How Do I Find My Topic?

When writing content for your blog, it can become overwhelming at times regarding the subject of topic. For example, if you are an eCommerce site selling Blue Widgets and need to produce 8 on-site articles monthly (to drive traffic to your site and engage prospective customers to make a purchase), how do you curate content to talk about the blue widgets without becoming repetitive and boring? Let’s take a look at 3 ways to help you find the right topic:

Brainstorming

First and foremost, set aside a 30 minute window of time and do the following:

  • Free your environment from noise, interruptions and distraction.
  • Set a timer for 30 minutes.
  • Open a Word doc. or Notepad for brainstorming.
  • Research/Explore Competitors blogs or articles related to your business (The internet is a regurgitation of the same ideas over and over again, the key is to brand the idea with your unique insight and additions to the subject).
  • Visit social media venues of your competitors to see what they are sharing or tweeting about.
  • Begin typing ideas.
  • Be as specific as possible.

It may benefit you to have a list of questions applicable to your niche that you can ask yourself and answer during this time to help you with your ideas.

Some ideas for valid questions in helping you get started are as followed:

  1. What makes your product/idea the best?
  2. What mistakes do people make within your industry?
  3. What are the biggest challenges your industry faces?
  4. What constitutes as success in your industry?
  5. Who is your biggest competition or the most successful in your industry?
  6. What is the biggest or most current news within your industry?
  7. Can you share a success story from your personal business and relate it to the industry?
  8. What skills are required for someone to achieve success in your industry?
  9. What tools must you utilize to achieve getting the job done?
  10. How, when and where do you do your best work?
  11. What are the most enjoyable aspects of being in your field of work?
  12. What changes are happening in your industry?
  13. What practices have you perfected in your field of work?

Discover What’s Buzzing

Another helpful resource is Buzzsumo. Buzzsumo is a free website that allows for you to explore topics that are relevant to your business and discover which of these topics receives the most attention with social shares.

After you have gained a better understanding of what articles are receiving the most attention within your industry, it would benefit you to curate content around those same topics. Naturally, the idea is for you to add to the topic. Do not duplicate the content verbatim or plagiarize. If you find quotes that are useful to you within the article, be sure to acknowledge that you are quoting someone and properly cite them.

Check Your Analytics

google-analytics-logoIf you are not already using Google Analytics to track your site, register your site now. It is a free tool available for you that benefits your business in a plethora of ways including: knowing your audience, seeing what they are up to and tracing their traffic or path.

After you can access your website’s data through Google Analytics, visit the content tab to see which pieces of content are doing well on your site and which ones are doing poorly. Discover which topics are working for you and then brainstorm ideas around that content with other aspects to the topic and fresh titles for the articles.

Once you implement this trio of help for finding topics and creating content around them, you should discover an increase of traffic to your site’s blog or news section. In addition, social media shares on major venues will help get your brand out there. Two final words of advice for ensuring these measures help your content marketing strategy are as followed:

  1. Be sure and know the Optimal Length for content on social media venues. This is with regard to the Tweet characters, Facebook posts etc.. (not the actual content piece you are sharing on social sites).
  2. Be aware of the best times to post your content on all social media venues. Times for posting on Twitter, Facebook and Reddit vary. Do your research before posting, to best optimize your content being seen, followed and shared.

Google loves content. Be consistent with your content publications and social shares. Be creative, informative and innovative. This will ensure that the articles are relevant and of good quality.