I’ve written about how great starting a blog can be for your freelance writing business. You can use a blog to promote yourself, develop a beat, make connections, improve your skills and if you’re lucky, pick up some paid gigs.
But sooner or later you’ll find yourself staring at the screen thinking, “What can I possibly write about today?” I’ve heard this recently from a couple of the 23 other freelance writers who’ve joined me in our May blogathon, where we’re all writing a post every day this month. While some people have no trouble posting something every day anyway, and some pro bloggers post many times a day, others are having a hard time coming up with ideas.
Here are 3 ways I come up with topics for blog posts:
React to news events related to my blog topic – In my case that means following news about the newspaper and magazine industry, online publishers or freelance writers.
Riff on what people are talking about – I connect with other freelance writers on blogs, Websites, LinkedIn and message boards and routinely get ideas for blog posts based on what they’re talking about.
Share lessons learned – I’ve been in the business in a while, I write a lot of service-type articles and I’ve taught journalism, so it’s a natural impulse to want to share what I know and love to do.
Here are two other places to go for inspiration on what to write about:
ProBlogger, one of my go-to sources for great tips on blogging, compiled a list of posts on how to write good posts, including a great one titled 7 Days to Rediscovering Your Blogging Groove, which includes suggestions such as writing a list, writing a review, answering a question and telling a story.
Joan Stewart, a publicity experts who blogs as The Publicity Hound, has some great ideas about what to write about in a post called Finding content for your blog is easy with these 19 ideas on Squidoo, a network of a half-million personal Websites.
Good ideas. Thanks.