You have found the expert. You have done the interview.
If you’ve done your homework right, you should now have the information your customers want to hear.
But what’s the best way to make that information work for you?
The answer lies in recognizing the enormous potential for self-promotion that the interview holds. A positive listener experience, both in terms of content and delivery, reflects well on your business.
So follow these seven steps and do your best to create one.
Be sure to edit the interview. People don’t want to hear the “ums” and “ahs” and boring bits that are part of everyday conversation. Get rid of them.
Add an intro to that audio. People want to know what they are about to hear. So let them know who is doing the interview, who you are interviewing, and what the listener is going to hear. An introduction puts everything in perspective.
Promote your products at different points of the interview. Let’s face it, if your interview is good, people will be listening. Don’t miss these opportunities. Insert “calls to action” at the beginning, middle, and end of the interview.
Upload your best work to iTunes. I have over 200 interviews on that site. When people download my interviews, they see that I’m the artist and they get my website URL. It’s a great gateway to potential new customers.
Be sure to insert an ID3 tag into your work. These are tags that you can encode your audios with. They make sure that even if people share your work with their friends (which is increasingly likely to happen), the end user knows who you are!
Use each part of the audio “real estate”. Most CDs are 70 minutes long. If your interview lasts 50 minutes, fill in the blank. I like to surprise listeners of my CDs by announcing, “Here’s an unexpected bonus for the last 20 minutes of this CD.” These additional interviews are particularly powerful marketing tools. They also allow for more promotional opportunities.
Finally, thank people for listening. Not only does it make them feel that their time was valued, but it also makes them feel good about you, making them more likely to continue their relationship with your company.
That’s all.
It is possible for customers to listen to your audio interviews without checking all of these boxes.
But, if you want to increase your chances of being bought, you’d be crazy not to do it all.