470. Why Your Podcast Needs a Pre-Interview

0:05 Good morning podcasting Morning Chat. Today is Tuesday, March 10th, 2026 and today mastering the podcast Pre Interview. We're running live mock sessions, spotting the mistakes that hosts make and revealing what every pre interview should uncover before you ever hit record. So if you're listening live on Clubhouse, hit the share button, bottom left hand side of the screen and share it. However Clubhouse lets you. And if you're catching us via podcast YouTube, please share this with a fellow podcaster. And now give us about 30 seconds. We'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here. Good morning again, podcasting, Morning Chat. Thank you so much for being here. I am your host, Mark Roddick and currently on stage with me. It's a full house here.

1:31 This morning we have producer Ashley, Dr. Fay, Ralph Estep, Jonathan Howard, Sid Meadows, Matt Bliss, Nick Naulback, Alex Baelish, and Tide AKA Nikki is on stage with us as well. Thank you all for being here. Thank you all for holding down the Fort for me once again yesterday. Appreciate that. And yeah, it's just still dealing with the sleep issues. They are getting better overall, but there's just usually now it seems like 1-2 nights a week or so I just can't fall asleep. And that was what happened leading into Monday morning. I virtually had no sleep leading up to Showtime. We're all probably leading up till about 5:00 in the morning or so.

2:17 That was when I finally was able to get some actual sleep. So I appreciate you all holding down the Fort. Yesterday I even texted Alex to say thank you for jumping in in the morning and yesterday and Alex got confused with my text. He thought I was scolding him for some reason, but no, I wasn't scolding him. I was just sometimes I like to reach out to you guys individually and say thank you and that's what I was doing there yesterday. All right, so today we are going to get into a little game playing if you will. We last week we started talking a lot about the value of the pre interview because we had a mailbag question about a guest that was constantly promoting their book or their app or whatever it was.

3:08 And that led us to those discussions about pre interviews that maybe that could have been avoided in a pre interview. And so here's how I want to do this. Let's first define what a pre interview is. Let's reset a little bit because we can't assume that everybody heard last week's show. So we'll talk a little bit about what it is. I know we have at least one person on this stage who isn't a fan of the pre interview, so we'll find out both sides of that coin. So yeah, let's start. Who would like to go first? What is a pre interview to you? What does it mean to you? We might all have different definitions of it.

3:48 Let's go to Dr. first. Go ahead, Dr. Good morning. Hi good morning. So for me, a pre interview is to make sure that the guest and I are on the same page, that I'm hoping that the guest has heard a couple of the episodes and that they kind of get a sense of flavor of what the show is about, the tone of the show, maybe who the audience is and they are in step with, you know, giving the audience as much value as possible. Thank you, Dr. Yeah, And one thing that caught my ear that you had said you'd said, you know, you hope that they'll they've listened to a couple of episodes before even the pre interview.

4:35 And I think that this is where you also have that opportunity to find that out. So there's twofold in as far as opportunities go. A It's yeah, let let's see if they've actually listened to any of your shows. But B, if they haven't, this is your chance, their chance to get to know you on a personal level a little bit more, right? If they haven't listened, they don't really get a good feel for you yet. They don't really have a good feel for the show. Having the pre interview creates that rapport. It sets up a little bit of chemistry. There is some value to that too it. Also gives me a chance to see if they are strictly about self promotion or if there is some value in there. That's kind of the subtext of it though, You know, that's not, I'm not going to say, hey, I want to find out, you know, what your, what your goal is here.

5:26 I, I don't want to say that, but I want to. It's a vibe thing, you know what I mean? Absolutely. Yeah, I see lots of people want to chime in. I'm going to go to Sid first, then Ralph, then Nick. If my memory holds up and I remember to do all that, go ahead Sid. And my goal of the pre interview is a couple of old one is to get to know the person. I want to get to know them just a little bit, hear a little bit about their story. I want to try to understand it is that would be best direction to take the show. Now 99.9% of the people that I have in my pre interviews are people I have invited to be on the show. I take very few random PR promoted people to be on my show because they're typically not a mix. I got 5 last week and none of them are a mix or a fit for the show because my show's so niche, right? They have nothing to do with Office Vercher So I don't really take very many of them, but I want to get to know them. I want to understand what their insights are about the industry. What are they doing that's different or that's changed their business?

6:30 How are they moving their business forward? And then I don't require that they have listened to my show in the past. I asked them, it's one of the first questions I asked them, have they ever listened to the show? And if they say yes, so we have a great chat about the show. If they say no and then by the end of the show, I actually make a couple of recommendations of episodes that would be similar to theirs for them to go listen to. I typically will drop the links into the Zoom chat so that they can grab that link really easily and go listen to the show. But I'm looking to also create the structure of the show. Like what are the three or four things I want to talk about? And typically I always start with you like who are you? What do you do?

7:11 What brought you into the industry? Those kinds of things. So I try to always start the person 1st and then dive into the things that they're doing that are making a difference in their business. OK, Thank you, Sid. And I like that nice touch there. As far as finding a few episodes that relates closely to that guest or as best you can anyway, I think that's a great idea as opposed to just saying, oh, I would really like you to go listen to my show. You know, go find it and pick an episode and listen, right? At least now you're giving them something that they can sink their teeth into that they'd actually may have some interest in and might get those juices flowing for that guest before they come jump on your show. So yeah, I appreciate that.

