Ideas for Generating Content When Writer's Block Strikes
"Writing about a writer's block is better than not writing at all"
― Charles Bukowski, The Last Night of the Earth Poems
Note: This may be the most meta blog post you read today… or in the next hour.
B2C content marketing is nothing new, but B2B brands are just now finding this strategy to be more effective with providing value, building trust, and growing sales.
Content creation can be a great way to humanize B2B brands, and can make them more relatable in their communication with customers, but sometimes, the problem with content marketing… is all the content.
With so much "snackable" information available each day, marketers are not only competing with other brands that are offering similar, redundant pieces of content, but are also feeding the customers' growing expectations that we will always have a steady stream of content readily available for them to digest.
Maybe you've brainstormed a few smart topics that don't feel quite right once you start fleshing them out. Maybe you've just plumb run out of ideas. How do you continue to churn out relevant fodder without sounding like you’ve got writer's block?
Portent's and HubSpot's ultra-meta free content offerings come in the form of content idea generators, and are a helpful place to start –– you plug in a few key words, and they'll spit out a few titles that might pique a reader's interest.
Sometimes, this can be just enough to get your brain jogging if a lack of ideas is the sort of pickle you're in, but when your problem goes deeper than concepting, you may want to reconsider your research techniques.
This is where Google Alerts can be tremendously helpful –– this free tool scrapes the Internet for keywords that may lend context to support your arguments, credibility to your thoughts and recommendations, or proverbial "color" to your visuals, all neatly packaged in a daily (or weekly, depending on your preference) email.
CMI is another great content resource that can help you develop a strategy, and show you the distinction (and connection) between Content Strategy and Content Marketing.
Creating brilliant content isn't always easy, and there are days you'll certainly suffer from a bad case of writer's block, but take comfort in knowing that it happens to the best of us, because it literally just did.