How to Interview Your Library’s Patrons

Get user feedback right from the source

Posted on January 6, 2025 in Blog Posts

So you want to hear from real people who use your library! There are many user research methods to choose from, such as surveys, usability testing, and interviews. Your research goals will dictate which method you use.

Why (or why not) to hold interviews

In a nutshell: interviews let you get at the why and the how, not just the what.

For example, you could easily use surveys to ask a large number of your users which library services they use. But only an interview can tell you why your patrons seem to use virtual references services often but never the in-person information desk. Moreover, you can ask interviewees follow-up questions to dig into their individual answers. For instance, “I notice you said you don’t want to ‘bother’ the librarian at the information desk. What kinds of things give the impression that they would be ‘bothered’ by a question?”

Opportunities afforded by conducting interviews: they enable you to…

• Ask “why” and “how” questions (patrons’ answers will almost always surprise you!)
• Have extended conversations with real users
• Gain additional insight into how the library fits into users’ lives
• Get rich audio/textual data (you’ll definitely garner insightful quotes that your colleagues will appreciate)

Challenges of conducting interviews: you will need to…

• Figure out appropriate compensation (swag, food, gift card?)
• Dedicate lots of setup time for recruiting and scheduling interviews
• Dedicate lots of time for post-interview transcription, analysis, and report-writing

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How to recruit participants

Will a 5-minute interview suffice? Get your hands on some pastries, stickers, or other little goodies and set up a table in the lobby. Call it a pop-up interview event and take advantage of a convenience sample. On a busy day, you could easily conduct 10–20 interviews.

Do you need more time for longer interviews? Recruit interviewees ahead of time. You could use posters, social media, and/or targeted emails to find interviewees. Consider using a screening survey if your interview will focus on a specific topic. For instance, if you’re interested in learning how patrons use the children’s section, your screening survey could ask, “How often do you browse or borrow books from the children’s section? Never/Sometimes/Often.”

For longer interviews, you could hold these in person (best for building rapport) or remotely using video conferencing software (most convenient for your interviewee, probably).

How many interviewees should you recruit for longer interview sessions? It depends on how much time and how many resources you have! More interviews mean more data, but that also means more time spent scheduling the interviews, conducting them, transcribing them, and analyzing the data. If this is your first interview study, aim to recruit 7 people, and assume that 1 or 2 may cancel or be no-shows. A set of 5–7 interviews is a great place to start.

Drafting research questions and interview questions

With your colleagues, you’ll figure out what exactly you want to know. Aim for 3–5 research questions that will likely result in something actionable. For example:

• How could we improve our event programming?
• How do people learn about our events?
• Do event attendees feel welcomed/included?

Note that these are questions that will probably have complex answers. Simple questions, like “Do our users like our remodeled lounge?”, could be the basis for an interview, but if that’s all you want to know, stick to a survey. On the other hand, if you expect that a simple question could result in interesting follow-up questions on your part, go ahead and include them in your list.

Now for the tough part. An interviewer should almost never pose a research question to an interviewee. Instead, turn a research question into an interview question. Here are some examples that you can adapt to your study:

• Tell me about the last time you _____.
• Can you walk me through how you usually _____?
• Can you tell me about _____?

For instance, if your research question is “How could we improve our event programming?,” you could start with “Tell me about the last time you attended an event at the library,” and include some follow-up questions like, “How did you find out about the event?” and “If we held that event again, what would you suggest we do to make it better?”

The Nielsen Norman Group has a great guide to compiling an interview guide (script) with plenty more examples.

I strongly recommend doing a dry run of your interview questions with a colleague or friend. (Bribe them with coffee or snacks!) Doing a practice round can reveal whether the interview script flows well and whether any questions are worded confusingly.

Tips for facilitating an interview

• Take your time in the intro to make the interview feel relaxed. Don’t rush the participant through consent forms, what this interview is about, and so on. Take it easy to set the tone and build rapport. Make small talk about the weather, traffic, their cool t-shirt, etc. I promise this will pay off when the participant feels comfortable answering your questions honestly. Also, consider calling it a conversation, not an interview, in an effort to put them more at ease.
  
  
• Record audio (with their consent, of course). This is better than taking notes. It captures the flow of the conversation and gets verbatim quotes.
  
  
• Mirror the interviewee’s body language and tone. This makes the participant feel more relaxed. Ideally, if you’re meeting them in person, you’ll avoid sitting directly across the table from them, since that can feel like a job interview or interrogation.
  
  
• When you ask a question, stop talking after the question mark. In normal conversation, you might ask, “How do you decide to attend an event? I know it can be hard to find time in your schedule or find something that’s relevant to your interests, and…” Don’t ramble, and don’t prime the participant with things to say! Just ask the question and put a friendly, open expression on your face. Remember, they should talk much more than you should.
  
  
• Keep an eye on the time. Respect your participant: do not go over the allotted time. Don’t even ask them, “I’ve got two more questions. Is it all right if we go over time a little bit?” Almost no one wants to say “no,” even if it’s not actually all right with them.

After the interview

Transcribe the audio files. You can do this all by hand if you want to—I find that while it’s more time-consuming, you really get to know your data well. You can also save time by using AI tools to do a first pass. I’ve been known to play the audio file on my phone while in a Zoom call by myself, turning on the automated captions and saving the resulting file. Note that you will definitely have to look over the transcript. Even the best AI tools will make ridiculous errors. Plus, you’ll have to mark whether the interviewee or interviewer is talking. Don’t forget to remove any personally identifying data from the transcripts. Call participants “Participant 1” or some other anonymizing nickname.

Read every transcript, beginning to end. You will absolutely benefit by familiarizing yourself with the data (transcripts) and reading them back-to-back.

Analyze the data. Find themes and commonalities. It’s up to you whether you want to do a lightweight analysis or a really thorough one. Here’s an in-depth way to do a comprehensive analysis from the Nielsen Norman Group.

Write a report for your colleagues. The report should include a description of how the study was conducted, themes and findings from the interviews, and resulting recommendations for actions to take. Include any especially great quotes from your users—these can make a big impact!

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Interviewing is truly a skill. Expect to stumble a bit or hit a few snags if it’s your first time. But remember, it’s just a conversation! As you continue to conduct interviews, you will build your interviewing skills and gain confidence in this versatile, powerful user research method.

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