7:52 Thank you. Yeah, think the more work that you make for the guests, the less likely they're going to enjoy it or want to do it. And so I just try to make it super easy. So if you're ACEO and I'm interviewing you for ACEO chat, I'm going to recommend that you listen to one of my CEO chats because that's something you're going to identify. You're going to understand the type of questions that I ask as CEO. I'm not going to send you an episode about AI if you're ACEO, I'm going to direct you to something that's more similar to what your episode would be like. Yep. Thank you, Sid. Appreciate that. Now let's check in with Ralph and then we're going to check in with Nick and Alex. Go ahead, Ralph. Good morning. Good morning everybody. So I think the main goal with the pre interview is you want to vet this person with your gold. And what I mean by that is you've build up this audience that is your gold.

8:39 And you want to make sure that before you bring somebody into your atmosphere where you've to these people, that they're going to be a good fit for your audience and they're going to bring value to your audience. That to me, there's a lot of other things we do in a pre interview, but to me, the big hairy audacious goal is to make sure that this person is going to bring value to my audience. This person is going to sync with my audience that I'm not going to let them in. I think it kind of like the gatekeeper, if you will, they're going to, you're going to gate keep because you've spent so much time, blood, sweat, tears and effort in building your your audience. And you don't want to bring somebody into that that's going to destroy that or or mess it up or not bring value to your audience, Mark.

9:19 So I think that is like 30,000 foot view, the big thing we want to accomplish. There's a lot of nuanced things within that and I think Sid nailed it. But I think that the bigger goal, like the big, the big goal is to make sure they're a good fit for your audience. Because people will send you pitches and there's PR. People are out there that'll get on their radar and they do a good job of using AI to do all that kind of stuff. But you really need to to get and dig in to understand what they're going to bring in value to your audience. Thank you, Ralph. I appreciate that. And a reminder, if you're wondering, we are going to do some mock pre interviews to share some examples of how other podcasters do it. We'll even maybe try to create a little bit of role-playing here and actually get a little creative with this as well. So we'll see how that turns out.

10:04 First, let me check in with Nick, who I know wanted to share something as well. Good morning to you, Nick. I usually would look at the pre interviews as a three-part process and the first part is, as other people have mentioned, like you get a good feel for how the guest is going to fit into your show. Obviously with one call sheets and like Ralph was saying with promoters and things like that, like you only get so much of the picture. And I kind of think of the one call sheets and all that as like a resume for a job. You Get the facts down on paper, but everyone likes to pretty up the facts and make them look as good as possible. So getting them on a call and having a conversation with them allows you to get a better feel for the things they have on that resume.

10:50 It also serves point #2 as kind of like a vetting screening process. So yes, I bring you on to the pre interview, but we don't necessarily have an interview locked down at that point yet because I still don't know if you're a good fit. Everything might look good on paper, but if we get on a call and we don't have a a good connection there or I don't think it's going to be a good fit for my audience, that's where I can say, OK, yeah, this probably isn't going to work out right now. And then the third and final point that I really like the previews for is for Breaking the ice because it's really hard to just jump into a conversation not having ever talked to a person before and like feeling like, you know, each other and the audience themselves can sense that as well.

11:38 Like we've all talked about podcasts where you're like, Oh yeah, the the guest in the host had really good chemistry. Having that really in chemistry is difficult. A lot of times when you've never spoken to the person before, really have a sense of who they are. So those are kind of the the three goals I always went into with a pre interview. Love that. Thank you, Nick. I think you really hit the nail on the head here. A lot of people agreeing with you. I've seen seeing head nods here on the video, it says some 100% emojis being flashed here. I'm going to quickly just jump their line real quick and go to Nikki. I know Nikki wants to chime in and then I'm checking back in with you, Alex.

12:19 Then I got to keep, I want to keep this moving too. I think we've pretty much defined what this is. Let's see where what Nikki has to say about it. Go ahead, Nikki. Good morning. I was going to say that it was really scary for me to have to turn someone down. I knew I was doing the pre interview for all of the reasons that you guys have listed. I was vetting people. I was making sure that they had something to say. It was a vibe check, you know the whole thing. But I did come across a lady who was extremely nice and very, very, very kind. And, but when I spoke to her, she didn't have a whole lot to say. She was in the middle of a career transition and all she wanted to do was talk about her her book. And she didn't have a lot of substance behind it. Because when I was asking her questions about her life and what connected her personal experience to the story, she did not want to to articulate what that was. And I wasn't 100% sure why that was the case. But I didn't really get a whole lot out of her in the interview. I will intentionally ask some questions where I can push people's buttons a little bit.

13:32 And it's not in a harsh or a negative way, but I will try to push people's buttons a little bit to see if they can be challenged and to see if they will allow themselves to be vulnerable or whatever the case may be. And she was just not that at that moment in time. So I told her, I said, I don't want to invite you on the show right now, but why don't we check back in and, you know, maybe six months or so and see how things are going. And she agreed to that because she she could feel that she was stumbling over her words. She could feel that she was rambling when she was talking to me. And she knew it. She knew it just as well as I did. So it was a very scary moment that I had to turn her down to come on the show.

