Writer’s block is one of the top three reasons why people struggle with blogging consistently (time and imposter syndrome are the other two). It’s natural to get stuck, stare at a blank post page and think, “What do I write about?” Don’t panic. Finding blog post ideas is not nearly as tricky as you might think.
The truth is that inspiration is around you. You just have to be open to it. Below is a brief list of easy ways for finding blog post ideas, but please know, there are many more opportunities for discovering content ideas than what is mentioned. Before we get started, however, let’s review the importance of blogging and how it can boost the success of your brand.
Why Blogging Is Important
Whether you’re launching a new website or have an established brand, regularly blogging keeps your brand relevant. Here’s how.
- It drives traffic to your website. In the end, what you want to achieve is publishing a blog post that gets indexed by search engines, comes up in search results, and causes people to visit your website. You can’t sell your products and services online without consumers visiting your site. The way to get them there is to create new content (your blog posts) that search engines crawl, scan, and index for internet users to find.
- It establishes brand recognition. If you’re a beauty brand and want to be considered a leader in the industry, consistently offering blog content that is accurate, helpful, and engaging will keep your brand at the top of shoppers’ minds. So, whatever your business category is, you can establish brand recognition just by blogging regularly.
Now that you are convinced you should be blogging on a consistent basis, how do you go about finding blog post ideas? Keep reading to find out.
Conversations
This is my favorite way to discover topics. Mind you, these conversations could be anywhere, at anytime, with anyone. Stay alert.
Coworkers and Staff
What work projects is your team working on? If your staff has encountered a challenge on a current project, write about the solution. Are your coworkers super excited about a recent success? You could recite that story as a case study, success story, or company news.
Peers
Networking events with your peers are the perfect opportunity for finding blog post ideas. Do more listening and less talking at these events. Take notes. Connecting with your peers will fill you with an abundance of information and inspiration.
Social Media
While taking a break from social media is often great for your mental health, you could miss out on captivating topics for your blog. If you don’t feel like interacting, lurk. Browsing other people’s conversations will guide you to what you should be writing about on your blog.
Client Feedback
Client feedback is a wonderful source of blog inspiration. When you know what pains and aches your customers have and how your product or service helps them, you can write fantastic content that targets them specifically.
In your blog post, address their concerns. Provide solutions. Everyone will be coming back to you for answers when they incur the same problems your clients previously had.
It’s important to make it easy to acquire client feedback. Encourage and ask your customers to leave reviews, and make submitting those reviews as simple as possible. If you have one-on-one conversations with your customers, just ask them verbally for their feedback and take notes. They want to let you know how much they appreciate your service and what you can do to improve. They’ll be glad you asked.
Sales Team Feedback
Like client feedback, sales team feedback is immensely valuable. I use the term “sales team,” but this could also include customer service. Basically, anyone on your staff who is at the frontline with direct contact with your client base will be able to provide some amazing blog post ideas.
They know your customers well, what they’re looking for, and what they need. All of this information will make it easier for you to create captivating content catered to your customers. Sales team members will even provide inspiration for blog posts that influence your customers. That could lead to conversions and sales.
Other Blog Posts
When searching for ideas, turn to other people’s content. Obviously, you should never copy it, but use what other people are blogging about, including your competitors, to lead you to new angles and points of view.
For example, this blog post you’re reading now was inspired by “8 Blog Post Ideas You Can Write and Publish Today.” It’s a great article, and you should read it. As I was perusing the piece, I thought to myself, “But what about those times when I’m short on topics? How do I got about finding blog post ideas?” Voila! I now have something to ponder, investigate, and write—and now you’re reading it.
The kingdom of Google is ripe with inspiration. Conduct a simple search on subjects related to your business industry’s category, see which articles are ranking the highest, read them, and invent your own angle and point of view.
Trends
Modern trends make for great content. Keep in mind, though, a blog post about a trend will not serve as an evergreen piece of content, but if optimized correctly, it could garner you some good search engine results. If there’s a trending topic affecting your industry, jump on the bandwagon now and blog about it.
Current News and Events
Like a blog post based on a trend, those that are based on current news and events will also not be evergreen. That’s okay. However, current news and events could directly be impacting your business. Address that impact in the blog post and keep your customers informed.
Something You Learned Recently
We should all make the effort to learn something new daily. Whether you’re attending webinars or a series of classes, when you have that a-ha moment, you should share that with the world.
Learning by experience counts, too. Our engineering team often tells tales of learning something new while working on a client’s website. So, hands-on experience is another way you might come up with a blog post idea. Writing about that moment could impress any potential new clients who have been contemplating doing business with you.
Hopefully, I have guided you to a point where writer’s block exists no more. As I said at the beginning of this article, inspiration is all around you. Open your mind and ears. Soon, you will have your editorial calendar filled out for the rest of the year, and you’ll never have to worry about finding blog post ideas again.
Nice article, thanks. I would add YouTube videos as an important source of inspiration, at least for me. It is a great source, even more so because so many of us watch it in our free time, which means we can get inspired “by the way” while doing the things we like. Full of topics, different people with different perspectives, it can either become the inspiration for something totally new, or shed a new light on a known subject. I am also one of the relics of the past that gets inspired by traditional press – I have a habit of purchasing the country’s largest tech-oriented magazine each month, and it inspired me to write my own articles on more than one occasion.
Those are awesome ideas, too. Thanks for mentioning them.