So you’ve gone to write a new post but your brain is completely fried. “How do I come up with a good blog post idea?” Don’t worry, we’ve all been through the dreaded writer’s block. In this post i’m going to show you 10 different ways that you can consistently find new inspiration for your blog posts.
Before we dive into the different ways to find new topics to write about, it’s worth mentioning that you should aim to get as many blog post ideas together in one go. Batching your content makes life so much easier than trying to fight fires each day. Once you’ve got a long list of blog post ideas you can just go in and smash them out whenever you get a chance to write.
It’s also worth noting that these are also great ways to find things to write about on social media too! So if you’re struggling with what to write on your Instagram page, Linkedin or Facebook Group, then don’t worry – this post should help you.
How do you know what to write about?
Having difficulty stressing over what to write about on your blog, social media page or group? It’s easy to get writer’s block and give yourself a migraine when trying to come up with new ideas on what to write all the time, so here’s 10 ways to get some ideas flowing…
#1 – Frequently Asked Questions
Now, ask yourself this… What questions do clients or people in general tend to ask you? If you find yourself answering the same questions every time… great! Write about it.
For instance I might get asked a lot about how much a website might cost, I could then write a post on how to calculate the cost of a website yourself. Another example would be a personal trainer getting asked “how do I do squats?”, they can then write a post on ‘How to do squats properly without injuring yourself!‘. This method is great because you already know that your customers are interested, even if it’s something they already know, they’ll appreciate receiving a refresher.
It also helps long-term for you because if anyone in the future asks the same question, you can just point them in the direction of your post, thus bringing in site traffic but also saving you time. If your goal is to never have to answer a repetitive question again, write as many helpful blog posts as you can!
#2 – Google
Google is your friend. When I don’t have any questions in mind I usually head over to the search engine and start typing away. As I tend to write in the business & mindset niche, I start to type in things like “How To * Business” and let Google suggest things for me. For those that don’t know, the asterisk (*) is telling Google to fill in the blank space between “How To” and “Business”, providing me with many more ideas than I would have come up with on my own.
I won’t bore you too much on this as Google’s such an obvious point, but you can also use tools such as Ubersuggest & the Keywords Everywhere Chrome extension to show you the search volumes for different keywords and phrases, although you should take the search volumes with a pinch of salt, these tools also suggest related searches too! Kind of like Amazon’s “people also bought this” feature, which is a great way of coming up with a number of topics.
You may also notice, that when you search for something on Google, there will also be some related searches at the very bottom of the search results page. For instance when I search for “How to write a blog post” I also see searches for “How to write a blog and make money”, so now that gives me another idea for a blog post.
#3 – Your Competitors
It doesn’t hurt to look over your shoulder every now and then, see what’s going on. If you’re struggling for ideas on what to write, take the time to check out the competition. What are they writing about? Which of their posts or videos is getting the most views & engagement? Can you improve on what they’ve created? If so then produce your own version, providing your own perspective on the topic.
I must stress though that you’re doing this not to copy, but instead to provide your own insight into the topic and hopefully provide a more helpful post or video than your competitors. Google will mark down any websites that are seen to be copying content from others, and people in general catch on sooner or later anyway, I mean… ask Jay Shetty.
#4 – Pinterest
Pinterest is a fantastic app, it might just be the best social media platform around. Pinterest is very much like Google in that it’s a search engine that will suggest search ideas based on the keywords that you use and the popularity & relevance of the search results. The social media app will also suggest related search terms for you, for instance, “Business” might suggest “Business Marketing” or “Business Ideas” and so on.
Within each search result, you’ll find an abundance of Images (or videos) known as Pins, each containing a link to a website. Usually these pins are directly linking to specific blog posts, and as such tend to use imagery to support that blog post – such as “50 Ways To Market Your Business Online”. The pins tend to be ordered near enough in terms of engagement, so you can click into each pin and see how many times they’ve been repinned (effectively the same as Sharing). If it’s got a lot of repins then you know that people are interested in that type of content!
You can follow me on Pinterest here!