14:15 But I did it anyway for the good of the show, for the good of the audience and for her own good. And it was I was able to give her personalized feedback on what I thought the show really what would enhance the show if she did decide to come on, What would be the best angle for us to talk about. And I told her those things. And I said, once you kind of figure that piece out, I said I'd love to have you. And she really knows. Very gracious. There are times when you do have to turn somebody down. And I think it's important to be prepared for that. I agree because it can be really hard to say that to somebody. It almost feels like you're breaking up with them, right? Or it's like you went on your first date and it's like, thanks, but no thanks. And I think for a lot of us that can make us uncomfortable. So I appreciate you sharing how you do that. And maybe Tide, if you have some time during this part of the hour, what maybe you'll participate in one of these mock interviews as well, these pre mock pre interviews as well. I'd love for you to do that.

15:16 All right, Let's see here, Mark. Yes. You have one more thing to add before you get forward. OK. And I'm really, I'm really surprised at this. There are 12345678 podcasters on this stage. Yes. And not not counting me. 9 counting me because I didn't count Nick because he doesn't officially have a podcast right now. Not a single one of you mentioned equipment check and that surprises me. I was going to say that, but I figured that was implied. Sid, sorry. No, not implied. Not implied. I think that's a great point, Sid. Matt, do you want to chime in on that? I personally don't think the equipment check is as important as all of the other stuff that we've talked about so far. And I think if we said like if we said we'd do it even in the last episode, we mentioned like there's Chuck it in the e-mail, it's easier to describe what a quiet environment is and making sure that you don't sit right next to the cement mixer that you have running in the backyard when you're recording the episode and that kind of thing.

16:15 I do think it's implied. But I say that as someone who has a bit of a technical bias and likes to share the riverside.com/test Dash me or whatever that testing URL is. I tend to include that in the post. That's a smart one. Yeah, that's a smart one. Let's we got to find the exact link and share that because I think that can be handy for a lot of people to use that. I'm with you Matt, because a lot of times they may be doing the pre interview from a different place where they intend to do the actual interview. So it might be hard to do that equipment test, but I do think it's at least worth sharing some things with them to make sure like OK, like I do like to say, is this where you're going to be recording from?

17:04 You know, when we do the pre interview and if they say yes, then that's my opportunity. If the sound doesn't sound great, if there's something off, I can at least call it out there so that they have that awareness going into the actual interview. But I think providing an actual checklist for them that they can have on paper and run through before they actually sit down to record with you. I think that would be a really important, important piece of that puzzle for sure. Jonathan I know it it that you are anti pre interview and I wanted to hear how come would you share?

17:45 I think there's a couple reasons why I'm anti pre interviewing. One of them is I use pod match for all of my interviews and I use the hell out of pod match. I will go back and forth with yes, I will, you know, I expect them to pitch what they want to talk about and how they want to, you know, structure it And I, I will send them previous like interviews because I keep it to 10 minutes. My my interviews 1015 minutes is really all I'm doing with them. One, I don't like to overthink it and pre interviews make me overthink everything. And two, it keeps it natural. I keep it really tight and it just seems to work much better for me. I've done a couple pre interviews and I ended up hating the episodes. The other thing is I don't promise anybody that after an interview that it's going to air. If it doesn't work out, it doesn't work for my show. I'll let him know after, you know. Hey, sorry.

18:40 Thanks for being with me. Love to maybe do something later. We'll keep this recording. If you want it, you can use it, but you know it may not go up on my show. To each their own, right? Like if that it's something that you just aren't comfortable with, then so be it. As long as you think you can put on a a good interview without it. And I know Jonathan does put on great interviews, the ones that I've heard, so it's working for him. I can't tell him, Oh well, you're doing it wrong. He's found his style and I know that look, I'm looking here on stage. Maybe a couple of you remember Chuck Taylor. Chuck Taylor was a regular in the, I'd say first couple years of the podcasting morning chat that at least my version of it. And he commented, I put a clip out last week about the pre interview being so valuable and he disagreed. Now Chuck is a 40 year radio veteran, right? So his comment to me on that post was, if I'm being honest, I don't agree with this.

19:39 In more than 40 years of interviewing, I've never once done a pre interview. It's all about active versus passive listening, having a conversation and knowing when to shut up and let your guests talk. Now I agree with him that about those that those, I think there are three there three ideas of what it takes to put on a good interview. But I still, first of all, don't believe that most podcasters have the kind of experience and training that someone like Chuck has. And that's actually what I told him. And it's also whether he does it or not. I know from being in the TV and radio industry over my career, pre interviews are still very common now.

20:23 Sometimes they're not done by the hosts, sometimes it's a producer that's doing a pre interview, but there are generally speaking, pre interviews being done all the time with TV and radio. So again, to each their own. Like I can't tell Chuck he's wrong because he's had a very successful career in radio and interviewed all sorts of people and from celebrities to what have you. So I, I don't take that away from him, but I do think when we're talking about podcasting and most podcasters, I think personally the pre interview is invaluable. Matt, did you want to add something? Yeah, just to jump on something you kind of briefly mentioned there that you can't fault someone's experience and have it be incorrect. And when you start to get to that stage, it falls into the IT depends category of podcasting that everyone's past experience is going to inform the way that they approach the interview or if they do a pre interview or not, which doesn't mean it's right or wrong.

21:26 And it also shows the issues of trying to reduce a piece of advice to cover every single possible scenario in a single sentence, when invariably it doesn't or it can't because everyone's got their own bias, none more so than before when I said I don't think about the tech stuff. But that's my bias. I've been doing technology stuff for 30 years. Yeah, yeah. Thank you, Matt. Alex, you want to chime in? I'm on the fence with the whole pre interview thing because I've never been a pre. I've had pre interviews, meaning I've been part of a pre interview where they did that. And I just think that as a independent podcaster, you don't want to see any surprises. And I think that's what the main thing is. But at the same time, you want to make an organic guest. I get all that.

