It’s not always best practice to conduct an email interview as a freelance writer. But sometimes, for whatever reason, it’s what you have to do. Over the years, I’ve gleaned some great email questions that ensure you get fantastic quotes from case studies. Here is my step-by-step guide to email interviews for journalists.
Email interviews for journalists can be super useful.
But, like anything, there are pros and cons to using this method of interviewing case studies or experts.
Skip to what you want to read:
- The benefits of email interviews in journalism
- The drawbacks of freelance writers using email interviews
- The best time to use email interviews for case studies or experts
- Using a two-step approach to email interviews
- When email interviews don’t work
- What kinds of questions can you ask?
- Example of email interview questions to ask academics or researchers
- Some tips
The benefits of email interviews in journalism:
- You have your case study’s words in writing
- It’s so time efficient, especially if you’re a full time freelancer (no back and forwards scheduling a phone call)
- No transcribing
- No stress about whether your dictaphone or recording device is working
- It can really help with your time management and productivity
- Plenty of time to craft your questions and ask exactly what you want
- Great for interviewing experts like academics or researchers where you need precise information
The drawbacks of freelance writers using email interviews:
- You lose some of the magic and spontaneity (okay, a lot)
- There’s no opportunity to pursue any other line of questioning
- You don’t get to create any personal connection (and often you lose opportunities for case study spoking)
- High potential for canned, lifeless responses
The best time to use email interviews for case studies or experts
I would never interview someone over email if I was writing a profile of them or where I needed lively, colourful quotes.
Though that said, I once wrote a feature on Instagram influencers and one influencer was only available for an email interview.
So I had to go with it.
Her responses were okay, but they weren’t great.
Her personality didn’t shine through and her answers seemed to be very mindful of protecting her ‘brand’.
Maybe that would be the same if I had spoken to her, but for the same article I spoke to two other influencers over the phone and they were nowhere near as filtered.
I find email interviews most useful when I need to gather clear, crisp answers from people that don’t necessarily have to be vibrant or jumping off the page.
This means I tend to save email interviews for academics or experts.
This is where the facts are more important than florid comments.
Interviews where you need to explore recent research or where you’re asking an expert for ‘how to’ advice are great to conduct via email.
Using a two-step approach to email interviews
Sometimes I use a two-step approach where I’ll ask questions via email first and then follow up with a phone call.
This way you can get all the facts out of the way in the email and then get straight to the good stuff in the phone call.
I’ll also often give people the option to answer questions via email or by phone.
Some people much prefer having the time to deliberate and answer via email, and some are happy just to chat freely over the phone.
Alternatives to phone interviews are much more common that you might think – one French magazine conducts interviews via text message and even Vogue has got in on the act of text interviews.
Write to Done editor Mary Jaksch has an usual process of interviewing bloggers.
She emails one question and then waits for the reply before asking the next.
To me would be a slow form of torture, so you have to work out what suits you best.
When email interviews don’t work
Because you only have your words on a page, it’s crucial to know how to structure a good email interview.
The best that can happen is that someone writes and replies as they talk.
This means you get natural, free flowing responses to your questions.
The worst is you get regurgitated jargon that is inaccessible, meaningless and ultimately unusable.
So what kinds of questions can you ask to make sure you get fantastic quotes each and every time?
The examples below are questions that I would typically ask researchers, academics or experts in a particular field.
It probably goes without saying, but these are not the questions I asked my Instagram influencer.
These questions are drawn from two main sources – I discovered these resources a few years ago.
I come back to them time and again to help me craft my questions via email.
An example of email interview questions to ask academics or researchers
Even though you have told the case study who you’re writing the article for and what it’s about, it’s always worth recapping.
So start with a brief description of the article you’re writing.
I usually say something like:
“As I mentioned, I’m writing this article about X for X. I’m speaking with X experts and X case studies with lived experience about X.”
Set the scene (background questions)
- Can you tell me about the project/research and how you became involved in it?
(This may also go something like: Can you tell me about yourself and your experience in this field – although if you ask this expect a bio, rather than anything you can quote) - What prompted you to get involved in this research/project?
(What prompted you to pursue X?)
And so? (here you want to get to why this is important/relevant/new)
- What did you find?
- How might I explain your findings in a way that 12 year old could understand?
(This is so helpful for cutting through scientific jargon) - Why are your findings important for everyday people?
- What might the broader implications of your findings be?
- What kind of response have you got?
(Another good one to ask here is: What do others in your field think/say about this? Or: Is there anyone else who thinks your results show something different?) - Was there a turning point where you realised you had made an important finding?
- What do you personally find exciting, important or surprising about the results?
- Are there any myths or misconceptions in this area that you’d like to clear up?
- Is there anything else you’d like to add about X?
- What else are you working on at the moment?
(This is a great question to ask because it might lead to other story opportunities)
Some tips:
Be warned that if you put prompts in brackets, people are likely just to answer those.
For example you might ask: “Tell me about yourself (e.g. your age, height and hobbies).”
While you’ve suggested those three things as items the case study might like to tell you about, you’re likely to only get back answers to those questions.
Give them a deadline – tell them specifically when you need their answers back by.
Please learn from my experience.
Don’t tell your case study or expert when your submission date is and hope they’ll do the maths and email you their responses a few days prior.
They won’t.
They’ll think you are a super human who can receive their responses on the day of submission and turn them into a sparkling article by 5pm.
You can’t.
Give yourself plenty of time.
Because sometimes you might just find you need to do a phone interview after all.
Do you conduct interviews over email? Do you have any other go-to questions that you commonly use?
10 thoughts on “How to get the most out of email interviews”
Thanks for the tips! I do like conducting interviews by mail for my blog but agree you do miss some spontaneity. Once I was interviewed real time through Facebook Messenger and I admit I loved it. It felt like having a conversation, yet everything was typed. This to me was a wonderful option.
I hadn’t considered Facebook Messenger as a way of interviewing, but I think that might strike the right balance between phone and email interviews. I might keep that in mind! Thanks for your comment.
Such a useful post Lindy. I’ve spent far too long transcribing interviews, only to use a fraction of what I’ve recorded. I can see how I can make things more concise as well as the possibility of conducting interviews by email. Great links to the resources as well, thank you.
Thanks Claire 🙂 Another tip is to record and type at the same time if you’re fast enough and then you can go back and fill in the missing bits you need. Or jot down the time stamp when your interviewee says a great quote, so you can go back later and know which bits to listen to and transcribe.
I have never conduct any interviews by email, phone or face to face. If I am about to interview any expert in certain field, I prefer email interview. Thank you for the tips.
Thanks for your comment Mat!
I agree it is generally better to approach scientists and researchers via email. I find that the answers tend to be concise information nuggets, perfect for quotes. Very rarely does the interviewee want to write an essay. I also make an explicit request at the beginning of the email that they answer the questions bearing in mind that the readers are non-experts and that I would love them to steer clear of jargon. Thank you so much for making me feel better about using email interviews; many professional writers give them such a bad rap! They have their time and place too.
Thanks Sarah! I love that you remind them who the audience is/readers are, I think that’s a really great bit of advice.
I did recently see that one writer did an email interview with a source and the source plagarised their answers, so it’s also worth checking that the responses we are getting are original!
Email definitely has its advantages. No waffle time, no transcribing, no hard to hear bits. But, also definitely no colour. I’ve had to interview a chemist who only wanted emailed questions. His answers were all copied from the net! I couldn’t quote him at all.
Oh Melissa, that’s the worst – what a cheater! And yes, you’re right – I always dreaded trying to transcribe the parts of an interview when the interviewee suddenly cut out or their answers were muffled.