How to Brainstorm New Content When You’re Feeling Stuck
Maintaining a blog for your brand has countless benefits. At GoLive, our blog has been a constant source of traffic for the business over the years. Our blog is meant to provide female entrepreneurs with helpful content on everything from website design to social media marketing and our ideal clients often find us through our blog posts--whether they come up during a Google search, on Pinterest, or through our Instagram. All that to say, our blog has been a valuable component of our brand and we truly believe that it’s an essential part of marketing for any business. The key to getting the most value out of a blog, however, is consistency.
Blogging regularly for your business…
Provides your audience with helpful resources, which ultimately boosts your credibility
Drives more traffic to your website through SEO, and when you share the posts on social media
Builds relationships between your brand and potential or existing clients or customers
Gives you more content to share on other outlets like social media or your email list
Whether you’ve been producing blog posts for years or are about to dive into producing content for the first time, consistently coming up with engaging blog post topics can feel like the most intimidating part of the process. But before you start to feel overwhelmed thinking that you need to come up with tons of award-winning blog post topics right off the bat, just know that it’s okay to feel stuck. At the end of the day, you are an expert in whatever service or product you provide so you have all the information. You just need a few brainstorming methods to get the creative juices flowing. Our biggest tip for brainstorming new content is to think about your ideal customer or client. Your blog, social media, and ultimately your business, revolves around providing them with something--whether that something is helpful, inspirational, or entertaining. So it only makes sense that your blog should focus on your customer and being a go-to resource for them. If you’re feeling stuck on what to write about for your brand’s blog, here are a few ways to brainstorm new blog post ideas.
5 Ways to Brainstorm New Blog Post Ideas
01. Use Google (or other searchable websites)
Where is the first place you turn to when you’re stumped or have a question? Google, right? Well, the search engine can also be a handy resource when you’re trying to brainstorm new blog post ideas. By using Google, you can search for topics that you’ve covered on your blog before and see what else comes up in the results. For example, let’s say you are a social media manager and typically write about social media marketing tips on your blog. To find more topics to write about you could search for “social media marketing” and see that “social media marketing tools” and “social media marketing for beginners” pop up in the related searches. This gives you two starting topics that could then be splintered into several blog posts. You can also refer to the “People also ask” or “People also search for” section to determine what other angles people may be interested in. There are even tools like Answer the Public that will essentially do this for you. Simply type in a topic or keyword, and the tool will populate tons of related phrases or questions that people are searching around that topic.
PRO TIP: Give the blog post a searchable title. Naming your blog post with a title that people would actually search for increases the chances of the post showing up in search results. As you’re writing, think about what someone would type into the Google search bar. With the social media marketing example, you can see that a common search term is “social media marketing tools.” To personalize this phrase but still make it searchable, you could name your blog post “10 Must-Have Social Media Marketing Tools For Small Businesses.”
02. Ask Your Audience
Go directly to the source and ask your audience what topics they want to read about on the blog. Your blog is designed to serve them, afterall, so it only makes sense to invite your readers to join the conversation. Asking your audience to share their input will not only encourage engagement but it will give you a clear idea of what they are interested in learning more about. If you send a weekly newsletter, ask your audience to reply to the email with blog post topics that they’re interested in. Or, you can post a poll or questions sticker on your Instagram Stories asking your followers what questions they want answered on your blog.
03. Use your own content as inspiration
If you’ve been creating blog content for a while, then you’re in luck--you already have a well of inspiration at your fingertips! All you need to do is determine how to repurpose your current content to create something fresh. Start by taking a look at your top-performing blog posts--these are popular for a reason. Can you break down the main topic of one of these posts into a few different topics? For example, maybe you are a wedding photographer and one of your most popular blog posts is about the best wedding venues in your area. Consider breaking it up into more specific blog posts like best outdoor wedding venues, best wedding venues for small weddings, most unique wedding venues, etc.
04. See what your competitors are writing about
There’s no harm in seeing what your competition is up to. If you need some inspiration, visit their blog to see what they’ve written about lately. Just remember: this method is simply for inspiration, and it’s important not to copy anything they’ve done. Instead, see if there’s a topic they’ve covered that you’ve yet to write about. You can write about the same topic but put your brand’s own unique spin on it. Another good place to look for topic ideas is on your competitor’s social media. But rather than checking out the content they’ve been posting, take a look through the comments section to see what their audience may be asking them in relation to the topics you write about. The comments section is always a goldmine of ideas, whether on Instagram, TikTok or LinkedIn. When you’re in the same industry as another brand, there will always be overlap in the services you provide or topics you cover on your blog. The key is to determine what differs you from the competition and highlight that in your blog posts.
05. Think about what your ideal client or customer would want to read before they’d book or buy from you
Put yourself in your ideal client’s shoes and imagine what they’d be interested in reading about that would lead them to you. For example, if you are a wedding photographer, then your ideal client is most likely a new bride that is in the midst of wedding planning. Some things she could be searching for are how to plan a wedding, the best wedding venues in her area, or tips for creating a wedding budget. Or, if you’re a graphic designer for small businesses, then your ideal client is likely a small business owner who may be getting ready to launch their new business. They may be searching for tips on creating a brand identity, building a website, or how to create a logo. By writing about these topics on your blog, you could potentially draw in your customer during their planning phase which means you would be top of mind when the client is ready to book or buy.
When you are seeking inspiration for new blog posts, the main takeaway is that you don’t need to reinvent the wheel! Everything you need to brainstorm new topics is already at your disposal. By keeping your audience in mind, using tools like Google, and relying on your own expertise, you can consistently come up with blog post topics that will position your brand as a resource and draw in potential clients and customers in no time.