How to Get More Yardage from Every Blog Post

Have you ever struggled to find new content ideas for your blog? Ever sat and stared at your computer screen wondering when the words will come?

I have.

I've struggled to find new blog topics, been challenged to come up with fresh content, and come up short several times.

If you want to grow your blog's audience, attract more readers, and possibly even turn your blog into a business, you'll need to be able to create fresh content on a consistent basis.

Over the past few months, several people have asked me how I create so much content. To me it doesn't feel like all that much. My content comes from blogging for almost three years and applying many different strategies.

I have also published How to Come Up with Killer Blog Post Ideas and 5 Simple Things You Can Do to Double Your Blog Traffic so be sure to check out those posts as well. (Both links open new windows so you don't lose your place)

Here's the deal: If you've published ten high-quality blog posts, you already have enough blog topics for thirty or forty more posts. You may just not know it yet.

Haven't started a blog yet? Click here and I'll show you how to start a blog in 8 minutes or less.

Some of the most common ways to get more life out of each blog post is to repurpose your blog's content to other sites. You can:

• Create slides and upload them to Slideshare. Check out my Slideshare here.
• Read the post aloud, add anecdotes, record it, and turn it into a podcast. I turned a blog post into a podcast here.
• Record a video discussing the blog post topic and upload it to YouTube. Watch the video here.

While these are just a few of the hundreds of ways to retool, repurpose and redistribute your content, each of these methods tend to take your reader off of your blog. That's almost like a clothing store sending their foot traffic across the street to buy shoes.

Each of these off-page sites should act as sign posts redirecting people back to your home base, not away from it. They're also not replacements for blog posts.

Three Questions You May Be Asking

1. What if I want to keep people on my site AND get more life out of each post?
2. How do I get more yardage out of the content I currently have on my blog?
3. How can I come up with new blog post ideas on a regular basis?

The Solution

After studying the art of blogging almost daily for three years now, I've discovered something worth sharing. I've discovered that not every blog post I write has to be entirely unique.

And, neither do yours.

At one point in my blogging journey I believed that once I'd covered a topic, I'd covered it for forever. Using that thinking, if I wrote about starting a professional podcast, I couldn't write about starting a mobile podcast.

But that's not the case for me, and it's not the case for you either.

By approaching a topic with a different point of view, you can create new and unique content on a consistent basis. (Tweet that!)

Here's an example…

You could write a list post – a post listing resources – and then a blog post going in-depth for each item on that list.

Here's another example…

You could write a blog post about the challenges that come with being a military spouse. Then, a few weeks later, publish a post about how to connect with your soldier when they come home. Or fun activities, or foods to make them feel at home…

In both examples, your posts are different, yet related. In each case, you can take a central blog topic and come at it from multiple points of view.

One more quick example…

Write a blog post listing the most common reasons small businesses fail. A month later, write a post about how you can succeed as a small business. Same idea, different viewpoint.

How Do I Find Out Other Blog Topics to Write About?

While researching writing and how to become a better blogger, I came up with the idea for the “Blog Topic Idea Web.” It's not a glamorous name, but it does the trick.

Here's what the Blog Topic Idea Web looks like:

How To Use the Blog Topic Idea Web:

Step 1: Use Google Analytics to find your most view blog post. Look under Behavior > Site Content > All Pages. See what post has the most page views in the last 90 days.

Step 2: Put the title of your most popular blog post in the middle, in the “Original Topic” bubble.

Step 3: Working your way out from the middle, brainstorm additional blog topics that relate to the one in the middle. Think about opposites, expansions, the most critical elements of, the most overlooked, ways to do it better, things to avoid, resources for helping you do… etc. These are just a few lenses through which you can view your existing content.

Step 4: Rinse and repeat for your top three posts with the most pageviews.

The first time I did this exercise I came up with two additional blog topics. The second time up with six, plus two third-tier topics. The third, seven more blog topics and one third-tier.

Each time you walk through this exercise you'll come up with more blog post ideas than you can write about. The next time you're hurting for ideas, look to your own work for inspiration!

Using the steps I shared above, I've created over three hundred blog posts and nearly one hundred podcast episodes.

When you first started reading this post did you believe it was possible to have more content ideas than you could write about?

I want you to have the Blog Topic Idea Web and change the world with your words. I'll send you a printable version of the Blog Topic Idea Web for free! Just put your email in the box below.

Question: What is your most popular blog post? Share your post's title and your new content ideas in the comments below!