Creative Ways to Come Up With Blog Post Ideas and Topics

Coming up with fresh, unique blog post ideas is essential for content creators and bloggers looking to grow their platform. Yet tapping into creativity and identifying new topics can prove challenging. A recent survey showed 89% of bloggers struggle with writer’s block and content ideation at some point.

The good news? With the right creative thinking techniques and content research, unlocking new blog post ideas can become a breeze. This comprehensive Blog post details multiple strategies to activate innovation and develop compelling content topics and angles. Employing the creative post idea generation approaches outlined below can help your blog stand out from the competition while creating opportunities to attract engaged, loyal readers.

Brainstorming Techniques for Generating Blog Post Concepts

Brainstorming is a go-to technique for stirring up new ideas and possibilities. While simple in concept, an effective brainstorming approach requires some strategy and guidelines.

When structured appropriately to remove barriers and judgment, brainstorming paves the way for unexpected connections and unique concepts to start flowing.

Implementing consistent brainstorming as part of your creative workflow results in no shortage of blog post ideas.

Key Ground Rules for Productive Brainstorming Sessions

Before detailing go-to brainstorming methods for fresh blog post ideas, let’s review some guidelines for an ideal creative thinking environment:

No bad ideas – Withhold judgment and analysis of each idea during the session. Filter later.
Build on others – Use each concept as inspiration for new related ideas.
Challenge assumptions – Question traditional perspectives to uncover inventive angles.
Encourage wild ideas – The more imaginative, the better to tap your unconventional wisdom.
Relax and have fun – No pressure for perfection. Playful thinking yields creative gold.
Focus on quantity – Set goals for number of ideas and build momentum.

With the freedom to entertain any notion without repercussions, your subconscious creative center starts bubbling to the surface.

Now let’s channel this creative freedom into specific brainstorming frameworks optimized for blog topic generation.

Free Writing to Uncover Standout Post Ideas

Free writing is one of the most adaptable brainstorming methods for producing diverse ideas. It involves non-stop writing without self-editing whatever thoughts bubble up.

Here is an effective approach:

Set a short time frame – 10 to 15 minutes works well. Extend as you get on a roll.
Eliminate distractions and judgment – Let whatever notions arise without questioning value.
Start writing with a prompt – This kickstarts your flow. “10 ideas for posts on [your blog topic] are…”
Don’t stop to edit – Avoid breaking flow. Jot every idea as it emerges.
Highlight standout ideas later – Review to identify ideas resonating most for blog post development.

Committing to regular free writing bursts results in an expanding palette of potential posts over time as your creativity expands.

Here’s an example…

Here is a fictional excerpt from my free writing brainstorm to generate potential blog post ideas:

“Thinking of new article topics for my food blog…maybe highlight my favorite exotic ingredients and recipes I’ve discovered. Or a funny confession post detailing all my biggest kitchen disaster stories and baking fails. Readers do seem to love relatable humor. Feature my friend Jean who left her job last year to open that cute bakery downtown. That could offer inspiration to aspiring entrepreneurs…Oh! Do a behind the scenes at that artisanal chocolate factory highlighting their techniques and specialty products. Perhaps too niche? But maybe ideal for the holiday season guide I’m planning…What about controversies? I could give my hot take on foods like pineapple pizza or raisins in cookies that divide public opinion and debate the pros and cons…”

After 10 minutes of uncensored ideation, I have several promising possibilities that escaped my usual thought patterns:

Share funny personal cooking mishap stories – Relatable humor draws engagement
Interview my entrepreneur friend about her bakery – Uplifting stories ideal for inspiration
Factory tour highlighting gourmet chocolate production process – Seasonal angle ties to upcoming gift guide
Reaction posts weighing in on divisive food debates like raisins in cookies – Controversy and opinions perform well

The free writing unearthed unique angles I likely wouldn’t have considered that show strong potential. These will now become working draft post outlines for further development and expansion on themes of humor, inspiration, seasonal content and reacting to controversies in engaging ways.

Mind Mapping New Blog Post Possibilities

Another exceptionally useful ideation technique for sparking creative blog post ideas and discovering unseen connections across concepts is mind mapping.

Mind mapping is an intuitive yet strategic visualization approach that links related ideas, words, phrases, and subtopics through a color-coded, non-linear branching diagram flowing from a central theme.

