Apart from the need to write blog posts, most bloggers have the “idea generating” problem. It’s hard to keep coming up with ideas for topics and to stretch that idea into a full-blown blog post. It’s not impossible either. It’s just hard work and there are ways to come up ideas in advance.
Here are some great ways to come up with inspiration and ideas for your blog posts:
Mention popular bloggers
As long as the human ego exists, this approach to finding blog post ideas will never go out of fashion. Find popular bloggers – with at least one unique aspect to their business, blogging, writing, style, or approach – and mention them. Obviously, you’ll find groups of bloggers with something in common between them. Some ideas could be:
- 6 Top SEO Consultants Who Blog Incessantly
- 7 Accountants that beat the “Accountant” Stereotype
- 11 Stylish Backpackers With Million-Dollar Potential
Seek and feature upcoming bloggers
Mentioning popular bloggers is good but these are usually shots in the dark as most of them don’t respond, link back, or even acknowledge your efforts to mention them in your blog post. Yet, the effort is worth it.
If you want some traction, exposure, and instant love mention the not-so-popular bloggers – the kinds who aren’t Darren Rowse, Chris Brogan, or Seth Godin. They have the potential to make an impact. They also do everything that successful bloggers do: they post regularly, they are active on social media, they provide you precious backlinks, and they are highly receptive to mentions.
A few ideas for blog posts to target upcoming bloggers could be:
- 8 Bloggers You Never Heard of, But You Should
- Blogging Underdogs: 6 Bloggers Who Are Unknown But They Still Make an Impact
- 8 Charitable Bloggers Who Blog With Passion
- 10 Bloggers, Each With 10 Respective Reasons To Blog
For finding bloggers, you could use any of the niche directories, blogging directories, Technorati, and even Google’s own “Blog Search Function”.
Forget word limits. Produce lists: Really Long Ones
The web is awash with advice on the proper length of posts.
Here’s the final word on it: the length of blog posts should be proportionate to the intent, depth, and the actual message you’d like to communicate. You can’t possibly limit your blogging to word limits.
Passion knows no limits. As long as you message has intent, purpose, and charm, it can be as lengthy or short as it can get.
As for lists, you can’t create a list of 50 Greatest Books Published in 2013 in 350-600 words. Either you won’t be able to cram in 50 books into the list or you won’t be able to explain what makes each entry great and worth mentioning.
Do set overall guidelines for word limits such as 600, 1200, 1800, and never more than 2000 words for a single blog post. Craft your blog post within this generous word limit, if you have to.
If you have to create a list, produce a long one. Short ones are not as inspiring as long ones. Further, it’s not about the number really. It’s about how you justify each entry into the list. You need to do the balancing act.
Step on toes; but justify your stand
Blogging is popular because it gives you the freedom to express devoid of any bias, editorial restrictions, and fear.
Literally, what that means is that you can take on anyone on the blogosphere. Link to a blog post you don’t agree with and write out another post about why you don’t agree. Pick up 11 tips (or choose your number) – each from a different person while on the same topic and come with justifiable responses to disagree with each of those tips. Here are some example topic ideas:
- 8 Tips From Reputed Social Media Gurus That Just Don’t Cut It
- 7 Blogging Tips From Veteran Bloggers You Should Unlearn Today
- Be On Guard: 8 Sleazy Tactics Internet Marketers Deploy
Keep on top of trends
For most people, keeping up with the trends is just to read up on the news; it’s just to know. Catching up with the trends, absorbing information, and reading news takes a different meaning for bloggers: they do need ideas and they need news, books, trends, articles, posts, and features published elsewhere on the web. Yet, bloggers have their tasks cut out for them. It’s not just about reading; it’s about reading with a purpose.
For bloggers, it’s always about trying to put all that they read together in groups.
For instance, let’s assume that you blog about mobile apps. TechCrunch publishes a post on a new app. Readwrite.com has a list of apps every entrepreneur should use. You’d get similar updates from four other different sources on apps, of course. Your job isn’t to read and move on.Instead, you’ll collect the names of each of these apps and collect them in a single document. Once you get a sizable number of apps, you can publish that as a post.
Depending on your niche, blogging topics can be created just by curating content or using research from various sources that publish new trends, news, etc.
Just Ask
In the chaos that publishing can be, we usually forget the basics. One of the best ways to come up with topic ideas is to “ask” your readers. Plenty of widgets are available that help you to capture what your readers would like you to write about. You can also ask questions directly on websites such as Yahoo Answers, Quora, and other Q & A sites or forums.
Collaborate and Brainstorm
Some blogs grow up to a stage where there are usually a team of writers who collaborate and work together with a supervising editor or content manager. While individual bloggers don’t have the luxury of brainstorming (except with themselves), small and large teams have an advantage: make blogging a collaborative exercise.
Why take the trouble to come up with blog topic ideas on your own? Why not let a few members of staff – with a penchant to write and express their opinions – write up blog posts on anything relevant to the blog? Perhaps you can even plan for growth – complete with a team of writers — even before you plan to have a website?
Using any of the online collaboration tools or Google Docs, you can collect great ideas for future blog posts. Of course, you might have to choose, select, discard, and rework the actual titles but the idea is to collaborate with teams.
