You want to create content that appeals to your buyer personas, but how will you go about coming up with attention-grabbing blog topics? You will need to discover the pain points of your buyer personas and come up with topics that address those. Easier said than done; I know. You have so many other tasks on your todo list and you just can't seem to come up with a great blog topic. No need to raise the white flag and surrender because your creativity has run dry, there are ways to spark topic ideas.
Running out of content ideas can happen to anyone. I have experienced it countless times with my personal travel blog and other projects. When this happens, it's useful to utilize a few blogging tricks to mine ideas that might be hiding from you. Would you like to know what these tricks are? Of course, you do! Here are five ways to refill your creativity bucket so you can generate valuable blog topic ideas for your target customers.
1. Breathe New Life into Older Content
If you've been blogging for your business for a while, then you most likely have some content that is out-of-date or needs to be refreshed. Giving old content a reboot is like a slumping sports star being traded to a new team and all of a sudden their career is reenergized. The player just needed a new environment in which to thrive. Your old content can perform the same way.
To hit the refresh button on your old content, change parts of your old blog post that can be improved on or updated with more recent information. It could be new references or better external links that point to more relevant statistics. Have your opinions on this topic changed over time? If so, take your old thoughts, get rid of them, and inject your new opinions. Do you know more about your industry or the particular topic now since the time you wrote the original post? Add that new insight into the post and republish it as new content.
2. Scan Industry Websites, Blogs, and News Trends
The internet is filled with other blogs, websites, and new stories about your industry, do a search for it to see what others are writing about. Just scanning the headlines in the search results can spark an idea for a new post. I use this content generating trick a lot. Set up a feed reader of important blogs that are dedicated to your business industry. You'll be able to scan through what's happening and spot trends your target audience should know about. Do you sell cars and a big recall was just announced? That's trending news and something worthy of a blog post. Do you disagree with what a particular blogger said about a topic? Write a post refuting those ideas and link back to the original content that spurred your opinion.
3. Write a Personal Introspective Post
Building trust with your readers/customers is one of the most important things you can do as a business. One of the best ways to do that is to show them that you are human. That's why writing a more personal blog post will help people feel more connected to you and you brand.
For example, if your business sells cookware you could write a blog post about "The best recipes for falling in love." In this story, you can inject a little personal feeling by touching on how you once fell in love over this particular dish. Adding personal flare might not work for every industry, but you'll be surprised by how often this can and does work. You have life experiences, just find a clever way to weave them into your content to make it successful.
4. Read Print Publications
Print media is not dead. There are still plenty of great magazines out there that relate to your industry, business in general, or consumer trends. While popularity in print media is fading, the writers for these publications are still professionals that state their own opinions. You can use those opinions to create content and provide your take on the subject.
5. Write a Round-Up Post or Series
A Round-Up post is a list of other posts that people might find useful and interesting. Remember all those other industry blogs that I suggested for you to follow for ideas in #2? Well, these blogs have great content that your readers are likely also interested in. You can use these other blogs, curate it, and write a Round-up post. By doing this, you won't have to create a lot of writing yourself. Although it is always best to say a few words and lead people into why you chose to include each particular blog post on your list. I do this weekly on my personal travel blog with great results.
It's good to keep in mind that a blog is not just about creating content, it's about being part of a community and engaging with other industry thought leaders. This interaction with other bloggers can earn you inbound links and help your site's SEO in the process. Creating a Round-Up post helps accomplish this. Other bloggers will see the incoming links from you, becoming more familiar with your brand and hopefully link back to you in their content.
Creating remarkable content consistently is hard work, and it takes time. Constantly coming up with fresh and interesting blog topics can be a difficult task. You're creativity simply dries up and you're stuck staring at a blank screen. Don't fall into this hole, use the above tips to stir the waters of creativity and put words on the screen. For more information about business blogging, download our free headline swipe file. It will help give you some great blog topic ideas.
If you've been creating and writing blog content for any amount of time you'll sometimes find it difficult to come up with new blog topics.