How to generate good ideas to create content
Posted: Thu Jan 23, 2025 6:54 am
Where do ideas come from?
It’s a bit of a strange question, isn’t it? In ancient times, it was believed that real goddesses, called “muses,” were responsible for our creative inspiration. Today, creatives and content marketers need more than that. After all, they can’t afford to wait for their muse of inspiration to come along to do the work for them.
Generally, there are two different ways to generate content ideas:
On your own.
With a group of people.
Let's analyze each option a little more.
How to create ideas on your own
When generating content ideas on your own, there are four factors you need to consider:
What are the reading habits of your buyer personas?
What are your competitors doing?
What are people talking about on Quora?
What can you learn from your search engine optimization efforts?
Let's analyze each of these questions.
Understanding reading habits
Put yourself in your prospects’ shoes australia whatsapp lead empathize with them. What are their challenges and weaknesses? What do they read online and what do they learn about? Is there a specific blog or website they visit frequently?
If you can, try interviewing some of your best customers over the phone or by email and find out what their reading habits are. What do they like or dislike about your content?
It's easy to discover which contacts are most interested in your content through their contact records. Consider creating a smart list to identify:
– Contacts who visited specific content on your website (perhaps your most popular pages).
– Contacts who viewed a specific number of pages on your website (maybe more than 50).
Once you've identified a list of contacts, find out what they like about your content and what they'd like to learn more about.
Check out this article to learn more about creating a smart list in HubSpot .
Next, use a tool like Buzzsumo to see what content is performing best on social media. Simply type in a domain name and you'll get a list of pages, along with their results organized by social media channel.
For example, let’s say you’re writing content for a Boston real estate company. Type “ Boston real estate ” into Buzzsumo and look at the top results. You’ll find posts about how much it costs to live near Boston subway stops, what rising real estate prices mean for the area, and how much you need to make on average to afford a standard apartment. With a simple search, you can discover the most popular social media posts related to the Boston real estate market, and you can also get plenty of topic ideas that will help you optimize your content marketing.
Alternatively, you can go directly to the blog and search for the most popular posts.
Research your competitors
Another tactic you can use, especially if you’re not sure about your buyer personas’ reading habits, is to look at your competitors’ content marketing efforts. If you share a similar target audience, chances are the content that performs well on your competitors’ sites will also appeal to your prospects. See what they’re producing and what’s making a significant impact. Again, use Buzzsumo to take a quick look at their websites and see what content is performing well.
Check Quora
There are times when you may not be able to figure out what your audience is visiting online. In those cases, another approach to coming up with content generation ideas is to start with a set of keywords, such as “industry” or “profession.”
For example, let's say your audience consists of business development representatives. Head over to Quora, a popular question-and-answer site where anyone can ask a question and get answers from the community. While anyone can participate, moderators do a great job of limiting activity and keeping quality high.
It’s a bit of a strange question, isn’t it? In ancient times, it was believed that real goddesses, called “muses,” were responsible for our creative inspiration. Today, creatives and content marketers need more than that. After all, they can’t afford to wait for their muse of inspiration to come along to do the work for them.
Generally, there are two different ways to generate content ideas:
On your own.
With a group of people.
Let's analyze each option a little more.
How to create ideas on your own
When generating content ideas on your own, there are four factors you need to consider:
What are the reading habits of your buyer personas?
What are your competitors doing?
What are people talking about on Quora?
What can you learn from your search engine optimization efforts?
Let's analyze each of these questions.
Understanding reading habits
Put yourself in your prospects’ shoes australia whatsapp lead empathize with them. What are their challenges and weaknesses? What do they read online and what do they learn about? Is there a specific blog or website they visit frequently?
If you can, try interviewing some of your best customers over the phone or by email and find out what their reading habits are. What do they like or dislike about your content?
It's easy to discover which contacts are most interested in your content through their contact records. Consider creating a smart list to identify:
– Contacts who visited specific content on your website (perhaps your most popular pages).
– Contacts who viewed a specific number of pages on your website (maybe more than 50).
Once you've identified a list of contacts, find out what they like about your content and what they'd like to learn more about.
Check out this article to learn more about creating a smart list in HubSpot .
Next, use a tool like Buzzsumo to see what content is performing best on social media. Simply type in a domain name and you'll get a list of pages, along with their results organized by social media channel.
For example, let’s say you’re writing content for a Boston real estate company. Type “ Boston real estate ” into Buzzsumo and look at the top results. You’ll find posts about how much it costs to live near Boston subway stops, what rising real estate prices mean for the area, and how much you need to make on average to afford a standard apartment. With a simple search, you can discover the most popular social media posts related to the Boston real estate market, and you can also get plenty of topic ideas that will help you optimize your content marketing.
Alternatively, you can go directly to the blog and search for the most popular posts.
Research your competitors
Another tactic you can use, especially if you’re not sure about your buyer personas’ reading habits, is to look at your competitors’ content marketing efforts. If you share a similar target audience, chances are the content that performs well on your competitors’ sites will also appeal to your prospects. See what they’re producing and what’s making a significant impact. Again, use Buzzsumo to take a quick look at their websites and see what content is performing well.
Check Quora
There are times when you may not be able to figure out what your audience is visiting online. In those cases, another approach to coming up with content generation ideas is to start with a set of keywords, such as “industry” or “profession.”
For example, let's say your audience consists of business development representatives. Head over to Quora, a popular question-and-answer site where anyone can ask a question and get answers from the community. While anyone can participate, moderators do a great job of limiting activity and keeping quality high.