Doing an Interview? Read This!

If you're going to do an interview, you'll have a better opportunity to get your message out if you provide the person interviewing you with two things...

1. A list of "sample questions" to ask.

Yeah, I know that's not your job, but make it your job and you'll have a much better interview experience. You'll get questions you want to be asked, questions you know the answer for, and questions that have answers that will help you further your career.

Not doing this may get you a "boxers or briefs" interview, full of stupid questions, which will annoy you, won't get the fans the info they care about, and bascially be a huge waste of your time.

2. A list of "talking points" or facts about you.

You have a certain way you want to introduced or written about, so let people know. You have certain topics, events, products, and achievements you want to talk about, so let people know.

Here is an example of a "bullet sheet" I got from Warner Brothers recording artist and hit songwriter Jason Reeves...

And here are the show notes from the episode of Music Business Radio I did with him...

Notice any similarities?

Comments

[Music Marketing Chris]

Yeah I guess there are two schools of thought on this.

Either you go the old school rock star route, drinking a bottle of Jack Daniels and "winging it"...

Or you prepare, either way you should do a good interview ;-)

- Chris

[Brad Fallon]

I rather prefer the Jack Daniels way and never prepare.

[Vic Stathopoulos]

I never thought of the idea of preparing a set up questions for interview. This is handy because you can prepare yourself also its good practice to practice answers especially if its a live interview for tv / internet video or live phone interview.

Vic Stathopoulos

[ACMastering]

I had to do that for a festival recently where I was one of the panelists on this mastering panel - The female moderator seemed to be chosen for her looks not her technical knowledge - So I came up with the agenda for the entire panel! The trick is to lose the negativity that you're doing the job for someone else and focus on the fact that you get to design your dream interview.

Good luck to the Jack Daniels approach - that might have worked 10 years ago but unless you're a train wreck celebrity, I doubt that will do much for your fan base.

Thanks for the good post
Adrian

[Steve B]

Legendary Coach John Wooden was the biggest advocate of preparation, even in the most trivial and mundane aspects, like putting on socks. He also believed that success was in the preparation or "journey" than in the game or performance. When in the music game, media is your biggest ally, having a steam list to plug is great for making sure you cover all the bases you want to increase your TRUE fan base and make sales. "Failing to prepare is preparing to fail." If that's what you want, enjoy the bottle, but don't quit your day job.