How to interview
like a journalist

Good interviewing is not just important for journalists. It’s a key to better writing for any content creator.

by Kimberlee Meier

Journalists are known as the writers of the first draft of history. 

So much of writing that draft comes down to how well a journalist can interview someone. Writing out basic questions and gathering surface-level information is easy. But an outstanding interviewer can hold a conversation, draw out unique perspectives, and ultimately find the truth. 

This article covers:

• how to research and prepare for an interview
• how to write a good list of interview questions
• the importance of active listening
• taking notes, and
• how journalistic interviews improve your content.

But the skill of interviewing like a journalist isn’t just useful for, well, journalists. 

When Google announced it would rank content based on a new set of guidelines called E-E-A-T (experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness), many companies panicked. However, the key to meeting this benchmark is right in front of us: interviews. 

Content writers and brands can use journalism-like interviews to create better articles, write-ups, and case studies, and become industry authorities. Each interview is an opportunity to build trust and get a unique, expert opinion on a topic to help shape a narrative. 

Ready to learn how to interview like a journalist?

You must learn how to conduct (really good) research and have real, authentic conversations with people. With that said, there are some ways you can fast-track these skills to get better at interviewing quickly. 

Below are some interview techniques I picked up from my years at the newsdesk.

The foundation of any good interview is solid research. The more you know about a person, the easier it'll be for you to ask deep questions and uncover information. 

As The New York Times’ Campus Weblines publication pointed out, there are few things more embarrassing than an interviewer not knowing what has already been written about a subject:

A question on the order of, 'Well, Mr Jones, have you been teaching here long?' almost guarantees a poor interview. Mr Jones almost immediately begins to look at his watch to try to figure out a way to get out of this. 

A far better question, in the same area, may be: 'Can we talk about the changes that have occurred during your eight years here at Central?' 

Or: 'You were at East High for a number of years before coming here. Why did you move? Are glad you did?' 

Or: 'What are the major differences between East High, where you taught before coming here, and our school?'

Interview questions like these, which probe beyond the surface, require knowledge. I like to start with a Google search. This is where you dig into everything you can find out about the interviewee:

• Background information. Where did they grow up? What nationality are they? Where did they go to school? Where do they work? Depending on what your actual interview is about, find out the ‘foundation’ information about your subject. At the very least, these details give you some icebreakers for the start of the interview. 
• Social media. Every interviewee will likely have a social media presence somewhere. Start with LinkedIn, X, and Facebook, and then move on to other platforms like TikTok or Instagram to find out whatever you can about them. Here is where you will find out the subject's interests, family, friends, and even information like their political beliefs. 
• Other interviews. Watch any publicly available interviews or read previous interview articles the subject has appeared in online. Is there anything interesting that wasn't followed up on properly? Make a note of it for your interview. 

Get a solid understanding of who the subject is and what their opinions are on major topics. The more you know, the easier it’ll be to have an authentic conversation with the person when it’s time for your interview. If information is thin, don’t be afraid to look at other sources of information, like Quora, Reddit and YouTube, to learn even more about them.

Put any information you find in a dump file and split it into sections — like background, interests and topics — so it’s easier to come up with a question list.

Any journalist will tell you that writing a basic list of questions is an absolute must before you step into any interview. 

A questions list acts as a blueprint for the topics you want to cover and also the information you need to get from your subject during the interview. When I was studying Journalism at the University of South Australia, my tutors taught me a formula (of sorts) for how to approach an interview. It was all very simple: 

• gather some basic information about the person you are interviewing
• write out 10-15 questions you want to ask them, and
• take notes and follow up on any unclear details.
  

According to reporter Joe Coscarelli, a journalist should know enough about the interviewee’s life and work to carry a natural conversation and touch on new topics without relying on a question list. 

“You want to have the most natural possible conversation with someone in a totally unnatural environment,” he explains.

The key to achieving this is to use active listening during your entire interview. 

This technique is used by journalists to pick up ‘crumbs’ of information their subject drops when they answer a question. These crumbs are used to ask deeper, more informed follow-up questions to get more details. 

To use active listening: 

• Get your source talking. Focus on the flow of your conversation, ask ‘how’ or ‘why’ and always have follow-up questions.  
• Give your full attention. The best interviews are social interactions. If your subject says something really interesting, make a quick note but don’t transcribe it word for word. Instead, make sure your interviewee knows you are listening to every word. 
• Have your next question ready. Use active listening to avoid awkward silences in your interview. Listen carefully to everything your subject says and focus on finding those crumbs in their answer. If they drop one, use it to frame up the next question in your mind so it’s ready when they are finished talking. 

One of the best active listening interviewers (in my opinion) doesn’t work at the New York Times or Washington Post. He’s a YouTuber named Sean Evans, who interviews celebrities while they eat (insanely spicy) chicken wings on his show, Hot Ones. 

Hot Ones humanises celebrities in a way that other interviews cannot. And I think we can all learn a thing or two from Evans’ interview style.

As Evans told Drew Barrymore in a recent interview, his success with guests comes down to listening to them. He consistently looks for cues, like a guest’s body language or how they react to his questions, to guide what he will ask next in his follow-ups. He likened it to a pet cat letting its owner know where it likes to get patted.

“Listen. Because if that person feels comfortable it's like, I've used this analogy before, [how] a cat will always let you know where it likes to get pet.”

One of the most impactful skills I've sharpened for interviews is note-taking. Effective note-taking during interviews allows you to capture important nuggets of information a subject throws out when they answer a question. 

Here’s how I like to take notes: 

• Dot points. Unless you know shorthand, keeping notes in dot points is the only way you will keep up with the interviewee. Take down anything important mentioned, like names and events.  
• Circling or underlining. This quick trick really helps when you go back through your notes. I like to circle anything the subject says that I want to follow up on at the end of the interview for clarification. If they say something I think is really important or could be the angle of an article, I underline it so it's easy to find later. 
• Date, name, title. Always add the date of the interview to the top of your notebook, along with the subject’s full name and title/job role. I like to do this to keep things organised. Accurate notes are also a record, (super) important if an interviewee ever has an issue with the information or direct quotes you publish from your conversation with them. 

These notes also help at the end of the interview if you need to clarify information. Remember, this is your last chance to get any additional insights from the interviewee, so ask them if they want to add anything. Tina Rosenberg, who founded Solutions Journalism Network, has two pieces of advice on how to wrap up an interview:

• She always asks: “Is there anything I should ask you about that I haven’t?” 
• When you ask interview sources about a problem, ask them: “Who’s doing a better job with this?” Rosenberg says she has uncovered many stories by asking this simple question.