Have you ever run out of content ideas? You open a document to write your next blog post, then sit there staring at the screen. You’ve got nothing. It’s bare desert where the ideas are meant to be.
I’ve been there and know how disheartening that can be. The idea behind this blog post is not to provide you with a million and one ideas, which can be overwhelming itself. It’s simply to fire up your inspiration engine with a couple of ideas to give you the confidence to begin creating again.
Never run out of content ideas again
Break the task down into smaller pieces
Trying to come up with blog post ideas for the next 6 months will feel overwhelming if your idea tank is low. You’ll end up talking yourself out of starting for ages and ages or giving up although.
Start with 1 idea, or 4 ideas for the month. Go easy on yourself and make it manageable.
Think small
Your conversation with people will have given you plenty of ideas yet it’s not always easy to see them when you’re feeling uninspired so start with one small area to get the ideas flowing again.
What is one small problem that you’ve heard someone talk about, that you can solve? A call with a client or a chat with a business buddy could provide just the inspiration you need.
Here’s an example for you . . .
One larger problem that my clients have is messy content. It’s stored in lots of different places, there isn’t any flow or structure to it. Lots of their time and energy is spent wasted looking for documents and generally feeling out of control. There is no logical flow from their core content, to their social media, to their newsletters.
One small problem they have is that they don’t know how to create a table of contents in their documents, which means they don’t have an easy way to access the information in the document. That surprised me when a client first told me that. She was amazed at how simple it was to do and how easy it would be to manage her content.
I thought everyone knew how to do that! It goes to show that we all have knowledge that we naturally presume others have, yet it’s exactly the kind of knowledge that will help them.
I solved that small problem by creating a video to show how to create a table of contents in a Google doc and in a word doc.
Now I’m the first to admit that this is not ground breaking content. The thing is, it doesn’t have to be. The aim of that kind of content is to take people one step closer to solving their overall problem of messy content. It also shows potential clients how easy it is to organise their content when they have a mentor to guide them, which takes them one step closer to working with me.
The most common problems
What are the most common problems that your clients have? Review the last few calls that you had to find the problems that come up over and over. They can be the base of your next piece of content.
In the future, take a few minutes after each client call to write down the questions they asked and the topics you discussed. Those calls are a gold mine of ideas!
Always remember to respect the confidentiality of your clients and anonymise any content you create.
Repurpose old content
There are plenty of ideas hidden in content that you’ve already created.
You could:
- Expand a social media post into a blog post
- Take one element of an old blog post and expand that idea. This is especially true for tip style posts as each tip has the potential to be a new blog post.
- Transcribe a FB live that you recorded and create a post out of that.
When you go looking for ideas you’ll be surprised at how many you can find.
Step away from the computer
No great ideas were ever created by staring at a blinking cursor on a blank screen. Go for a walk. Sit somewhere different. I wrote the outline of this blog post while sitting on the floor, next to the sliding door to my court yard. Pen and paper in hand, music on. That’s a much more creative space for me, than sitting in front of my laptop.
Ideas are all around us. Yet we don’t always see them, especially if we’re in a creative rut and feel that we’ve run out of content ideas. That’s why it’s essential to have a system to capture all of those ideas when they come calling. You’ll then have a library of ideas that you can delve into whenever you need inspiration.
Ready to create your library of ideas and design a content management system that is tailored to the needs of your clients? Book in a free call with me. I’m a total systems geek and I’d be happy to talk to you about systemising your business and freeing up your ideas.