Discovering the story from the inside out: stakeholder interviews

Every new marketing communications project begins with discovery. Discovery can vary in both its elements and its depth. Sometimes it’s as simple as a single kickoff meeting between a client lead and a creative or strategy team. But sometimes it calls for a deeper, more deliberate process, unfolding over weeks or months, bringing together many different perspectives. No matter the scope, one element consistently proves irreplaceable: stakeholder interviews.

Stakeholders — be they company leaders, decision makers, subject matter experts, customers, or customer proxies — represent a direct stake in the success of a brand, initiative, or organization. Their perspectives offer a unique form of insight that rarely lives in existing materials. Stakeholder interviews are how you get the inside story.

Interviews give marketing teams unique access to lived experience: context, history, opinions, vision, and nuance that can’t be captured through secondary research alone. Through interviews, you can probe specific areas, ask thoughtful follow-up questions, and observe non-verbal cues. You can discover what excites people, what concerns them, and what truly motivates those shaping and delivering the brand. Engaging leaders and decision-makers in the discovery process aligns with the very essence of ownership, bringing authenticity, internal support, and ultimately, success. When approached thoughtfully, stakeholders are unique, high-value sources offering insights that can enrich your messaging and marketing strategies.

Stakeholders often have busy schedules, so preparation is key. We want to be sure of what type of insights we’re looking for and how to use the information we get. In this blog post, I’ll give you some clear direction about how to get the most out of stakeholder interviews by setting clear goals, preparing and conducting interviews, and what to do with the valuable data, insights, and quotes you’ll gather.

Goals: establishing a clear lens

Many conditions could signal the need for messaging informed by stakeholder interviews: These range from broad objectives, such as repositioning a brand, to more targeted goals like announcing a product or service enhancement. Common triggers include:

• Navigating a leadership transition and seeking alignment and buy-in for what comes next
• Responding to shifting market conditions requiring a reassessment of competitive positioning
• Understanding changing customer needs or losses
• Launching new products or services
• Reinforcing — or reshaping — perceptions among key audiences

Any effective research effort begins with clear goals. Stakeholder interviews are no different. To determine what goals will guide your interviews, ask foundational questions:

• Why are interviews needed now?
• What are we hoping to learn?
• How will these insights shape the current initiative?
• How will success be defined or measured?

The answers shape the Research Plan, outlining who should be interviewed, what methods to use and what topics should guide the conversation. This clarity leads to focused conversations and purposeful discovery.

The purpose for interviews can vary by stakeholder group. Here are some possible goals for different types of stakeholders:

Leadership:

• Capture strategic vision and expectations
• Uncover short- and long-term goals for the brand or organization
• Get leadership perspectives on strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and challenges, and how success is defined from the top

Subject matter experts (SMEs):

• Mine their deep institutional knowledge and practical insight for origin stories of products or services
• Clarify what is truly known — or unknown — about customers
• Reveal past or anticipated challenges
• Get candid feedback on previous communication efforts
• Clarify how SMEs define success

Customer or customer-proxy:

• Offer an external perspective distinct from internal viewpoints
• Identify which needs are being met by the brand and where gaps or opportunities exist
• Shed light on the customer journey from awareness through experience
• Learn which alternatives are considered
• Clarify which priorities drive their choices
• Get to know their perceptions, misperceptions, and wishes for how the brand could evolve

What to think about when developing your research plan

Once you’ve clarified your goals, it’s time to build a research plan that realizes your intentions. It’s helpful to think about it in terms of preparing for the interview, conducting the interviews, and what decisions to make post-interview.

In preparing for the interview, you are shaping the entire experience. Your pre-interview checklist should include:

• How many interviews will you be conducting and over what time frame?
• Will interviews be one-on-one or small group discussions?
• Should marketing or internal team members be present, or is anonymity preferred for more candid feedback?
• How will scheduling and coordination be managed?
• Will stakeholders receive pre-interview briefings, or will discussions be more intentionally open-ended conversations?
• Setup: how will the purpose be framed? How will timing and confidentiality be communicated? Will customer or competitor interviewees be offered an incentive or gift?

Follow-through also matters. Post-interview decisions ensure that insights don’t get stalled in a document or presentation. Decide when a summary or report will be delivered, who the audience for the findings will be, and what level of detail is needed. Will themes be identified, or direct quotes included to represent authentic voices? Most importantly, how will these insights be used? And where do they fit in the broader discovery and strategy process?

The power of authentic voices

Beyond insights, your stakeholders provide authentic voices to add credibility, depth, and authenticity to a wide range of communications — both internal and external.

By integrating these perspectives into broader storytelling, you’re investing in the core of your organization — the very stakeholders that define it. Stakeholder insights can help launch new products or initiatives, helping audiences understand not just what is changing, but why. They can strengthen strategic communications by grounding goals and plans in real experience. Internally, they can reinforce commitment to mission, vision, and values, and remind teams that their work is connected to a shared purpose.

Stakeholder voices are especially powerful when addressing challenges or change. Direct perspectives — carefully framed — can help communicate complexity, acknowledge differing viewpoints, and build trust during periods of transition. Incorporating stakeholder input demonstrates an ongoing commitment to listening and teamwork that brings everyone into the tent.

Bringing the inside story out

At their best, stakeholder interviews do more than inform marketing strategy — they reveal the human stories behind the brand. They bring motivations, tensions, aspirations, and beliefs to the surface that data alone can’t capture. They help teams move beyond assumptions and bring clarity to an organization’s purpose.

When guided by clear goals, supported by thoughtful planning, and applied meaningfully, stakeholder interviews bring the inside story out. And that inside story is often the difference between communications that just sound polished and communications that truly resonate.

Gayle Morse is McGuffin’s Brand Strategist and has developed strategic messaging foundations underlying award-winning marketing campaigns for leading names in healthcare, B2B and financial services. She’s always in pursuit of the “why.” Why brands matter to people. Why they don’t. And what does matter that can inspire connection, attraction and action.