Get your mojo back with these 50 blog post ideas.
Let’s face it, sometimes you run out of blog post ideas. You’re stuck and you find inspiration has left you. Maybe it’s time to take a break and find a liminal space to regain your creativity. Go for a walk or meet up with someone who lifts your spirits.
And when you come back refreshed here’s a list of ideas to get you moving again and writing some shareable content that will move you and your business forward.
1. Reviews and recommendations. What product or service have you used recently that you would recommend to your customers or clients? You could even get something for free to review if you share a targeted audience with a supplier.
2. Guest posts from other bloggers. You may need to blog for a while and make an impact before this happens but there is mutual benefit in asking people whose opinion you respect to come up with some blog post ideas and write something for you.
3. Sponsored posts. This is content that someone else writes and pays for. Once your blog gets established you can expect some unsolicited emails asking you to publish content on your blog. This can be a good source of income and blog post content but be aware of the pitfalls. This post on sponsored links will help you.
4. Infographics. You can either make these yourself or you can search for them to find ones that allow you to repost on your blog. Add value by sharing your viewpoint. See my post on Infographics and this Infographic on blog content for other blog post ideas.
5. Podcasts. I was once told that a microphone that plugs into your computer is actually a cash machine! It depends on your audience but podcasts are a popular way of consuming content on the move with smartphones and tablet options. Many devices have inbuilt microphones and recording software with which you can create a podcast and share as a blog post.
6. Videos (Vlog). Re-purpose an old blog post into a ‘talking head’ video.
7. Screencast. Invest in screencast software to share presentations, webinars or training videos.
8. Images. Not just any old image but something that showcases your products or services. For example, products being used, how products are made, galleries of your displays. Think video options here too.
9. Competitions. Everyone likes to win free stuff. The cinema company Odeon just did an easy-to-enter competition on Instagram. Their first 60k followers got 6 free tickets. I did something similar on Twitter for one of my first 100 followers on Twitter to win a free consultation. You can do the same with a blog post and get another post by publishing who the winner was and sharing their feedback.
10. Giveaways. As in competitions, make it easy for people.
11. Events. Those you put on and those you attend. This is again two blog post ideas. If you are putting on a workshop, event or conference promote it on your blog. If you attend an interesting event that potential and existing clients would be interested in, write a blog post giving your opinion and sharing the most interesting aspects of the event.
12. Introduce products and services you sell. Highlight the value of your products and services by explaining the benefits of using them.
13. People. Your team, your suppliers, your business partners. People like to get to know you and often they feel they know you better and rate you more highly if they know who you rub shoulders with. Imagine you’re attending a prestigious event and you walk in with two well-known people on either side of you. People will recognise who you’re with and they will be also wondering who you are!
14. Locations. Where you work, where you sell from, shops that sell your stuff, where you put on events.
15. Customers. Profile your best and most loyal customers. Ask them why they do business with you.
16. Testimonials. There’s no shame in sharing great feedback when you have delighted a customer. Lidl’s latest advertising #lidlsurprises has been very effective. They don’t shout about themselves. They let their customers do it.
17. Tips and techniques. Useful ways of doing stuff.
18. Helps, Hints, Hurrahs and Horrors. What has helped you in your business and who has given you good hints? What have been the high and low points in your business?
19. Common mistakes. Help your followers by pointing out the traps they may fall into.
20. Industry news.
21. Your news. What’s happening in your business?
22. Competitor news and information.
23. Innovations. What’s new in your field?
24. Trends and predictions. What’s your opinion on how your market is going to change in the future?
25. Challenge your readers. There are always New Year blog challenges that ask you to write a blog a day. How about a challenge suitable for your audience?
26. Awards for contributions. Acknowledge and reward people for being engaged. Who’s contributed to your blog the most, made the best comment, had great conversations with you on Twitter or given the best feedback which has helped you improve your business?
27. Themed posts. Word to the Wise, readers’ tips, Through the Keyhole.
28. Unusual uses for your product or service. Do your customers use your product or service in an unusual way?
29, Seasonal post. Does the weather or season make a difference to your service. Are there anniversaries related to your business? (Freelancers day, local shopping day, home workers day etc).
30. TV programmes related to what you do.
31. Special offers and promotions.
32. Series of posts on one subject. Sometimes when you write a post it suddenly blooms into a much longer piece. Rather than present it as one long post consider making the most of the content and run a series of posts.
33. Thought leaders or celebrities in your industry. Talk about someone who is a leader in your industry and give your thoughts about how they got there and what makes them stand out.
34. Offline media. Read newspaper and magazine columns for inspiration.
35. Press mentions, social media mentions, PR pieces. If you’ve appeared in the news or in a newsfeed tell people your story about how it happened.
36. Case studies and stories.
37. How to ….
38. Lists. Checklists, lists of people, top 10, best of the bunch, 5 steps to achieve something etc.
39. Viral videos. Post them on your blog or have a go at creating your own. Mirabeau Wine did a video about how to open a bottle of wine when you don’t have a corkscrew. As you can see on YouTube it got a huge response with over 9 million views. You can’t predict what’s going to go viral but you have to be in it to win it! Think about what problems you solve for your customers.
40. Quotes. You may cringe at the mention of quotes as they are churned out incessantly on social media. However there are some great lesser-known quotes that you can use as a basis for a blog post.
Never eat more than you can lift. – Miss Piggy
41. Comment on what someone has said. Has someone come out with something controversial that affects your business or your customers? My partner Judy, who writes a blog about working from home, picked up a Boris Johnson quote about home working during the Olympics. He allegedly said ‘Some people will see the Games as an opportunity to work from home, in inverted commas. We all know that is basically sitting wondering whether to go down to the fridge to hack off that bit of cheese before checking your emails again. I don’t want to see too many of us doing that.’ She responded with a blog post giving her opinion.
42. External market forces which affect your business. These include political, economic, social, technological, environmental or legal issues. A current political/economic issue is the new European VAT rules that mean if you sell online information products you have to calculate VAT for the end consumers’ country. A complete mess which will affect many micro businesses selling globally.
43. Internal market issues. What new entrants are moving into your market? Who are the new kids on the block in the way of alternatives to your product or service?
44. Why you? What are your unique buying points?
45. Look at other people’s blogs. Use their blog post ideas and make them relevant to your own business.
46. Surveys.
47. Interviews. This is one of the simplest blog post ideas. First, find someone interesting. It can be someone you already know or someone you don’t know yet but would like to develop a relationship with. Ask them if they would be willing to answer a few questions via email for your blog. Send them the email. Write a blog post using their answers. Voila! Another blog post and potentially the start of a beautiful business relationship. The other benefit is that your interviewee is likely to promote your post to their followers. A double whammy.
48. Ask a question, answer it and encourage your visitors to respond. Make it a bit controversial to provoke a response.
49. FAQs. What questions get asked most by your customers?
50. Best practice. For instance here’s my piece on best practice for using WordPress.
That should keep you going for a while!
And as a bonus why not check out this infographic, ’22 ways to create compelling content’, for more blog post ideas.
I hope you enjoyed this list of blog post ideas and that you can use some or all of them. Print out this blog post ideas checklist and use it as a prompt whenever you lose the plot.
What blog post ideas have you got? It would be great to expand the list so please feel free to chip in.
Top photo by Cathryn Lavery on Unsplash
Giveaways and interviews posts will really make people read them… i am planning to start these two post types on my blog next month…