4 Ways to Come Up With Content Ideas Quickly 

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

 Are you stuck in terms of content? Are you also tired of reading some blog with a title like “50 Different Ways to Come Up With Content” because you don’t have time to read something that long? Me too. 

 

As a professional content creator at our web design agency in Los Angeles, I have to come up with content all the time. Speaking of “time,” I have neither the time to read “1000 Ideas to Come Up With Content” nor do I have the time to be out of ideas. 

 

These are four ideas that work for me when no other ideas will work for me. My guess is they’ll work for you, too. 

 

Ask Yourself the Right Questions 

 

What are your customers struggling with right now and how can you provide solutions? Asking yourself that question can’t go wrong. Really. If you’re able to answer that, then you’re always able to create great content. 

 

If you can’t come up with the questions yourself, see what the customers are saying. This is where all of the comments on your previous content, the messages you get from customers, comments on content that your competitors put out, and so forth can come in handy. 

 

If it sounds like I do this often, your instincts are correct. One of our best and most successful attorney SEO clients, Belal Hamideh, uses this often when we talk about content. He offers free case evaluations to prospective clients. There, they ask him all kinds of questions as he lets them know how he can help them. So many of those questions are then worked into his content, as that’s what real people are really thinking. 

 

Remember, for great content to be able to answer these questions, you have to “show” and not “tell.” Really, whenever someone says that content has to “provide value,” this is what they’re talking about. Telling someone that you’re the best does nothing. If it’s off-putting at best. Showing them what you do and how good you are at it, of course, is the essence of great content. 

 

If you have that, then, in a basic sense, you’ll have everything that you need. 

 

A Season to Change 

 

Content, even the best content, is ephemeral. It’s specific to a time. Then, new content has to be created to continue driving your business forward. This is true even of “evergreen” content. 

 

Think of the “evergreen” content that your business has. If you’re like most of our clients, the best-performing “evergreen” content is that which best displays what you do, or perhaps it’s tied to a time period, such as Black Friday, the holidays, back to school, spring, etc. 

 

So, when you’re stuck and unsure about what to do with your content, think of what’s going on right now. For example, as of this writing, we’re a few weeks out from Halloween. Here at Website Depot, as a digital marketing agency, we don’t really have a lot of “horror-themed” clients or work (to say the very least). 

 

But, that didn’t stop us from releasing this utterly fantastic post on Instagram. I had nothing to do with it myself but it has an arresting image, some fun text, and then the hand grabs for you. It’s certainly much more memorable than explaining to someone yet again that you’re going to be able to provide solutions or something. 

 

Now, in a few weeks (or even less) that post isn’t going to be appropriate. Soon, we’ll be thinking about Thanksgiving, the holidays after, etc. Looking at the season and how it affects what your customers are thinking will always give you a leg up in terms of content. 

 

Summon the Past 

 

Having said that content is ephemeral doesn’t mean that it fails to have use after its prime. If you’re like many of our clients here at Website Depot, you’ve had content that did very well for you in the past. Maybe it was just a few posts, perhaps it was some blogs or videos, but, companies have some content that did better for them than others. 

 

It’s still useful. Just in a different way. Instead of being what drives engagement to you itself, it can become fuel. Material for recycling. Now, you can use it to create content that works for today, too. 

 

When you’re truly stuck, when you aren’t sure what to do, look at what worked in the past. Then: think of how you could adapt it to the future. 

 

Find a blog post from the past you loved. How could that be converted into a TikTok? Take your favorite Facebook, or Twitter post, or even Google Plus (depending on how far back you go). Couldn’t that be made into an Instagram Reel? A YouTube Short? 

 

It’s the same content. You’re just as much (if not more) of an authority at your job than you were there. You’re conveying the same great, useful, value-laden information. All that’s changed is that you’re just doing so in a new format, to connect to a new audience, in a new way. That way, your content engine can “burn clean,” continually driving your content marketing forward. 

 

What’s New? 

 

If you’re really stuck on what kind of content to produce for your business, just look around. What are the people at your company working on right now? What are they doing today to help the company? This kind of content can be more helpful than you might think. 

 

A restaurant is perhaps the easiest example of this but you can apply this to just about anything else. If you’re stuck when creating content for a restaurant, show what you’re cooking that day. Let’s see someone make the food, dress a table, etc. It doesn’t have to be the finest example of it, something that someone spent weeks storyboarding, blocking out or something. No, it just has to be what’s happening today. 

 

Alfred Hitchcock once said, more or less, “we like people who are good at their jobs.” That’s true for movies and it’s true for your content, too. When in doubt, let’s see your people being good at their jobs. “Day in the Life” videos and content are relatable and they can show your authority, too. 

 

More Than a Web Design Agency in Los Angeles 

 

Those are the four pillars that I more or less go back to when I’m stuck. This is broad strokes, yes, but I also didn’t want this to be as long as those “50,000 Ways to Come Up With Content” articles. 

 

If you want to know more about getting more from your business, there’s a whole team of professionals here at Website Depot. We have a truly stellar team of professional web developers, SEO services, and so much more. They (with some help from me) can help your business to get to where you want it to go. Schedule a free consultation with us through our site or by calling (888) 477-9540.