22:11 But to what Nick's point is, you want to have some kind of rapport and that's where the rapport is built. But yeah, I'd be interested to see how everybody does the mock pre interviews because it can go a lot of different ways and you don't want to give out the good stuff on a pre interview. But I guess it's the definition of what a pre interview is that really makes it because I think in this room there's a lot of different ways people think of a pre interview. Like Matt said, he doesn't think about the techie stuff where that's in a pre interview. That's where I'm, I'm going towards, you know, the content is kind of secondary to making sure everything works because we deal with people that just aren't used to podcasting or they're new to podcasting, or they just have their setup and that's pretty much it.

22:57 Or they might be using their phone. I think the biggest argument you can make for a pre interview is to build that rapport is it is a chemistry builder. Even though there are some podcasters that feel like it's the opposite, that they like that idea of having the the conversation happen for the first time on the recording. But I do believe having even if it's 10 minutes with the person before the interview a few days before, I think it there is something to be said about the chemistry that it starts to build when you do actually sit down and press record. OK, I want to keep things going and I did see Tide put something in the chat here. I did not see this Tide.

23:41 Tide says. Did you all see that video where a guy went to go for a job interview at ATV station and the people thought that he was the next guest on a segment and he just went along with it? No, I did not see that and that sounds hilarious. If you find that link Tide, please put it in the chat. I'd love to put that in the show notes and see that for myself. That's awesome. I love that. OK, we're going to do a mock interview. All right, so the idea, I think for this first one, we'll try to do two or three. This first one here is to learn the guest's main story.

24:22 So someone's going to play a host, someone's going to play a guest here from our team. Maybe we'll, maybe the host wants to identify two or three different talking points, Maybe clarifying the guest expertise might be helpful and maybe you want to try to find a surprise angle. Just you, you can do your thing. But I'm just trying to give you some ideas, some thoughts as to where you may want to go with this. OK. And I'm going to say both people can play themselves. And I would love for Matt, if you would be the host on this one. And Sid, I would love for you to be the guest. And I did prep this.

25:04 I did share with the both of them. Sid has been working on a monetization strategy for podcasters and all based on what he's done with his own show for his latest season. And this is a real thing, like he is actually developing this system that he wants to share with other podcasters. So that will be the angle. Sid, I'll let you explain a little bit more just to set things up for Matt. And then Matt will do this as if Sid's coming on your show. And you're welcome to plug your show while we're at it. So Sid, first you want to just briefly share the service that you would be selling as Matt's guest? Matt, do you need me to do that?

25:49 Because you've been part of some of the conversations where I've talked about it. How much do you need me to tell you about it? Honestly, zero. I have an angle and I'd like to share the process I go through or I have gone through to get guests on to rethinking podcasting, if that's agreeable, because I think it'll take off what you mentioned, Mark, and it will allow me to show my unique angle in terms of how I approach. It we'll do the the mock interview 1st and then let's talk about it and the strategies that you do after. Does that work? Absolutely. OK cool, let's do it. All right, so you guys have the floor. I'm going to give you roughly 5 minutes. So obviously your pre interviews may go a lot longer than that, but let's just try it for the sake of the show. Let's keep it to around 5 minutes and I'll I'll call it even if it's not complete, I'll still just call it that. It's when it's complete.

26:36 OK, so take it away, Matt, for rethinking podcasting. So, Sid, pretend that I've sent you a direct message or an e-mail before this and I've come to you with a specific angle in mind for the chat. Because what I prefer to do is to become big fans of the podcasts or the podcasters that I like to talk to you. Because obviously I talk to podcasters and I like to come to them with a topic in mind because I'll generally consume a lot of content from the person that I'm looking to interview and have something in mind. The thing that I have in mind for you after doing a bit of exploration and with my own background, is that your background in workplace design and office furniture and the approach to building awesome workspaces speaks directly to my experience in government and learning environments, desk setups and being effective in workplaces, change management.

27:38 It applies to the kind of workplaces that people work in. So I think that would be our polite into my experience and recognizing yours and then to talk about the monetization strategies you've used in the new season of your show. So that would all be in the direct message or the e-mail. As of quick aside, in case you weren't familiar with me, I would be sending you a link to rethinkingpodcasting.com/foundations, which includes a few episodes that introduces you to me and my background as well. Sid, do you feel adequately prepared? I'm good to go. Well Sid, thank you so much for for coming to the pre interview.

28:20 I really appreciate it. How are you my friend? I'm doing great. Glad to be here. I'm excited to have this conversation with you. Yeah, it's going to be great. Now you would have seen the message that I sent you that I've got a particular topic in mind. I think I'd be really interested to talk to you about workplace design, just because of my background in learning design and working with teams in in in place organizations. Probably only before 2020 now that I think about it, but it's all super interesting to me. And the fact that you have a podcast about that space and talk to people about it, I think it'd be cool to have a chat about that. There's a bit of an intro. I'm more interested in hearing about the monetization stuff that you've done over the new season of your podcast.

