Content brands live and die based on your ability to come up with content ideas. The more ideas you come up with, the easier it is to create content uninterrupted. However, as we create more pieces of content, it becomes more difficult to think of additional content ideas.
Many content creators don’t want to talk about the same thing twice, and as they cover more ground, there are fewer unique topics left to cover. If you always have more than enough ideas, you’ll avoid the stress associated with a lack of content ideas and rushing content so you maintain consistent.
Once a week, you should pick a day to come up enough content ideas to cover an entire month. As you think about new content ideas, here are some resources you can seek out to fuel your idea generation.
#1: Listen To Podcasts
Not only can you learn a lot by listening to podcasts, but you can also come up with great content ideas. Any part of the conversation can spark a new idea, and in longer episodes, you’re bound to come across multiple content ideas.
Every part of the conversation has the potential to yield great content ideas. Whether the guest is sharing strategies or the host is sharing a personal story, each conversation presents the opportunity to come up with your next blog post, video, or episode.
#2: Read Books
The most successful authors tend to be voracious readers. Similar to a podcast episode, books provide an array of ideas and concepts. The great thing about a book is that you can look at the table of contents to get an idea of what will get covered.
Sometimes, I’ll browse on Amazon and read through the table of contents rather than actually buy the book. This helps me come up with additional content ideas. If I like the table of contents, I’ll get the book through Kindle Unlimited and start reading through it.
Each page has a new content idea waiting to be discovered. If you think like a content creator rather than just as a reader, it will be easier for you to find those ideas. Don’t be afraid to underline or write in the book you’re reading so you can go back to the notes later.
As a bonus, if you’re browning for books on Amazon, read through the book reviews. You’ll get a better idea of what readers like and don’t like about the book, and these reviews can help you come up with better content ideas.
#3: Watch Videos
While this is similar to the other two strategies, video is the most engaging form of content. Furthermore, if you’re watching videos on a place like YouTube, you can read through the comments for additional ideas.
On some websites, the comments are actually better than the original content (I personally learn a lot from Seeking Alpha comments). Some people prefer to watch videos while others prefer reading content or listening to it. You can incorporate multiple content formats when coming up with ideas or choose the one that best works for you.
#4: Browse Through Quora
Quora is a site where people ask questions they want the answers to. While this sounds simplistic, the entire concept of this platform presents a gold mine for content creators. You can search “social media marketing” on Quora and see what questions people are currently asking about the topic. These questions can form the baseline for your next piece of content.
If you already have an audience, you can similarly ask them what they want you to create content about next. I use a combination of an open ended question and a poll to figure out what my audience wants.
Regardless of whether you have an audience or not, Quora is a great place to find potential content ideas because people asking questions on that platform are telling you exactly what they want.
#5: Look At Your Popular Pieces
Coming up with content ideas isn’t just about writing a list of ideas. It’s about writing a list of ideas that have a shot at gaining traction and resonating with your audience.
Looking at your most successful pieces will help you come up with ideas that can have similar success. When I saw that my most popular YouTube videos were about investing, I decided to take the leap and create more investing videos on my channel.
That decision significantly accelerated the channel’s growth and I am excited to see what it will look like a year from now. The more content you produce, the better understanding you’ll have of which topics resonate with your audience the most.
#6: Write About Personal Experiences
When you include personal experiences in your writing, your potential content ideas greatly multiplies. Personal experiences also help you build a deeper relationship between you and your audience.
When someone shares a personal experience, it more deeply connects that person with the people who hear their story. Not all personal experiences are enjoyable to write about. This doesn’t mean writing a list of all of the traumatic experiences in your life and turning them all into blog posts.
You can most certainly some of those experiences and turn them into blog posts, but even a mundane day can hold exciting content ideas if you know where to look and how to present your ideas.
#7: Use The Socratic Questioning Method
You can get ideas from the previous content you published. View each piece of content you published (or are working on) as a beginner. What questions would you ask? What would you want to know about the topic if you were starting fresh?
Content creators often forget their audiences don’t know as much as them. It’s easy to believe that as you level up your knowledge, your audience has leveled up their knowledge at the same pace.
Just because you know something that you see as obvious doesn’t mean most people in your audience will see it in the same way. In my investing videos, I often talk about the P/S ratio because that’s a metric for growth investors to determine if a stock is overvalued or undervalued.
However, I say the entire word (price-to-sales ratio) rather than just saying P/S ratio because not everyone in my audience knows about that ratio.
When you act like a beginner, you’ll find new content ideas. This goes well beyond just saying the entire word rather than an acronym. The more questions you ask, the more ideas you’ll end up with.
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