As you actively build out associations attaching disparate ideas to one another on the thought map, fresh angles and post possibilities begin to emerge at the intersection nodes that may never have crossed your mind previously. Things connect.

Implementing consistent mind mapping sessions as part of your content planning workflow leads to a treasure trove of unique blog post ideas spanning various facets of your core niche. This article will reveal best practices so you too can harness this simple yet immensely powerful brainstorming workbook.

Let’s start with the essential mind mapping basics before detailing advanced applications for next-level blog post inspiration and context generation.

Getting Started With Mind Maps

At it’s core, mind mapping encourages scatterbrained external processing of concepts tied to a central topic through quick visual organization rather than traditional linear note-taking approaches.

The goal is to unpack as many associations as possible across categorizations without judgement. You are quite literally mapping the landscape of your own mind related to chosen subjects via rapidly recorded thoughts.

While pen and paper allows flexibility, digital mind mapping applications bring more robust organization features to the table.

These tools allow custom branching for clearer relationships, color and icon coding systems, flexible manipulation, neat layouts keeping associations in close vertical proximity, visual cue fluidity with branches, and other indulgences physical journals prohibit.

Recommended digital options include MindMeister, XMind, Coggle and iMindQ. They remove restrictive friction so creativity flows freely.

Now let’s break down an effective step-by-step process for conducting mind mapping sessions optimized to ignite blog post formulation.

Crafting Inspiring Mind Maps

Follow these guidelines for architecting resonance mind maps fueling idea connections:

1. Pick Your Central Theme

Choose an initial core topic representing your broader niche, a common post category, or a narrow concept. This functions as the taproot anchoring your tree of extended thoughts.

Build from general to granular. A cooking blog may select overall “healthier baking substitutions” then drill-down based on associations uncovered.

2. Identify Main Branches and Categories

Next, chart between 5-8 high-level “main branches” tied to post groupings, strategies, angles or considerations related to the central topicFiltered thinking prevents wandering. Consider formats, outcomes, processes etc.

For a personal development blogger, main branches may include motivation types, solution styles, voices to feature, focus areas, use cases etc.

3. Populate Sub Branches and Ideas

This is the heavy lifting. Under each main branch, spawn additional “sub branches” expanding on specific considerations and post idea kernels worth noting for later extraction.

Avoid shallow obvious associations in favor of nuanced takes pinpointing curiosity gaps offering fresh value once developed into posts.

Document all sparks before they fade then prune dead-ends ruthlessly later. Volume births treasure.

4. Interconnect Complementary Concepts

Scan for compelling mechanisms linking one populated branch set to related branches spawning unique combinations to investigate.

Does advice from one industry insert well when repackaged for additional contexts? Jackpot crossover posts reveal themselves through bridging analysis.

5. Switch Central Topic Focus

Once you feel current arms reaching maximum saturation. try again from scratch by replacing the central topic with related yet distinct concept and repeating previous steps observing what new associations emerge under altered lens.

For example, the baking substitutions model may try swapping overall healthy recipes focus for specialized diets hooks like Keto and Paleo ingredient swaps. Different associations arise, leading to additive creative potential.

6. Prioritize Post Development Opportunities

Review your messy mind maps and highlight novel intersections or clusters offering curious chemistry presenting strong candidates for standalone posts worth developing further now that raw ideas have been unlocked.

Not every pathway merits energy investment. But resonant ones beg spotlighting. Map exploration grants clarity on highest potential to unlock based on intrigue and gravity around interactions.

While simple in theory, this intentional approach for linking words, phrases, and concepts across categorizations uncovers novel blog post format, topic, and angle inspirations you would likely never register otherwise. Outlier connections materialize to analyze.

Now let’s demo mind mapping in action from a niche site perspective to demonstrate the strategy bearing creative fruits…

Mind Mapping Demonstration For Blog Inspiration

Let’s explore a specific example of mind mapping to create blog topic ideas for an RV travel tips niche website.

Central Theme: RV Lifestyle – We intentionally kept the main topic broad to encourage wide ideation on all aspects of RV living, travel, purchases etc.

Main Idea Branches: High-level RV categories like Gear Guides, Road Trip Hacks, Camping Locations, Trip Planning Mistakes, Budget Travel Tricks and Environmental Conservation. These form common post groupings.

