If you are reading this post, you might be struggling with new, catchy ideas to write about. Don’t worry! There are many ways to come up with topic ideas that will help you rank on Google, even if you’re stuck.
Start by learning more about your target audience. Focus on where they spend their time and how they speak. Find out about their interests, hobbies and what keeps them up at night.
These are the only ways to find topic gems that haven’t already been picked up by your competitors – those valuable “seed” keywords.
After that, regardless of your topic research approach, you’ll want to inspire your readers, make them learn something new, and maybe even share your professional or personal experience.
With this said, let’s dive into eight helpful tips you can use to find relevant topics with SEO in mind:
1. Use SEO keyword research software
Your first stop for finding relevant topics should be one of the all-in-one tool suites for SEO keyword research. These will help you figure out what people type into Google to find what you offer.
The most popular solutions (SEMRush and Ahrefs) are paid, but they include free trials. These are widely regarded as the most accurate sources of keyword data on the market.
To start with SEMRush, login into your account and select “Topic Research” from the left menu. Then type in your main topic and click “Get Content Ideas.”
For Ahrefs, log in to your account and select “Keywords Explorer” from the top menu and look up your main topic.
Google Keyword Planner is your most reliable free option, but it’s primarily aimed at those running Google Ads. Nevertheless, we’ll explain how it works because it’s a Google product, so the insights for Google searches are priceless.
After logging in, click on “Discover New Keywords” and enter some products or services closely related to your business. Alternatively, enter your “seed” keywords. Once you’ve entered your information, click “Get Results.”
No matter which tool you use, you’ll gather a list of keywords with their monthly search volume, plus indicators on how easy (or difficult) it is to rank for them.
It’s essential to strategically weigh in your criteria. For example, you may plan your content efforts to address the keywords with the lower organic competition and a rather generous search volume.
According to a web development agency in California, it’s critical that you place those keywords in the right place throughout your content to improve the odds of having search engines rank your page according to them.
2. Reddit is a gold mine for content topics
Reddit is a massive forum with a heavy focus on its communities. The platform is accessed by over 430 million users monthly.
To start getting content ideas on Reddit, enter a topic or your “seed” keyword in the Search field at the top. You’ll be able to view the most relevant and popular posts. You can also subscribe to topics that appeal to and interest you.
It’s essential to subscribe to subreddits that are relevant to you and your business. This way, you will get plenty of trending content suggestions and thus ideas for new content.
3. Piggyback off of Twitter’s trending topics
Twitter is an excellent tool for finding trending content topics.
To access “Twitter Topics,” log into your Twitter account, click “More” on the sidebar to the left of your feed and select “Topics.” When you click on “Topics,” you are greeted by a welcome message, and you can start picking the “Twitter Topics” you want to follow.
You can choose to get personalized recommendations based on the accounts you follow and topics you’re interested in, similar to what Reddit offers.
The point is to find something you think your customers will want to discuss.
4. Listen to Quora’s Q&A community
Quora is an intriguing community. The platform contains trending topics and an extraordinary number of well-documented answers from passionate users.
You can personalize your Quora experience for whatever’s relevant to your business. To start, enter your “seed” keyword in the “Search” box to see some of the latest and most popular questions and related topics.
5. Try Answer the Public
The primary purpose of content is to answer your audience’s questions.
Answer the Public is an innovative tool that combines Google and Bing’s suggested searches and displays them in a search cloud. That makes Answer the Public great for optimizing your content and SEO efforts.
To start using Answer the Public, add your “seed” keyword in the search box and hit “Search.”
Answer the Public provides darkening green dots to assess how popular a search term is. Take into account that trending terms can appear above terms with higher search volumes, which could be a bit misleading for your SEO efforts.
6. BuzzSumo is the content creator’s best friend
BuzzSumo is a popular online tool that allows any user to find out what content topics are trending on any website.
BuzzSumo’s “Keyword Research” tool uses machine learning to suggest new topics. If you navigate to the “Content Analyzer,” you can see the most engaging topics and the number of likes and shares articles on the topic get on social media.
However, BuzzSumo’s popularity is both a blessing and a curse, considering that you’re going to get the same trending content as every other content creator out there.
7. Always analyze your impact
Creating content on trending topics gives you an edge, but don’t forget to analyze your existing content. Google Analytics comes in handy here.
You can track your blog post visits from the “Behavior” section of Google Analytics. Google’s data shows you which of your blog posts attract the most visitors. The “Average Session Duration” tells you if they remain on your website long enough to truly engage with your content.
When you know what content works best with your audience, you can leverage that topic. This will enhance the connection with your audience and will inspire you to create innovative content.
8. Remember: Not all relevant topics are available online
Always expand your reach and look for your next topic in industry-related books. That gives you an edge, as you’ll get a different angle when researching a niche topic.
Everyone else is probably reading the same content online, watching the same webinars and using the same strategies to explore ideas and keywords.
Be different. Your readers will respect the extra effort you’ve put in providing richer content. People are more likely to follow you and listen to you if you’re consistently sharing or producing quality content that they care about.
Remaining offline, speak directly to your customers or interview the team that is in contact with them. Get to know your target audiences better and let them inspire some new ideas.
Another smart way to come up with content topics is to attend events relevant to your business. These events yield innovative ideas for posts and inspire studies and stats you can include within your blog posts.
Lastly, be on the lookout for industry reports that tackle common problems in your line of business. People in your line of business will likely be searching for solutions to these problems.
Author bio:
Tomas is a digital marketing specialist and a freelance blogger. He is focused on new web tech trends and digital voice distribution across different channels.
Photo by Kaleidico on Unsplash