Running short of blog topic ideas? Out of fresh ideas for writing? Here’s how to come up with unique blog topics and become a writing powerhouse.
Are you running short of ideas for your blogs or articles? Is generating fresh ideas for writing becoming difficult? These tips and techniques will help you overcome writer’s block and become a writing powerhouse.
1. Read… a lot!
Subscribe to a dozen newsletters on various subjects you are most interested in. Scan through the feeds every morning or at night and select a few articles for thorough reading.
After reading the articles, tag them using your own classification system. Classifying articles in different categories helps locate them quickly.
Alternatively, you can use Google's RSS reader for reading and tagging the RSS feeds. You will have access to your categorized articles from any computers connected to the Internet.
Subscribe to a few print magazines and read them regularly. After you finish reading an article, record the main points of the article in a Google note so you can access them anywhere you go.
2. Take a creative writing course
In addition to improving your writing skills, doing a creative writing course can teach you how to make your writing more creative, which will make you a better writer overall.
When you do a creative writing course online, you’ll learn creativity exercises and ways to come up with unique ideas or combine old ideas in new ways.
These practices will help you improve your creative writing skills and set your artistic expression free so you can become a powerhouse writer.
3. Capture inspiration wherever you go
Take pictures of interesting places, events, and moments you come across in your daily life. Record an idea using your Smartphone audio the moment it hits you.
Use the time you spend driving or exercising on a treadmill, to think about your favourite topics and try to relate them to things you observe. When you get an idea, record it on your Smartphone.
Every night, transfer the ideas from your Smartphone to your Google notes and upload your pictures to your favourite photo storage service.
Go through all the ideas and articles you have recorded in Google notes and your RSS reader to create new ideas by coming up with a new twist.
Combine two or more ideas and change or improve on an existing idea to come up with unique blog topics and ideas.
4. Leverage the wisdom of the crowd
Scan through comments posted on the online articles you read regularly. Record interesting ideas, pros and cons of an issue, and strong opinions posted by others. Leverage the wisdom of the crowd.
Have lunch with friends at least once a week. Bounce ideas off them on any topic. Merge ideas from divergent topics to create new ideas in your own domain.
5. Use online writing tools
You can find a number of online tools such as BuzzSumo, AnswerThePublic, and even SEO content writing tools for writing inspiration.
You’ll definitely find a few gold nuggets that can serve as springboards for new ideas for your blog posts.
6. Analyse data for patterns
If you’re good at using data for analysis and comfortable with using spreadsheets, draw charts in the spreadsheet and look for patterns in the data.
Provide your own interpretation of the data and use the charts and graphs to illustrate your articles to create deep research or opinion-forming content that meets high-quality journalism ethics and standards.
7. Do it differently
Ask yourself what if, what else, and why not questions on an issue and search the Internet to find answers from different sources. See if you can present the idea in a different way or come up with a new angle.
Create new ideas generated from existing materials, write a step-by-step guide on an obvious idea, or list the benefits of an old idea.