How to Create Content for your Blog

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As a blogger, one of the most common grouse I share with any of my fellow bloggers is to find fresh content for their blog. It's imperative for us to find & create content which is interesting and revs up the audience. We need to create content from the topic we love & would like to have the audience love them too. And believe me, it's not easy to be creative & generate content regularly.


In case you have just begun to write, do visit this post to understand the basics of blogging.


Then how do we do it?? I have list few tricks on the way I create content for my blog posts:


1. Google Reader


Google Reader, pull up feeds from the subscribed list & show the posts in a stream. I agree, there are various RSS reader tools, but I still love the simple interface of Google Reader. Since I read multiple blogs, it is difficult to keep a list of them & visit regularly. So, If I have liked a certain post, usually subscribe to their feed so that I stay updated with their content.


Reading to the various posts, and being updated helps me to think about the topics that would resonate with my audience.


2. Scoop.it


Scoop.it allows you to curate online content into a dynamic digital magazine. It also connects to various social platforms like Twitter, Facebook, etc allowing you to share the content you like. Similar to Google Reader, you need to subscribe to the user's posts to get them streamed on your page. 


Since, the users of Scoop.it also pull post for different places on the web, skimming Scoop.it has helped me to look for ideas from beyond the few chosen people that I follow on Google Reader. It just takes me about 30-45 odd minutes to go through the list & I have my ideas flowing.


3. Disqus


Disqus is a global comment system that improves discussion on websites and connects conversations across the web. I have installed 'Disqus' commenting system on my blog & while it has indeed brought some traffic, the best part is, it has encouraged people to comment & these comments are indeed helpful at times to produce post.


Let me tell you, comments, either on your post or other posts where you have shared yours, are a great place to have discussion, are at times greatest inspiration for your own content. Since, there would be people commenting on your post, you'll know what their challenges are & how certain content has got the audience interested. I remember one of the Klout post that I did a while back, to my surprise, it got comments within 5 minutes of being posted and the various discussions gave me inspiration to write more on certain challenges.


In addition to these three tools, I also use Twitter lists. The utilities of Twitter lists has already been covered at multiple places like this and so I'll refrain from covering here.


Also, I have started to use list.ly lately, though am yet to utilize its potential,  but I do see that it can be an excellent tool to make a 'list' and have it crowdsourced. It's a great idea from Nick Kellet & Shyam Subramanyan and I am looking forward to use it more often. You can find me on list.ly here.


Your Turn

How do you think that these post will be useful to you? I would like to hear your opinion, you know it counts. As I told, comments are a great source of inspiration and I love them coming from you. Also, you might even share your source of ideas/inspirations using the 'comments' below. They would be helpful to us - the bloggers. Remember, 'Sharing is Caring'.


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