29:05 How open would you be to talking about the details of the monetization strategies that you've put in place? I've been in the office furniture workplace design industry for 30 years, so it's something I'm passionate about and I can talk about almost anything relative to that topic. When you start getting really technical about certain things, I'm going to probably pass on, but I love the industry and I love talking about it and so happy to dive into any topics there. And as it relates to the monetization, I'm pretty much an open book. I'm happy to share what I did, what the results were and what I'm learning because there's been quite a few learnings after the fact about what we offered and what we're having to provide. So I'm much, very much mad and open book. The way that I try to run the conversations on Rethinking Podcasting is not to prepare you too much because I do enjoy having a bit of a, not an unpredictable, but a conversation that kind of wins around that curiosity a little bit.

30:02 So we might talk about monetization. We'll probably talk a little bit about how you structure the episodes because I can see that you've got a lot of different episode types there, which is great. In particular, though, I just like to kind of go with the flow a little bit. So after the interview that we've done here, I'll send you a few guiding questions that I'll have in mind for the conversation, along with a couple of links for testing your connection for Riverside FM and all that kind of thing. You're a Odcaster, you know the drill though. O There's not going to be a rescribed conversation necessarily. I like to see where the conversation goes a little bit. And I think we're pretty good friends at this point, right?

30:43 You'd tell me if I asked you something bad during the interview? OK, Matt, I'm with you. I'm very much an organic conversation guy and like to just see how the conversation flows and where things go. So yeah, and if it can support your audience and the topics are a point for them, then I'm happy to be very organic with the conversation. That's awesome. So we'll probably record video and audio, though. I'll record audio. I'll publish audio episodes only at this stage, just to keep the video in the back pocket a little bit because I like to be an audio guy. But I'll also send you a copy of the interview after we've had it and I've edited together and it's got all the fancy stuff in it just so that you have an idea of what it's going to sound like in the case you say anything that you'd like to take back a little bit later. And I'll give you the chance to share some stuff on the show as well, to plug your podcast and anything else, any kind of offers you've got rolling.

31:37 I'm trying not to make you talk about the things that I want us to talk about in the session specifically because I know that's where the good stuff happens. I guess the last thing I'm. Going to call it right there. Last thing would be questions for me about the podcast. Yeah, good. Yeah. And thank you for calling that out. I think that's a good one to to wrap it up at all. Right. So let's talk about it. And look, we're, I think we're all adults here. So I, I think it's OK if there are criticisms, but also what did Matt do? Well, like, let's hear all of it now. I just saw somebody flash. Alex. You guys make it too easy. I mean, you're both professionals. You know what you're doing and that's great. That's one thing that I love, that you're very prepared.

32:19 The thing that's going through my head is there's always that thought that, OK, this is all well and good, but when they get on the podcast, they may decide to change their colors, so to speak, meaning the interviewer. And I know you wouldn't do that, Sid. I'm just thinking, you know, that pre interview. OK, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everything's fine. It's like going on a first date and then, you know, the third date you're, you know, doing whatever. All in all, I love the questions. You made it really relaxing for him. You didn't give a lot away. I had a pre interview where the person wanted to know what the conversation was going to go, so you kept it really vague and you said that. So you laid it out and it was good. I agree with you, one area I would have liked to have seen more of is just hearing more from Sid. Just when I talk about the rapport building, I would have liked to just have a few questions so that Sid could feel a little more.

33:08 I mean, I'm making this up because who knows if he really feels this way, but feel to feel a little more comfortable with the host, right? Because if look, let's be real, people like to talk about themselves. So to give them opportunities to talk a little bit more about themselves, I think will help with that chemistry building that rapport building that we're talking about. Fairpoint, Matt. I wouldn't say what I did there was necessarily representative of the pre interview that I usually do for the show, if only because a large part of my warm up comes before that pre interview. Because as I said, I like to become a fan of the content. I'll have listened to episodes. And if you go back in my feed and rethink a podcast in the last interview that I did is someone I've followed since 2023 and have been thinking about what I'd like to talk to her about in the podcast for like 2 years. So the Serenade of Sid in my head wouldn't have required as much, you know, rapport building as you'd usually expect. But then I also realize it kind of defeats the exercise. And that's probably where you heard me stumbling about trying to shove my process into the 5 minutes that we've got to spend here.

34:22 Agreed. Agreed. Thank you. Matt and Ralph, did you want to add something? Yeah, I want to add a couple things. I thought Matt was very good in setting the tone for the interview. Matt was very good about asking about guardrails, what things could be said, what things couldn't be said. Matt disclosed the idea that this is an audio first, but I'm recording video. So I feel like Matt did a really good job of setting the table of expectations. And I think that's super important because you want to make sure that you're both on the same page. And there's an expectation that he said he's going to send him a list of questions. If, you know, sit an opportunity to say, is there anything you don't want to talk about? So I Matt, I thought you did a great job, man. I thought it was, I thought it was right on point.

35:04 I think you, you're honoring your audience. And I go back to that again, because I think that's one of the key things is you're checking in to make sure you're going to be able to take the interview where you want to take it to value your audience. Say kudos man, great job. Thank you, Ralph. Anyone else from the clubhouse stage want to chime in? Just want to make sure I didn't miss anyone. How about you Sid, as the guest? Any feedback for Matt? So Matt, obviously very easy to talk to. He's very monotone, which is nice and comforting, right? Especially if you're meeting somebody for the first time. We're, you know, some of us have a little more energy, we get a little more excited about things. I was surprised now I understand it now, but I was surprised he didn't ask me more questions about me or more questions about the content itself.