Nested Sub Branches: Specifics fill each branch – review top state camp spots under Locations, analyze products under Gear for family/pet RV needs like cooking gadgets or best bunk beds. These form draft post titles.

Interconnections: Ideas link between branches, like correlating camping locations near top hiking trails for nature posts spanning interests. Family trips can also be budget oriented. These intersections inform unique posts combining angles.

Reconfiguration: Branches could also be expanded/shifted by RV seasons – needed Winter gear, ideal Spring destinations to visit, how fuel efficiency changes in mountain Summer areas and Fall foliage road trip sightseeing for example. Different associations arise when altering lenses seasonally.

The process ultimately uncovers various creative post ideas from pairing related branches that stretch conventional perspectives on RV content’s possibilities worth developing further.

“What Compelling Blog Posts Could We Create Around RV Lifestyle Topics and Trends?”

This frame of reference focused branching on idea generation rather than technical narrow factors early to spotlight creative opportunities.

Now let’s analyze pieces of this mind map highlighting applications of key guidelines shared earlier for sparking blog post formulations through associative reasoning and visual clustering workflows…

Central Theme Anchor – RV Lifestyle

We intentionally kept the taproot concept broad as RV living comprises many aspects from purchasing decisions to road navigation and everything in between. This umbrella coverage encourages wide ideation.

Main Branches – High Level Post Categories

From here, you’ll notice main branches taking shape aligned to common RV blog categories like Gear Guides, Road Hacks, Destinations and more. These create foundational areas to spur creative offshoots.

Sub Branches – Specific Post Ideas

Each main branch fans outward with related specifics. For example, under Locations we see target states and parks. Within Gear we tap budget picks to family recommendations. These become draft titles and topics for cultivation.

You’ll also notice certain main branches holding more nested sub layers than others. For example, we felt Camping Preparation warranted extensive associations while Tourism Tales minimized after enough themes populated.

Inter-Connections Between Branches

Next evaluate how certain sub-branches interrelate across categories sparking post idea hybrids. Notice cross-linked suggestions between things like Road Trip Games interplaying with Budgeting Tips. These conceptual mashups breed uniqueness.

Reconfiguration By Seasons Branch Example

Finally, scroll back to the Seasons Considerations main branch exemplifying iterative topic expansion through altered lenses. Winter, Spring and Summer phase constraints create additional Frugal Gift Ideas, Festivals Guides and Places openings.

Shifting core focus to seasonal hooks renders additonal recommendation possibilities as needs and behaviors change. This compounds creative pathways exponentially.

And that concludes our demonstration of leveraging mind mapping techniques to unlock hidden blog post ideas you may never conceive otherwise! Try implementing these visualization workflows in your niche and watch inspiration flourish.

Now let’s switch gears into advanced mind mapping strategies pushing post formulations further.

Leveling Up Tactical Approaches

While basic mind mapping makes connecting concepts easier, truly mastering the practice for optimizing blog ideation involves additional frameworks and filters driving strategic direction beyond shooting from the hip associations.

Let’s level up with actionable systems taking mind mapping to the next stage:

The RASCI Mapping Matrix

Beyond open-ended idea linking, RASCI matrices bring structured perspective when evaluating post possibilities revealed by mapping based on practical publishing prioritization.

RASCI stands for Responsible, Accountable, Supportive, Consulted and Informed.

This adds lenses measuring the viability impact and implementation team roles required for nurturing each draft post topic uncovered into a finished piece.

For example:

Responsible: Writer, researcher executing tasks
Accountable: Editor approving and overseeing progress
Supportive: Graphics designer, contributors providing assets
Consulted: Expert sources guiding subject authority fact checks
Informed: Social media manager aware of publishing calendar

Filtering associations through responsibility frames grounds ideas for amplified achievability.

Audience-First and Goal Optimization

Further expanding, mind maps traditionally start inward eliciting personal intrigue associations among passion topic dimensions. This unfortunately clutters creativity through unintentional niche rabbit holes losing mainstream resonance.

Flipping influences outward to audience appeal and site growth goals brings clarity.

Constantly evaluate emerging branches through target reader and business metrics filters like:

Audience-First

Does this post idea solve specific reader struggles?
Will the angle resonate with mainstream preferences?
Who responds negatively? Should their objections guide our message?

