
2. What is the best part of your job?
3. If you had to [grow a 6-figure business, build a successful blog, or become the CEO of the company, or whatever they’ve achieved] start all over again from scratch, what approach will you take?
4. What’s your all-time favorite quote, and why?
5. What books would you recommend everyone read once in their life?
6. How do you maintain a work-life balance?
7. What are the biggest challenges you have had to face in your career as a [their profession]and how did you manage them?
8. What’s the best advice someone has ever given you?
9. Who inspires you the most?
10. What’s the next thing you’ll do in life?

Interviewing an expert shouldn’t be that hard

Interviewing someone can seem like a daunting task, but it doesn’t have to be. If you are fully prepared and have practiced several times, this can be done easily.

Moreover, once you have done it several times, you will already become a pro of this art.

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