35:48 So, but that's OK because that's the way Matt likes to do things. And, and I do love the element of surprise. And I try to like when a guest comes on with me and they want to start talking about something, I'm like, hey, let's not talk about that. I've got it down as a note because I want to hear you say that live so I can react live to you and we can have a nice dialogue about that. Or I'll ask you a question, say I'm probably going to ask you this question on the show, but don't answer it now because I won't be able to respond naturally. Because my goal is that we're sitting at a coffee shop having a natural conversation and my guests are, you know, sitting right there listening in and I'm asking them the questions that they'd want to ask. So I do understand why you didn't go too far into the questions.

36:33 OK, fair enough. Thank you, Sid. And thank you both to Matt and Sid for playing along. Let's do another one. Dr. Will you play the role of host? Sure. OK, cool. Dr. with a little improv experience. So I'm looking forward to you playing along, Ralph, with virtually no improv experience other than maybe an empowered podcasting when we hosted that workshop. But Ralph, I'd like for you to be the guest. And let's do this from an angle where the guest's audio is a little challenging. OK. OK, let's start it from there. And yeah, and then if we can allow, I'll try to allow for a little time to actually get to maybe your style.

37:18 Dr. for pre interview questions. So with that, Ralph, you can play the role of you if you'd like, or if you want to make up a character, now's your chance to Do you want to be a certain character? Yeah. So I just wanted to let everybody know I'm going to be intentionally pushing my microphone off to the side just so everybody understands that's intentional. But yeah, I'm going to play the character of some zany, like, nutty guy that Dr. is bringing onto his show, and I'm just a little bit out there. All right. His name is Doctor Nutty. OK, Doctor Nutty. There you go, Dr. There's your guest. OK. Hey Doctor Nutty, how are you today? Oh, Dr. I'm doing fantastic. How are you? Hey, I'm great. Where? Where are you in this great big world? You know, I'm in New York City.

38:00 Oh, OK, New York, you're on the east side. I'm kind of east also. I'm I'm in Nashville, TN. I'm noticing a little bit of an audio something going on and I see behind you that you are in a room with like hardwood floors and you've got some hard surfaces there. Let's take a look at your at your mic. Do you know where the gain is on your mic? Maybe at the bottom of your mic? Can you adjust that just a tiny little bit? Hold on, you said the microphone. That's this thing that's plugged into my computer. Right. Possibly. Possibly hope so. So. You know, now look now, now, Dr. you told me I could just Does this sound better now?

38:42 It does sound better. It does sound better you. Know what I think? I figured it out. I put the microphone right in front of my face. There you go. Oh Doctor Nutty, you are right on the money. That is so great. Doctor Duddy, Let's talk a little bit about the room that you're in. Is there, do you have like any pillows or carpets or anything like that that we can really optimize that sound with? Well, you know what, this is my bedroom also, so you know what I could do is I could go grab some extra comforters and some pillows from down the hall. I could do that. I think that might sound better. Do you think it'll sound better? But here's the problem. I don't like this microphone in front of me. So let's move it back over to the side again because.

39:23 You know, you know what, Mr. Nettie, but we can't hear you. The the best thing is, is for us to hear you. And besides, this podcast is actually an audio first podcast, so you really don't have to worry about how it looks. Oh, oh, that's good. So no hair and makeup for me that day. No hair and makeup you can come with, you know, your face full of cold cream if you want to. Oh, that's great. Mr. Nutty, tell me about your story just a little bit. I just want to see if you know if you're a good fit for my audience. Have you heard any of our episodes? No, no. But listen, my publicist said that I need to be on your show. Really.

40:04 OK now? And what was your publicist's reasoning for that? Did they say it's because? I'll tell you why, because she's trying to get me on as many shows as she can so I can promote my book. Oh, so I see. I see. And what's the title of your book? How to be like Mr. Nutty? Oh, I see. OK, Well, Mr. Nutty, I understand that you really want to get the word out there. And actually right now, this may not be the right fit for my audience currently, but hey, down the line, this may be exactly what they're looking for. So I'm going to, I'm going to put you down for maybe in a year or so, I'm going to contact you to see exactly, you know, where you are with your book and where you are with your story. And I'm looking forward to it all. Right, I'm calling it there.

40:58 Thank you Ralph for playing the difficult pre interview guest. I appreciate that Dr. Great way of handling that for sure. Very patient. And where did I wrote? Oh, you know what I might have done? Because I get that that was where it was probably going, where you were going to say thanks but no thanks. I might have tried one more question like what inspired the book. Right. Because he brings up the book, so maybe I could then get him talking about something interesting about the book and see if there might be an angle there that might be interesting for the show. Yeah, that's what I might do, but. I like that, yeah.

41:41 I I think that worked out well. Sorry Tide had to go. I was going to give her an opportunity to play along. Alex, did you want to chime in on the pre interview? Yeah, I just, you know, that you you stole the Thunder. We don't know what the book's about. And it sounded like the IT sounded like she didn't know what the book was about. And it could have actually been a really good fit. Now, she might not have wanted to deal with all of his nuttiness, so to speak. I think once you get him talking about the topic that he wants to talk about, it might have been a really good fit. We don't know. Well, the title of it told me that's probably not the case was to be like Doctor Nutty when probably I want my audience to be authentic to themselves.