#5 – YouTube comments
This suggestion is great because there’s a never ending abundance of videos on the internet, many of which are in your industry. All you’ve gotta do is search for video topics in your niche, again you can look at your competitors, and see what questions people are asking in the comments. You’re more likely to find comments like these on tutorial videos. Not only can you to write a direct response to the people asking those questions, you can write a post on it too.
The only issue with this one is that it’s soooo easy to get sucked into the never-ending hole of YouTube’s recommended videos.
#6 – Amazon reviews
A neat trick I saw from following Jasmine Star, is that you can go onto Amazon and look up books in your niche and, much like the YouTube comments suggestion, you can then check out the reviews and see the feedback that interested customers are leaving such as “great book but it was missing X thing”… You Can Provide X Thing!
Bear in mind that 1 star reviews can be just full of negative a**holes and that 5 stars can be from ‘paid’ reviews, 2-4 stars are usually the sweet spot to look out for.
Alternatively you can preview the contents of a book (or flick through a book or magazine you own) and check out the chapters in the book, you might find that the chapters are split up into convenient sections like “how to do X”, which would also make good blog post ideas.
#7 – Provide your thoughts on things you see
Last week I saw a screenshot of a controversial post I saw on Linkedin, regarding Tattoos in the workplace, with basically some guy saying that he didn’t employ someone because he saw their tattoos through their shirt. I know, crazy right? Well, I shared this post in my Facebook group and it ended up being one of the most engaged posts in the group!
All I did was take a screenshot of the post, and add a couple of lines including “What’s your view on tattoos in the workplace?” and it sparked a big debate in the comments. It took me 2 minutes to write that post, and yet it’s one of the most engaged posts yet. See the thing is you don’t always have to create a bible’s worth of content every day – save yourself that stress.
It’s worth noting with this example, that controversial posts do work great for engagement however you want to be considerate of whether it’s going to offend people – although that’s not too difficult these days!
#8 – Share current or past experiences
We’re all human, so don’t be afraid to show some personality. I’ve never been inspired by the person who’s ‘perfect’ all the time, instead I’ve invested time in people who share both their ups & downs, showing what really happens behind social media.
It doesn’t have to be all negative, feel free to share your wins too and explain how it came about. For instance I’ve got a guy in my group called Nate, every now and then he shares his little-wins, such as being able to spend more time with his daughter. His posts aren’t necessarily complicated or overly informative but it still gets a great reception from the rest of the group.
So what have you been up to recently? What have you been thinking about? Perhaps you’ve got a question burning on your mind? Feel free to share that with your community!
#9 – Use your existing content
Have you written lengthy blog posts or eBooks in the past? If so then you can use this content to create multiple blog articles or social media posts. One eBook could equal 10 social media posts!
(That’s just a random number off the top of my head…)
The trick is to break up your content into bite-size chunks and drip feed them over several posts. The great thing is that, if you’re gathering this content from an existing eBook you’ve written, this won’t affect your eBook sales – as people will still appreciate having all of the said information in one place [in the book].
I myself wrote an eBook on How To Get New Clients In Facebook Groups, and in the eBook, I’d split it up into categories such as “Giving Value”, I then took this chapter of the book and used the content to create a separate post on social media. I adjusted some wording accordingly but overall it saved me a lot of time!
#10 – Ask!
This is the easiest one yet, just ask. I’ve done it a few times already in my group where I’ve said something like…”What would you like to know about SEO?” and I’ve had amazing results. Not only can you help people directly in the comments you can write a post about it too, which can then be shared with a larger audience. The great thing is the question is a post idea in itself!
Not only did I receive questions and feedback when I asked about how I can help, I also had one of my members ask where they could leave a 5 star review for me (for being so helpful), so if you learn anything from this post then it’s not to underestimate the value in just asking!
Conclusion
There is an abundance of places to find new post ideas for your blog, social media pages or groups, many of which require research into your clients, competitors and keywords – on Google and Pinterest. All of your post ideas should be collated in one go, to help avoid facing writer’s block every single day!
Do you have any other ways of getting new post ideas? Feel free to share them in the comments below…