Goal-Focused

Which ideas display highest traffic, amplification and conversion potential?
What solutions justify premium offers, emails and community cultivation?
Do certain branches nurture goals others neglect like backlinks?

Prioritizing outward resonance compounds content effectiveness regarding end outcomes beyond your own intrigue rabbit holes. Blog growth accelerates.

Getting Input and Feedback from Readers

While individual brainstorming sessions are hugely valuable for stirring up blog post ideas, never underestimate the power of going directly to the source and getting explicit input on content interests directly from your audience.

Conducting strategic reader surveys, interviews, social listening, comment analysis, polls and more can provide invaluable first-hand perspective on exactly which topics and post formats your community craves most right now. This ensures you create content that genuinely caters to their burning questions, frustrations, preferences and interests instead of best guess assumptions.

Prioritizing themes and angles coming directly from an actively engaged readership guarantees your content creation targets are aligned with current audience demand. This results in higher click-through rates, discussion, and most importantly, reader loyalty stemming from gratitude for having their needs heard and served.

Here are some of the top proven tactics for sourcing blog post inspiration directly from your fans:

Well-Crafted Reader Surveys

Distributing online surveys to your audience representing a healthy sample size can lead to explicit post recommendations and opinions they eagerly provide when presented with the right questions. This clear positive feedback loop beats guessing what might appeal.

Here’s how to conduct value-driving reader surveys:

1. Construct Specific Questions

The key is crafting strategic questions that draw out truly helpful responses. Yes and no questions won’t cut it. Asking open-ended advice on what posts they need guides creation.

Compelling Question Examples

“What one burning challenge related to [your niche] do you want to see a new blog post tackle providing a solution for?”
“Suggest one blog post topic we haven’t covered before that you want to gain more perspectives, tips or real examples on.”
“What specific format would you find most helpful for summarizing key [niche] advice – checklists, pros vs cons comparisons, step-by-step methodologies etc?”

2. Promote Survey on Key Channels

Share the survey prominently with current newsletter subscribers, social media followers, pop-ups targeting site visitors, link in YouTube descriptions etc.

Incentivize survey participation for best results through sweepstakes entries to win prizes, free access to gated content, gift cards and more.

3. Curate Suggestions into Post Buckets

Tally recommendations into categories like evergreen basics versus viral news hooks. Identify clusters and gaps.

4. Commit to Covering Top Requests

Produce reader top-voted post ideas first. Sort by popularity and urgency to determine publishing priority. Deliver precisely what they request.

Surveys create direct symbiosis between your audience needs and writing execution. This reader-centric approach compounds loyalty.

Interviews With Readers and Industry Experts

Further close the loop of crafting posts through your audience’s explicit lens by interviewing tribe members one-on-one. This elicits personalized perspectives beyond surveys.

Recruit relevant names to provide insider views into chosen topics. Capture key insights for converting into actionable posts.

Interview Recruitment Tactics

Existing Contacts: Leverage your current contact list and relationships who know the industry’s pain points and interests. Offer previews of their commentary.
Reengage Loyal Followers: Check analytics for particularly engaged long-term site visitors and subscribers to tap in dedicated fans.
Niche Influencers: Cold pitch prominent blog guests, authors and podcast interviewees whose thoughts you respect.
** Social Listening:** Pay attention to active social conversations around your keywords and reach out to lively participants you’d enjoy featuring.

Optimizing Interview Content Harvest

Strategically facilitate the dialogue guiding it towards valuable shareable material:

Prepare 10-20 questions spanning from big picture thoughts to specific examples of their experiences.
Ask for recommendations of other figures to speak with for additional perspectives.
Request quotes that concisely summarize their key advice on topics to spotlight.
Inquire about anecdotes illustrating their points for contextual color.
Curate favorite revelations into shareable quote graphics and blog posts syndicating the interview.

Showcasing respected voices within your community builds connection and provides reader-powered inspiration.

Live Polls

Digital polling through platforms like Polldaddy place content direction choice firmly in the hands of readers by asking simple A/B preference questions.

Poll to determine interest levels between potential topics, get quick feedback on angles, and have them vote on characteristics.

Pose questions like:

“Which blog post format would you rather see next – a DIY guide or expert rebuttal?”
“Do you prefer case studies or analogy examples demonstrating [niche] tactics?”
“Should our next industry analysis piece cover Topic A or Topic B?”