42:23 But I guess I could have asked further on the book. Yeah, and let's see, Ashley says. Were you Dr. Were you sort of BS ING at the end there? Absolutely. Yeah, Sid, go ahead. We'll go to Sid after. Go ahead, Dr., and then we'll go to Sid. You can tell when someone has had the experience of being on the mic and when someone hasn't. I would like someone to have just a little bit more experience under their belt and I mean there's a lot you can find out during this pre interview that doesn't require any questions or anything. Yep. And, you know, Dr., I guess could have said, hey, listen, I'm getting the feeling, you know, this feels a little a little all over the place. And I really want to try to hone this in before the recording. You know, if she wanted to push further and granted, you know, this was limited time here, so maybe she would have in a real life scenario.

43:22 But good things to call out in case our audience is taking notes here, which I hope you are. I'm going to go to Sid and then I'm going to go to Matt. Go ahead, Sid. I know this was a little bit fun and it was good to, it was fun to listen to the two of you banter a little bit about that. But I think one of the things we have to be careful of is talking above their heads in Dr. Use terminology like you know where the gain is. On your microphone. And things of that nature. And so we, I think we have to assume they don't know anything about audio and anything about how to use the controls. And some of them don't even have a professional microphone. If they do they like you, like me, don't really know how to use it, but they have it. And so I just think we have to be very careful about talking over their heads or talking at them and try to like coach him through like, hey, I think, you know, I'm having a hard time hearing you.

44:10 I think if you pulled it closer to you, it might sound a little bit better because this is an audio podcast. I'm gonna make sure you sound really good so we can get your message across something like that rather than go straight to, you know, where the game is on your microphone. Like what's the? Game like yeah and you know what I didn't get in that I that's always a non negotiable for me during these free interviews. Always always always I make sure that the guest has either earbuds or earphones anything to prevent the sound coming out of their computer. I always, always, always do that during a pre interview and if they don't have headphones, if they don't have earbuds, then I'm not going to go any further with them.

44:51 I'm I'm just not. Yeah, And you know, the disadvantage here was Dr. wasn't able to be on camera with Ralph, and she would have noticed probably because it looks like Ralph is not wearing headphones, although he is. He's just wearing the fancier kinds that hide the the wiring. But yeah, so that would have probably been a trigger for you, Dr. like, oh, yeah, Ralph isn't. He doesn't have headphones. Good. Time to remind him that I need him to wear them for the show. I'm with you there, Matt. Go ahead. I was going to very quickly point that out that where someone was on audio, someone was on video. So it makes it a bit hard to assess the situation technically. But what I did want to point out is that the more experience you get with dealing with people's hardware situations, I think the focus when you're assessing early on about how someone's equipment should be is to assess as fast as you can what their proficiency is with the space and then set the expectations for that really quick. So when route, as soon as Ralph said, oh, should I pull the microphone over here?

45:53 And then Dr. you started talking about hardwood floors and cushions. I think for me, I probably wouldn't have even bothered trying to bring up the idea of optimizing their environment because optimizing for mic position seemed to be the hardest thing that Mister Nutty was struggling with. And I would have picked my battles on that one and said, look, it's fine. The recording will be a little bit echoey. This is my internal monologue. The recording will be a little bit echoey. It may not bite be ideal, but it's OK because I'd rather them have the microphone in front of their face than wrestling pillows and, you know, not being in their ideal scenario. But again, that's a bias on my part. I've dealt with 40 to 50 year olds in environments where they don't really have to troubleshoot their own technology all the time.

46:44 So that comes as a second, second word. I don't do improv, I'm sorry. Second nature. Second nature. There it is second nature. And and you know, Dr., my guess is you were probably kind of creating a teaching moment there by speaking that suggestion for the guest. And yeah, I mean, in some cases, maybe they're that is appropriate. In other cases, like I do think, again, this is because it's improv and we're kind of shooting off the cuff here. You would have probably in real life, I would imagine you would have stopped after you heard the difference between the mic in front of his mouth versus far away. And you, you probably would have stopped right there because it did sound a heck of a lot better at that point.

47:26 But I appreciate the teaching moment. Anyone else want to chime in? Ralph, how about you as the guest? Yeah, I just wanted to say, Dr., you did a great job because I was intentionally trying to rock your boat and you did a great job of not making me feel like a complete moron. And the way you the way. No, seriously though. And the way you did that at the end where you're like, I don't think this is good. I got to be honest. You the next question I was going to ask you was, well, tell me about your show because I have no idea what you do. I just. That was the next thing I was going to say. But Dr., you did a great job of not burning a bridge, not destroying a relationship because I was going to tell you that my book was all about your niche. Whatever you were going to talk about, your podcast was about, I was going to take well, that's what my book's all about, just to see how you would respond to that.

48:11 So listen, you did a fantastic job. You made me feel good about myself. And yeah, I, I agree with said the gain thing, I was like, no, it's not the gain. The microphone is not in front of me. But Mark had a good point. You couldn't see me. So but but I think DRU did a great job of salvaging a relationship. Thank you. I agree, yes. One thing to be pointed out, He's not from New York. Yeah, that's true. He even. Called all New Yorkers and New Jersey people. You're not from New York. Not at all. No, I think you even had a little bit of a Southern twang coming out at one point. Yeah. So not a New Yorker. I agree. Although maybe he moved to New York, who knows?

