As a blogging newbie, you probably look up to a few bloggers/influencers that made it in the industry. And you have probably checked out their content more times than you would like to admit so you can see which topics they cover and what their writing style is.
When you were going through their posts, how did you feel? A bit uncomfortable, like you are not at that “blogging level”? Have you thought to yourself, “Oh, man, how do they get inspiration to write all these articles? Where do they get their blog post ideas? I wish I was that imaginative”?
If you have felt this, the first thing you need to do is stop telling yourself that you can never be like them. Believe it or not, the bloggers you admire are not that creative; they just know how and where to find ideas for their blog posts. Since they have experience (some of them have probably been blogging for years), they also know which types of posts perform the best and when the best time to publish such articles is.
And you can be good at all of this, too. You just need a bit of patience and practice.
The first step you need to do is learn how to get blog post ideas. And we can help you out.
In the following text, we wrote the top three ways that can help you get inspiration for your blog posts in no-time:
Browse for answers on Quora
Quora is definitely the place to get blog post ideas.
If you have never heard of Quora (which we, honestly, doubt that), all you need to know is that it is a website where people ask questions and experts (or anyone who knows a bit more than an average person about a particular topic) answer them.
Now, when it comes to using Quora to get blog post ideas, the trick is to turn Quora questions into blog post titles. Here’s how.
First, you’ll need to access Quora, which means that you’ll need to log in using your Google or Facebook account.
Next, once you are logged in, you should search for Quora “Topics”. Topics categorize content on Quora 一 they are like tags that describe the subjects of the questions. You can follow particular Topics if you want to see the content related to those Topics in your Quora feed first. If you are not sure what we mean, here’s an example: a fashion blogger can follow Topics like Fashion Blogging, Beauty and Fashion blog, Dresses, etc.
Third, once you feel like you follow the right Topics, browse through the Questions in each Topic. The goal is to find questions from which you can draw inspiration from, and ultimately, turn those questions into blog post titles.
Seems pretty easy, right? But there’s a catch.
You don’t want to find just any questions. You want to find the ones that can be turned into articles your target audience would be interested in reading. So, to find engaging and relevant questions, be sure to click the “…” icon and then click on the View Stats and Log. By doing so, you’ll see how many people followed the question, how many people viewed the question, and when the question was last followed. If you feel like the question does not interest that many people (it has 2 or 3 followers) or hasn’t been followed since 2009, skip it altogether and move onto some other. If, however, the question is followed by dozens or hundreds of people and is still relevant, it can be turned into a blog post title.
Once you feel like you have found the right questions, open them in new tabs. Then, go to your Google Drive and create a new Google Spreadsheet. In that spreadsheet, add four columns 一 one for the link to the question, one for the number of question followers, one for the number of views, and one for the “Last followed” section. Copy link of each question you find of value and fill in the rest of the rows with necessary parameters. From this step on, all that is left to do is perform keyword research, which you will include in the post title, and you can start writing the articles. It’s as simple as that.
Bonus tip: There is so much to Quora than just finding blog post ideas. You can use Quora to promote your articles. If you want to dabble into Quora Quora promotion, be sure to check the post on Discruptiveadvertising.com or the one on Adweek.com.
Find what people discuss about on Reddit
You can use Reddit pretty much the same as you would use Quora.
Once you create a Reddit account, you can join several Reddit communities that are related to your industry and blog niche to see what interests people in each community. Once you see what the most discussed topics are, you can write them down, do keyword research, and start writing blog posts. So, for example, if you are a fashion blogger, you can join the Female Fashion Advice community and see the questions and posts people share in there.
Bonus tip: Before you get to redditting, keep in mind that the good people of Reddit HATE spam. So, before you join a community, be sure to read each community’s rules and guidelines if you don’t want to get banned.
Keep an eye on your peers’ blog post comments
First, let’s get one thing out of the way: checking out your peers’ blog post comments is NOT considered spying or stealing. It’s called “finding inspiration for your next post”.
Here’s what we mean by that.
Let’s imagine that you are a new food blogger and that you have written a couple of articles, but are not sure whether the topics are attention-grabbing enough. At the moment, you are thinking about covering a classic American dessert and putting a twist on it. Still, you are not sure if the topic is intriguing enough. You feel like you need some fresh blog post ideas to get you on the right track.
Being a smart blogger you are, you decide to visit your competitors’ blogs to see what they are writing about. In your search, you bump into a fellow blogger, let’s name her Susan, who wrote an article on how to make a mouth-watering chocolate fudge cake.
At that moment, you are faced with two options.
The first option is to stop your search for inspiration right there, steal the blog post title, and write an article that covers all the steps to making a chocolate fudge. That would be a classic rookie mistake. Or, you could scroll down the post and look for the comments section.
Now, let’s imagine that you chose the second option (yay for you!) and that you bumped into a comment from a girl named Jenny. In that comment, Jenny mentioned that she would LOVE to read a “healthier version” of the posted recipe. She also mentioned that she tried to make the gluten-free and dairy-free chocolate fudge cake herself. Still, the cake simply wasn’t as delicious and rich in flavor as the original, “unhealthy” version.
And there’s your window of opportunity!
Why not try to make and bake the healthy chocolate fudge cake yourself, and once you perfect the recipe, post it on your blog? We bet Jenny would be interested in reading it. And some of Jenny’s friends. And friends of Jenny’s friends.
So, next time you feel uninspired, be sure to check some of the posts your fellow bloggers wrote a couple of weeks/months ago. Go straight to the post comments to see what readers had to say about the article. Somewhere in those comments, you should be able to find blog post ideas.
To conclude
These were the three super easy ways that can help you get blog post ideas.
We hope you found them helpful.
Let us know in the comments down below which techniques you use to get ideas for your article titles.
