Interview Skills and Article Writing for Content Creators

Marketing Communications. Connect better with your audience.

COVID-19 update: arrangement of our courses

We are now delivering courses online and in-person. Please check the delivery format of each class before enrolling.

Please note that course materials (excluding prescribed texts) are shared electronically within 48 hours of course commencement. Printing is not available.

For bloggers, marketers and journalists, interviewing is a valuable way to obtain fresh new content. Interviews add perspective and texture to articles and recordings in a way that can’t be matched by other research forms. Best of all, original interviews give your audiences content that’s not available anywhere else – only on your platform.  

However, the success of your interviews depends on your rigorous prework and expert conversational skills. In this one-day workshop, you’ll learn a range of techniques that professional journalists use to draw out stories that are engaging, informative and factually correct.  

Through several case studies and much class discussion, participants will also gain insights into how the best journalists guide a discussion, without dominating it.  

The workshop begins with a look at preparation steps, ethical matters and rapport-building techniques. Next, we explore questioning and conversation techniques that will help you maintain a fluid dialogue. These techniques will reduce the need to edit later – useful if you’re interviewing for audio or video. Participants will then use role play to practice asking open-ended questions, getting a conversation back on track, pushing for details, and probing for truth.  

Following this practice-run, participants will interview a special guest live via Zoom. The guest will be selected by the facilitator in advance based on their personal story: whether as a business owner, immigrant, researcher or other experience. We will prepare for this together on the day.  

Finally, the group will practice writing their interviews as a short article. This part of the workshop covers essential structures for writing feature articles, including compelling headings, openings and closes. The workshop ends with essential fact-checking and review techniques. 

This course is a useful complement to our Media Release Writing Course. You may also wish to follow up with our Editing and Proofreading Course. 

Aims

This course aims to give content creators and researchers more confidence in interviewing a range of subjects, using classic journalism techniques. Participants will gain first-hand experience at interviewing a live interview subject and will leave with clear frameworks and checklists to help manage their interviews. 

Outcomes

By the end of this course, you should be able to:

• learn how to prepare for interviewing success, by researching the back-story in a way that allows for a dynamic conversation rather than following a strict line of questioning 
• gain first-hand practice of live interview skills, such as building rapport, active listening, interpreting body language, and asking questions that encourage an open-ended response 
• practice a range of article formats, from the classic Q&A style to the case study and thesis-type article.

Content

Participants will explore the following modules and topics during this full-day course on journalism interviewing and article writing skills.  

Module 1 – Essential preparation 

• Interviewing foundations and principles  
• Ethics of journalism interviewing  
• How to decide on your story angle  
• Background research  
• Bridging knowledge gaps for technical subject-matter discussions   
• Sending questions in advance  
• Planning for phone, Zoom or live interviews

Module 2 – Day of the interview  

• Deciding whether to handwrite, type or record 
• Breaking the ice  
• Building rapport  
• The 6 W questions  
• Probing, clarifying and pushing for detail  
• Editing notes on the same day

Module 3 – Drafting the article  

• Using a case study structure  
• Q&A vs narrative format  
• Using quotes effectively

Module 4 – Editing your article  

• Writing snappy headlines  
• Ensuring clear, concise sentence grammar  
• Punctuation that supports correct sentence grammar   
• Best practice approval process

Intended audience

This course is aimed at content creators who interview people in either a live or pre-recorded setting, for education, entertainment, market research or marketing purposes. These include marketers, researchers, lifestyle journalists, students, live-streamers, podcasters, bloggers and vloggers.  

Delivery modes

• Face-to-face, presenter-taught training 
• Online training via the platform Zoom

Delivery style

Interactive full-day workshop involving a combination of facilitator instruction and hands-on practice of the techniques. Participants will engage in a mix of pair, group and solo exercises. A core part of the experience will be participants’ chance to participate in a live interview via Zoom with a guest interviewee. This volunteer interviewee will vary for each group, will be selected in advance by the presenter based on their personal story, and will be introduced to the group on the day.  

Prerequisites

None. However, you will benefit more from this course if you have some prior experience of interviewing – both good and bad.  

Materials

Participants will receive original course notes developed by the facilitator. This is provided as an editable pdf to either annotate on the day, or print out ahead of the workshop. Course notes will be distributed electronically prior to the workshop. 

Recommended Reading

• Abel, Jessica 2015, Out on the Wire: The Storytelling Secrets of the New Masters of Radio  
• Adams, Sally 2017, Interviewing for Journalists  
• Boyd, Andrew 2001, Broadcast journalism: Techniques of radio and television news  
• King, Patrick 2021, Improve Your Conversations: Think on Your Feet, Witty Banter, and Always Know What to Say with Improv Comedy Techniques 
• Laufer, Peter 2019, Interviewing: The Oregon Method 
• Lowndes, Leil 2015, How To Talk To Anyone 
• Lumby, Catharine and Probyn, Elspeth 2003, Remote Control: New media, new ethics  
• Morris, Alan 2015, A Practical Guide To In-Depth Interviewing  
• Morris, Tee et al 2008, Podcasting for Dummies: A Reference For The Rest Of Us 
• Sedorkin, Gail 2002, Interviewing: A Guide For Journalists And Writers 
• Walsh, Bob 2007, Clear blogging: How people blogging are changing the world and how you can join them  
• Warner, Andrew 2021, Stop Asking Questions: How to lead high-impact interviews and learn anything  
• Wenner, Jann S 2007, The Rolling Stone interviews