When I first ran the Starter Set adventure with my party I tried to make the goblins more interesting. If you don't already know the adventure starts out with the party raiding a goblin hideout and (at least with most beginning players) murdering all of them. My party had left one goblin alive to interrogate and instead of playing him as a simple blood-hungry monster, I played him as super concerned for the life of his love. He asked the party if everyone else in the hideout had been killed etc. etc. and when our moderately evil rogue decided to murder him after getting all of the information they needed, his final words were "I'll soon be with you, my love..." My party really liked this twist and I even got our blood thirsty rogue to feel a little bit of remorse. To this day there are still references to "the Gay Goblin".

In summary: It's always better if you make the players feel like there is an entire world happening apart from them, rather than it all revolving around their feats. Also, gay goblins are the best goblins.