No matter which idea or approach you take, here are some fundamentals that didn’t change: Publish regularly, post great content, promote your content, and respond to any comments or questions.
How do you find your ideas?
About Pratik Dholakiya
Twitter: vagish
says:
Do you not find that people will leave your website and go to the other bloggers site if you start mentioning them? Or do you find other bloggers in difference niches because that would mean you wouldn’t be losing readership?
Vagish recently posted..Arcade Machine with a Touch – Apex Touch
If you want to make money from blogging then it isn’t as easy as it might look. For a start, you will have to come up with a number of blog ideas. When I first started my journey to make money from blogging I realized that there were so many different niches out there that I was going to have a hard time finding one and sticking to it! anbos
Twitter: mchhimwal
says:
Hi
Without any ideas there is nothing.When we talk about blogging,then the role of new innovative ideas becomes more important.Problem is when we are in the stage of blanks in ideas.For such times your tips and ideas for “generating ideas’ .Thanks for nice sharing.
Mahendra Chhimwal recently posted..Best free messaging apps for smartphones
I’d never heard of ignoring word limits, although I never took them too seriously to begin with. I support the Q&A idea, I always ask my readers what they need to know about and try my best to inform them.
Luis recently posted..Responsive Design Español
You have a point Luis! Word limit should always be taken into consideration. Asking your readers on what they need to know is also a good idea. Thanks for sharing this technique – this is worth trying!
Twitter: brokerhollywood
says:
For me finding the best blog ideas is sometimes as easy as just getting off the couch and taking a walk out into the world :) Sometimes I get great ideas by going to a shopping center or home improvement store. Other times I find inspiration when I take my child to the Library. Browsing the Library is surprising sometimes. Give it a try if you haven’t in a while :)
silver lake realtor recently posted..Short Sale Process is expedited by Bank of America
Thanks for the great blog ideas.
I have recently just been using my readers as inspiration and then always targeted my long list of long-tail keywords lol.
Corey Will recently posted..Make Money Affiliate Marketing in 2013
Twitter: JcheddaLayGiri
says:
I would say SPOT ON!!! this was a great article, i especially like the part about “Step on toes but justify your stand”.. great stuff
Twitter: Ajayudayagiri
says:
I like the idea of mentioning unpopular blogger which lets them give a link back to our site. Moreover, it makes an awesome blog-post idea. The audience interested in the Bloggers we mentioned reads our post and may even subscribe to our blog. So, this type of posts may have a lot of impact.
Ajay recently posted..Samsung Galaxy S4 Release Date, Specs And Price | A detailed Review
Hey Pratik,
Nice post and I am totally agree with you that whatever the idea we choose, the basic of blogging will never be change as we have to update our blog regularly, make links with other blog and we have to respond every comment. Thanks for sharing this post.
Sudipto recently posted..Best Love Stories Of All Time
Twitter: Rohitkabdwal
says:
great Pratik article
in my opinion, when one gets a topic to write about then the world limits comes into action.
nobody knows the exact world limit to have good seo but. as i think about it and as you’ve already said that limiting your ideas into words is not good. so “forget the word limit”. :)
very nice article :)
Rohit recently posted..Addressing modes of 8086 microprocessor
I was very happy to have found this site. I wanted to thank you for this excellent post. I definitely enjoyed every little bit of it and I have you bookmarked to check out new stuff you post in the future.
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Twitter: ashish_therao
says:
i m talk with my friends for blog ideas by this great tips now i m also get some more interasting idea
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Twitter: asad357
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Twitter: konalkop
says:
Thank you for sharing very useful tips. I have had many troubles when finding content for my new blogs. I’ll follow your tip and hope it will work
Great i really like the idea of really long list. i think bigger the list, more keywords covered up and more search traffic coming in
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Twitter: viet_nam_brand
says:
Very good post. I have enjoyed and benefited very much. I hope such post more and more. Thanks to author.
Twitter: howzzzdat
says:
I always look at Google trends and post article related to that topic. This helps me a lot as search volume is quite high and there isn’t much content available on that particular topic.
Rinkesh recently posted..Deforestation
Twitter: buzzingmyreview
says:
Hi,
Thanks for great article . I am actually newbee and much to learn . I sometimes get bored and at that time inspiring post really motivates me , I check popular blogs in my niche ,read there life story , get inspired and i again start blogging. So inspiration to blog is the key to success .. :)
Regards
Shan
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Twitter: arunGudelli
says:
If the niche is technology we have to do lot of research(forums reading,following popular blogs) as Most of the bloggers writes about technology.Great Post Pratik. Thanks for sharing…
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Twitter: keepmyID
says:
These all tips are really admirable and will they give me lots of idea about way of blogging, it will helps to maintain my blog. Thanks for such nice post.
Twitter: LakeCableAnimal
says:
Unfortunately, inspiration is not one of those things that you can control at the snap of a finger. I do recommend planning ahead. Make a list of “someday topics.” As in, I can’t or don’t want to write about it know but someday down the road I might. Then you have them handy when you have deadlines to meet and posts to write.
Vet Canton OH recently posted..Hello world!
Hi, Pratik! Great post. When I lack inspiration I check what people talk on forums and based on most popular threads, I write articles.