Let’s Fill that Blog With Awesome Content

Remember your high school English teacher? The ol’ professor spouted lots of rules, but we can guarantee one thing he or she said was: write what you know. The same holds true for blogging – you must be at least familiar with your topic. There are a lot of things that you already do know and have an opinion about.

Five Ways to Find Your Blogging Voice

Here are some tips and questions that can help you to keep the creative juices flowing as your blog starts to take shape.

  1. What is your expertise? Readers want to read about what you know and your special experiences. Really!
  2. What’s the news? While you don’t have to necessarily be a new breaker, you can give your view on what happening in your industry and how it relates to your hobby, life, etc.
  3. What is your personality? Do you like to take a stance? Are you funny? Do you like being contrarian? These insights can help you to write about your topic.
  4. What are your hopes and fears? Things that you can’t stop thinking about or what keeps you up at night can be good things to share with others.
  5. What are your hobbies? Things that you like to do on your free time are often great topics to discuss.

Getting Inspiration

It’s scary to stare at a blank page or a blank screen – darn that writer’s block. Here are 5 tips to keep you inspired:

  1. Other Blogs. Follow others who write about your industry or topic of interest. While you can’t copy them, you can springboard off their ideas and add your special spin.
  2. Go Social. What are people saying on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+?
  3. Read Alot. Did you get anything interesting in your RSS reader, newspaper,  magazine,  emailbox? Anything that made you pause could be used to get you typing.
  4. Google Alerts. Get regular notifications on whatever you like to search on in your inbox.
  5. Post Types. Change up your repertoire from offering only text-based posts to adding podcasts or video in the mix.

Five Post Types to Consider

What posts are more likely to be read? There are no fast rules, but these types prove to be perennially popular:

  1. Top __ Reasons Why or Why Not … (list posts of any number are great)
  2. Q&A or Interviews (ask an expert from your industry)
  3. How I Use … (review a product, movie, book, technology, etc.)
  4. If I Were A … (put yourself in someone else’s shoes or imagine a new experience)
  5. Personal Posts (our humanness often endears audiences even more)

What Else?

Now that you have your topic, places you can go for inspiration, and some writing tips, it’s all up to you. Get blogging and keep at it!