Since starting IdeaMensch a couple of years ago, the demand in folks wanting to do an interview has grown exponentially. We went from nobody wanting to do an interview, to now being pitched dozens of times every day.
It’s a great problem to have. Sort of.
One of my rules and values is that I want to give everyone the chance to be featured on IdeaMensch – regardless of your level of fame or success. Also, you don’t need a PR firm to be featured on here.
What matters is that you put a lot work of into your interview, and create something of awesome value to our community. The better your interview, the more people will read it and the more value it creates for your business.
Our best interviews come from people who care deeply about what they do and who care a lot about being featured on IdeaMensch. Our worst interviews come from middlemen – people other than the folks themselves. Sometimes those middlemen are PR people, other times they are internal marketing folks.
The other lesson I have learned is that when people submit me their interviews directly, they get to IdeaMensch better and are much more likely to be part of our community going forward.
Hence, I am setting up a new rule here on IdeaMensch. Every interview submitted has to come directly from the person who wrote it.
Does that mean if you are a PR person, your clients can’t be interviewed on here anymore? Absolutely not. It just means that rather me forwarding you our questions, and then you forwarding me your clients’ answers – all you have to do is introduce your client to me.
You can still proofread their interview, and you can still give them advice on what makes a great interview.
But moving forward, there will be no more middlemen. Here’s to continuing to improve the value our interviews provide – for the folks writing them and the folks reading them.
Yours truly.
-Mario
image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/electricnerve/2232991604/
Mario Schulzke is the Founder of ideamensch, which he started a decade ago to learn from entrepreneurs and give them a platform for their ideas.