One of my favorite things about my podcast is the way I get to interview
inspiring people about their amazing stories.
Today at Live On Purpose TV,
how to interview someone for your podcast.
Podcasting is something that I love to do. I've been doing it since 2007.
My podcast, Live On Purpose Radio, has been really my professional hobby. I decided
to do something right up front that has made all the difference for me.
Now there's different formats for different podcasts. For me, interviews.
Interviews have been the sweet spot. Having an interview format for my podcast has
given me an opportunity to not only give my listeners a chance to hear a voice
other than my own but it's given me the amazing opportunity of interacting with
phenomenal amazing brilliant people all over the world. In fact, I got to show you
my bookshelf. This bookshelf is filled with books that have been written by the
guests of my show, there is not a book on my shelf that wasn't written by a guest
from my show. I had to clear out all the other books just to make room for these
amazing guests. I think of this as my human treasury, if you like that idea.
I can call these people, I can text these people, I can reach out to them for
various things they, have become part of my human treasury and I'm so grateful
for that. So I thought I'd take a few minutes on this video today to give a
few tips or things that I've learned about how to interview someone for a
podcast. I think the first step there is to be clear about your purpose.
My podcast is called Live On Purpose Radio. The purpose of the podcast is to
illuminate principles that allow people to do just what the show suggests,
to live on purpose instead of letting life push them around so I'm looking for
guests on my who understand that and who have a story
or a life experience that has taught them very powerfully how to live on
purpose. So as I get clear about my own purpose for the podcast, I can share that
with guests or potential guests and we can find out pretty quickly whether
they're a good fit. So you want to make sure that that fit of purpose is in
place right up front. You know, here's something that I've talked about many
times before. It's not about you, it's about your audience. So keeping in mind
the needs of your audience will help you to have conversations in the interview
with your guests, that will bring out the principles or the ideas that will be
most valuable to your audience. Think about who your audience is as you're
holding this interview. You might want to check in with who they are in the sense
of what kind of presentation is going to be most valuable to them. One of the
obvious examples that I'm thinking of has to do with humor, people are either
thrilled and delighted or offended by humor and it's because of the words that
are chosen, it's because of the topics that are chosen, it's because of the good
style of delivery and not every style is appropriate for every audience. I want
every one of my podcasts to be something that my kids could listen to, that I'm
going to feel good about having my parents tune into, that is important to consider
when you're putting together this interview and in selecting your guests
and that brings up my next point, know your guests. Know your guests. Many of the
people on my show, I've already met or had interactions with in some way.
There are a lot of people now that reach out to me because of the popularity of the
show, they'll reach out to me asking, "Can I be on your show? Would you highlight my
book? Would you tell my story?" And I'm happy to consider that. When I say know
your guests, have ways of understanding where they're coming from, what their
motivation is, do a little bit of homework, make sure you've read their
book, if they've written a book and you're going to mention it on your show.
I read every book of the authors who are on my show, it helps that I went through
a speed reading course years ago and I can get through that content fairly
quickly but I want to have enough knowledge of where they're coming from
and what their ideas are that I can be conversant with them, that I can have an
intelligent conversation with them, that's important to me and I think it's
important to my listeners. As you get to know your guests, consider this and I
think this is one of the things that I get feedback about this, I have
people tell me "Oh dr. Paul you're such a good interviewer. You're so good at this."
Why? Because I make them feel so comfortable. When they're interviewing
with me, it's simply a conversation and I know enough about them and about their
topic that I can lead that conversation to something that my audience will
appreciate and everybody's having fun. I feel like if we're not having fun, we're
doing it wrong. So you want to have a comfortable
conversational approach with your interviewees, it puts them at ease and
then my goal, what I'm thinking in my mind during the interview, how do I
elevate my guest to a position of - I don't know if I want to say celebrity, I
guess I just did. - I want to elevate them to a position of
celebrity at least in terms of this podcast in this episode, where they are
the most important, most brilliant, most wonderful person on the earth. This helps
them to feel good but it also endorses them in the eyes of my my listeners and
my subscribers. So making them the hero, you know what there's kind of an
interesting paradox here because the more you shift your focus as a host,
where as an interviewer, the more you shift your focus to the
person that you're interviewing and you make them the hero, the more heroic you
become in the eyes and minds and ears of your audience. That's something that can
make you a hero. Like I said at the beginning of this particular video,
there's a lot of different formats that a podcast could take. I have chosen an
interview format because of the richness that I think that that adds and the
depth and the variety and the new voices that my audience get to hear and the
human treasury that it builds for me. There may be other ways that you want to
run your podcast, if you want to do interviews, remember it's not about you,
it's about your audience and it's about your guests and as you elevate your
guest to a hero status with your audience, both your guests and your
audience will love you for that and you're going to have some fantastic
interviews.
Interviewing people, it's a great way to create content for your
podcast. If you know someone who you would like to feature at Live On Purpose Radio,
click on the link below in the description to recommend them.