When you’re in the business of selling services, content creation is key for building your brand and your mailing list. It’s a way to make the intangible tangible, and letting your audience know about your perspective, your unique knowledge and what kind of value you deliver.
But to show up consistently with content that is both fresh and helpful can sometimes be a bit of a challenge. So, to help you do just that, I’ve put together some of my best tips for coming up with content that both helps your audience AND boosts your brand!
First of all, let’s make creativity come easily. For me, working out is the number 1 way to get creative. For you, it might be something different. You want to be able to kickstart your own creative process and get yourself unstuck if you need to. So, if you don’t already know, spend the coming days observing what the context is when ideas and creativity start to flow. Then, when you need a creative boost, you’ll know what to do!
I’m sure that there are many different aspects to your work. Many of these will be relevant to your audience. To get creative, you can brainstorm all the different topics around your offer that you could talk about. For example, my business offer is helping women entrepreneurs grow their business. And the different aspects that I talk about are strategy, communication (like this blog post!), mindset work, productivity, etcetera. Once I have that structure in place, ideas for content start popping up by themselves!
Put yourself in the shoes of your ideal client. What is his or her everyday life like. What challenges, desires, needs, dreams or frustrations does he or she experience? How does your offer help fulfill those needs or alleviate those pain points? Thinking about the way you add value to your ideal client will give you a bunch of new topics that you can add to your structure.
Use case studies or your own experience. You can use your own experience and share how you solved a particular problem that your audience is also struggling with. Or, you can think about how you helped a client move past a similar situation. What were the key take-aways? These are the things that you can turn into practical, easy-to-use tips for your audience.
Learn from others. We all get input from the world around us. Very few ideas have NEVER been thought of before – but it’s our personal spin on them that matters. The way we view the world and the way we add value is what makes the interpretation of an idea or a concept unique. So, listen, read, watch and learn. Get inspired and you’ll see new ideas for content showing up.
For me, creativity often comes when my mind is at rest and when I let it wonder without any pressure to arrive at anything. This is something I do when I’m on the bus, on my way to pick up my son from school or when I’m out for a walk. Ideas also tend to show up just when I’m about to go to sleep. So, one thing you can do is to create some free space for your mind, put yourself in a non-pressured mode and let your mind wander where it wants.
Finally, a few words on the importance of taking care of your ideas. Too many times, I’ve made the mistake of thinking that an idea was SO GREAT so that I didn’t need to write it down. Surely, I would remember such an awesome thought?! Turns out, I didn’t. My strong suggestion is to use Trello or something similar – just make sure that it easily lets you organize any kind of content. (I prefer digital to paper as my phone is with me 9 times out of 10, but it’s important that you have a system that works for you.) Whatever tool you use, create your structure there. And when those ideas start coming, don’t wait for “later”, but note them down immediately!
There it is. I hope that you found this post helpful! Do you want more content like this? What other business growth related topics would you like to learn about? Your input is super important to me, so don’t be a stranger – comment below or send me a message! 😊