48:52 But yeah, that's funny. OK. DJ Rez, AKA Reza is on stage. Good morning. Welcome back. Did you want to ask a question or add anything to this? Yeah. Good morning, Mara. I just wanted to say hi. I just miss you guys and I love your profile picture. That's all I wanted to say. Thank you. Thank you, Rez. Appreciate that. Yeah, Good to have you back, Reza. Long time listener. Once in a while goes away for a little bit and then pops back in here and there. And I love that. Good to have you here, Rez. OK, OK, let's see here we are close to time. I will just share what I'll just share instead of going through a whole mock scenario unless somebody wants to let me just pause real quick. Anyone else want to do a mock scenario? OK.

49:38 Then I will share. What I like to do is to Matt's point, I do like to send a checklist to my guests ahead of time about their sound environment, the equipment that they may or may not be using, etcetera. And then on the call, what I, what I usually will do is just say, hey, I just want to give you a few highlights from that list that either I've already sent them or I intend to send them and I'll just list a couple of them, right? Like I'll say, I just want to remind you, if this isn't the space that you're going to be recording in, please make sure you're in a quiet space where you're unlikely to get interrupted, right? I might encourage them if I'm noticing that their camera where they maybe have too much headroom from their the top of their head to the top of the screen. I might ask them to position it a little bit, but I'll just pick like 3 different areas from my checklist to highlight, especially if there's something noticeable that I can call out during the pre interview and then even before I go through the checklist.

50:42 And by the way, the the people who are on camera here, we're just demonstrating what that might look like being too far close to the camera, too far away from the camera, etcetera. Yeah, so thank you guys for the visual there. What I what I think I like to do first more than anything is open with just some kind of easy question even before I start talking about their recording environment. I might even ask something as simple as like have you done many podcast pre interviews before? Because at that point I can I can gauge some of the conversation, I can help dictate it from there. If they say yes all the time, that might be the hardest way for me to keep that conversation going.

51:24 But I may just ask something as a follow up, like have you had any bad experiences recently, right. Just to hear about what those bad experiences were like. Maybe there are some things that I can learn from that and avoid with this particular interview, right. They may say, you know, I've done a few and I could still ask them, you know, how did those go? What, what, what did you like about him? What did, what did you not like? Again, just to help get them comfortable with me. It gets them thinking, wow, this guy really cares about my experience on his show. And that can go a really long way. Ralph, you want to say something before I go to Dr. Yeah. I want to throw something in it Tim put in the chat because this is a brilliant observation. Tim, always double check the pronunciation and spelling of the guest name.

52:10 And I think that's something that is super important because I've been on many shows and my name, and I don't think it's hard, but a lot of people do think it's hard. And I've said to them ahead of time, I said just so you understand, because they wouldn't ask me. I say, just so you understand, here's how to pronounce my name and I'll tell a funny story to take 10 seconds. Jim Curdlin or James Curdlin from Pod News would mention me on the show and he butchered my name for like 6 months. Then finally one day he says, listen, I need to apologize. I've been saying Ralph's name wrong all this time and he said finally. So Tim, brilliant observation, great idea. That's a wonderful thing to talk about in the pre interview. If they've got a business name, understand how to pronounce their business name.

52:51 But I just wanted to call that out. Marcus. Tim made a hugely impactful statement there. I fully agree. Thank you to ask, you know, before we go any further, can you please pronounce your name for me just so I know that I'm going to get it right when we do the actual interview. And yeah, sometimes some names like Matt Bliss, I think that's pretty, pretty easy one to pronounce. But you may, I want to ask anyway for in my case, I might say I see on the screen here Matt has it as Matthew Bliss. So I might ask him, do you prefer to go by Matthew or Matt? Right. That that that's just something I notice and I I call out before an interview. I get that all the time. Do you really? Everybody, even just not on recordings, people are.

53:33 Like do you prefer Matt or Matthew? And I'm like, bro, come on, let's go. Whatever. Really not fast. Dr. Did you want to add something too, Ralph? Stole mine because I was going to bring up. Tim's thing that he put in the chat. But before I wouldn't do the pre interview. I would probably go to YouTube or to, you know, your wherever you get your podcasts to see if maybe there's a, you know, a, a clip of them talking. Maybe there's something that will have the pronunciation of the name or something. And plus, it gives you an idea of how much experience this potential guest has being on a microphone.

54:20 Thank you. Dr. Jonathan, do you want to have? The final word here today. Oh, how much time are you spending in getting ready for a pre? Interview Man oh man going to YouTube. Checking everything out, I don't know. I don't know that I have that much time. You don't read but I mean it takes a second it. Just takes a minute. For that, Jake, Yeah, I'm with you. I'm with you there. All right. Coming from the guy who is anti pre interview, I get it. Thank you Jonathan and thank you all. I think we got a lot of great info out today. I think we've really helped define and explain what a pre interview is and the value of it. I always will encourage it even to those of you who like Jonathan who say I hate them, they don't work.

55:03 I do believe that just like an interview, it takes a little practice and once you've figured out how to do it, it makes the show, in my opinion, so much more smooth. It it helps with that chemistry. It helps you understand your guests, it helps your guests understand you. And I think that makes for a stronger podcast episode. So hopefully this has helped you today. And if you have questions, by all means, go to podcastingmorningchat.com, go to the contact page and send us your questions, comments, thoughts about today's episode and until tomorrow where we do podcast news. Make it a great day everybody, take care.