Need Inspiration For Your Blog? Pick Up a Book.

 In Content Marketing

Are you struggling to generate content marketing ideas and complain about not getting enough time to read? Here’s an idea to combine both work and play. Pick up an industry related (or not) book and read it with your blog and audience/buyer personas in mind.

Pick the Right Book

The easy route is to pick an industry related book, but inspiration can come from outside of your profession, and end up being more unique. The important thing to consider, rather the book comes from your industry or not, is make sure it has the potential to be fun. Yes, you are reading to garner ideas for your blog, but that doesn’t mean it has to be painful. When you’re having fun, you’re more creative!

Pick the Right Location

The typical office atmosphere can stifle creativity–so get the hell out of the office. A coffee shop is the usual fallback for reading and blog juicing, but feel free to try something atypical. A more interesting location can be a distraction, but with the right balance, it can be a boom for ideation and writing. One of my favorite alternative locations, a quiet pub with (weather permitting) a park coming in a close second.

Take Blogspiration Notes

Don’t jot down notes with just the goal of retaining knowledge in mind. I know that sounds counterproductive, but bare with me. Write down notes during those “aha!” moments when a scenario in the book spurs a content idea. You are reading for blogspiration, so stay focused on that particular goal. Want to really be in the right state of mind for content juicing while reading? Keep your DivvyHQ platform open in front of you, and make use of that Parking Lot feature.

Bring It All Together

So now you have a handful of notes or a computer screen full of Parking Lot ideas. What’s next? Review your ideas and sort them. Which ones are you jazzed about? Are some more timely than others? When you have a predefined blogging schedule, get them on your DivvyHQ calendar and start filling in some of those content gaps.

Pay Your Dues

If a content idea does knock on your cranial door, and the idea was derived more from the book’s author than from your noggin, then give credit where credit is due. Use quotes from the book and link to the author’s webpage or LinkedIn profile. If the author is internet savvy, he or she will notice and you may get an influencial “share” and a new professional connection out of the deal. Including their Twitter handle or Facebook page in your promotion is a great first step.

Divvy’rs, have you used a similar method? Let us know your brainstorm-by-reading tips in the comments or touch base with me directly. Now get that book. Get to reading and Plan. Divvy. Conquer.

 

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