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Conducting local interviews to post on your blog or website is one of the best ways to generate new customers.

Who will you interview, What will you talk about, When will you schedule it, Where will you conduct it, Why is it important, and HOW will you attract more customers?

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I certainly don’t claim to be an expert in this subject. I know that some traditional journalists scowl at the idea of lay people conducting interviews. Trust me, it’s been known to happen (read the first comment on this post). The game has totally changed since the dawn of the blog, and you; yes YOU have every right to interview anyone you want.

The exciting thing about interviewing is that most of the time you get to choose the topic, interviewee, and format.

Here are 5 interview ideas, and why they could help your business create more customers:

1. The Local Interview — This is one of my favorites. It is perfect for you real estate agents that are blogging about your local community. As a real estate agent, you are probably already extremely knowledgeable about your local market and should have alot to write about. But have you thought about getting some insight from other locals? Here are some ideas for people to interview:

• local merchants
• city officials
• social club presidents
• interesting neighbors
• past clients
• contractors
• local builders
• restaurant owners
• teachers & principals (local schools and Universities)
• local appraisers
• Officials of local attractions: theme parks, state parks, stadiums, event centers

I guarantee you that most of these people would love to give you an interview. Regular “folks” are flattered easily, and probably wouldn’t mind at all answering a few questions for a local real estate blog/website. The small local business owner will be thrilled for a chance to get free press.

People are impressed by this kind of stuff. Interviewing local people has got to be one of the best ways to build your blog.

2. Take the Time to Interview in Person — Like I said before, normal people will be flattered by the chance to give an interview. One neat thing about conducting an interview in person is that you get to know the interviewee… this could create a golden opportunity to create a new customer just by conducting the actual interview. Doing an interview like this is so outside the box, I guarantee you that people will be impressed. What better time to try to win their business?

My advice here is to come prepared with tons of questions, do adequate research before hand, don’t take up too much time with the interview, ask relevant questions that you know your readers will be interested in, and for goodness sake, write a thank you note to the person you interviewed.

3. Bring along an assistant to film the interview — If done right, this could open up alot of doors. Mainly because video is so versatile. Here are some ideas to try:

• Create a special nook in your office to conduct the interviews.
• With small businesses, you could take video onsite and showcase the business owner.
• Gotta have a tripod and a decent camera that easily transfers video to a computer.
• Place the videos on YouTube, and every other video aggregator you can find. Yet another excuse to drive relevant traffic to your site.
• Include a transcript version of the interview on your website for content purposes. Just make sure to mention your keywords in the interview (talk about real world seo!)
• Don’t overdress. The 3 piece suit you wear for closings won’t due while interviewing a local contractor.

4. The Phone Interview (turned into a podcast of course) — This is a good option for the agent in a major metropolitan area where a live in person interview might not be practical. Just call once to set up the interview, and explain some of the questions you will ask in advance so they know what to expect.

The best way to record a phone conversation is to purchase a couple of tools: a Mini Receiver Control, and a Digital Voice Recorder. The receiver plugs into your handset cord, and the recorder plugs into your receiver. Just make sure to test it before hand. Once you have the digital recording on your computer (the recorders come with a USB cable), use a free software tool like Audacity to edit the recording and turn it into an mp3 file for easy upload as a podcast to your website. My thanks to Mary McKnight for recommending some of these tools.

Again, I recommend turning the interview into a transcript so that the hungry search spiders have something to crawl. My last suggestion here is to keep the interview short… people listening to audio on the internet have about a 2 minute attention span.

5. Be Prepared – Before approaching anyone for an interview, plan ahead. How will you present yourself? Instead of telling them that you are simply out to create more business, take a round about approach. If it is a business, tell them that you plan on promoting them through the article and interview. If it is a city official, tell them that your website specializes in community news and events. Basically, try on focus on them. Genuine courtesy and interest will get you a long way. Also, bring your camera along. People love to see pictures of themselves online.

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Only 5 tips??!!! Ok, ok, I’ll give you a bonus tip:

6. You Posted the Interview to your Blog… Now What? — Don’t stop there!! Submit it to local papers and magazines. Feature it in your email newsletters. Write a blurb about it in your mailers. Contact local government and school websites to see if they will publish it (those .gov backlinks are drool worthy), and last but not least, don’t forget to send a copy of the interview to your interviewee. For local businesses this may even include a nice little frame and pictures of the business in the hopes that the owner will put it up in their local shop. The ultimate goal being: to create a sense of pride and accomplishment for the local business, and in turn being able to promote your own services.

Related posts:

• Podcast Interview: Andrew Shotland on Local Search Optimization
• Postcast Interview with NeighborhoodMatch.com
• An Interview with GooTube.net founder: Roldan Aquino
• More Reasons Why Quality Content is Important
• Podcast: Matt McGee From Small Business Search Marketing

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