Tally votes over a week across website banners and social promotions. Allow majorities to guide your assignments.

Advanced Listener Analytics

In addition to direct polling, “listen” to aggregated audience behaviors through:

Comment Sentiment Analysis

Plug your blog’s RSS feed into tools like Oktopost which scan commentary with sentiment analysis for recurring themes and unsolved complaints to address from past discussions.

Google Analytics Behavior Flows

Study metrics like bounce rates, time on site, and scroll depth for recent posts. Do deeper dives into specific reader cohorts by segmenting users based on traits like sign-up source to identify preferences.

Forum Observation

Lurk relevant niche communities on Reddit, Facebook Groups and Quora noting commonly asked questions. Join conversations with value helping establish your expertise.

News Trends

Monitor industry and adjacent news for paradigm shifts causing uncertainty prime for an explainer post.

Search Autocomplete

Google suggests searches commonly typed for recommendations. These quick queries reveal raw interest.

Social Listening

Previous strategies monitor existing communities. Social listening expands reach into wider keyword-filtered conversations happening around the web to uncover trending issues and analysis gaps.

This well-rounded listeners toolkit blended with direct outreach paints a detailed portrait of current audience preferences to cater towards.

Crafting Optimal Reader Surveys

Now let’s do a deeper dive specifically on formulating stellar reader surveys guaranteed to uncover a content goldmine.

Follow this checklist for maximizing question clarity and response quality:

1. Open With High-Level Gauges

Begin broader inquiries setting overall direction through rankings and priority:

“On a scale of 1-10 how helpful is our current advice on [X]?”

“Which of these potential blog sections do you want more content for?”

This frames their mindset on strengths and weaknesses.

2. Ask Open-Ended Suggestions

Encourage free form recommendations about gaps:

“What struggles to improve [Y] skill have you faced lacking answers online so far?” “What specific [Y] tips do you want shared for beginners vs veterans?”

This elicits personalized guidance.

3. Close With Ratings

End by rating interest levels around potential ideas:

“How useful would each of these upcoming posts seem on a scale of 1-5?”

This gauges demand for current considerations.

4. Limit Scope

Keep under 5 minutes by filtering to high-impact questions tailored towards uncovering idea inspiration only. Avoid tangents.

5. Incentivize Sharing

Encourage survey completion through lead magnet content downloads, gift cards, or entry into a valuable raffle/giveaway.

Investing in rich survey design pays exponential reader relationship returns.

Evaluating Competitors for Content Gaps

One of the most effective yet underutilized tactics for developing fresh, compelling blog post topics is to thoroughly analyze what other influential sites and figures in your space currently cover extensively or surprisingly overlook.

Conducting strategic competitor analysis reveals both gaping holes where conversation and audience demand outstrips quality information available as well as oversaturated areas to generally avoid competing directly in.

By doubling down creating posts around gaps where others lack, you set yourself up for bringing uniquely high value to readers desperate for that perspective. Sidestep mimicking content categories competitors have already thoroughly dominated unless you have an angle to contribute that truly stands apart still.

This intentional counterprogramming filters the social listening noise and charts a course towards elevating authority through serving overlooked insights in an ongoing capacity. Get ready to drive organic growth by catering directly to your audience’s sore spots for knowledge.

Here is a step-by-step blueprint cracking the competitor analysis code to yield a treasure trove of fresh content ideas and topics guaranteed to help your blog stand out in any niche:

Step 1: Identify Your Core Competitor Websites

Start by listing out the blogs, magazines, influencers, and other publications with significant audience crossover to yours. These players create articles vying for the same readers and should dictate your content battle plan.

Depending on how wide or narrow your niche is, this competitive landscape overview could span just 3-5 prime sites or over 20 relevant creators.

Identify who your readership also pays attention based on:

Social media crossover in followers/engagement
Backlink profiles and partnerships
Keyword and topic analysis revealing shared real estate
Reader survey data citing their go-to influencers

While it’s impossible to monitor the entirety of the internet, distilling down to who matters most provides key intel.

Tools to Expedite Competitor Research

Manually investigating crossover traffic sources would prove an extreme grind. Thankfully, robust tools exist to accelerate relevant competitor identification leveraging algorithmic legwork.

Here are two essential applications to derive competitor intelligence with little manual digging required:

BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo surfaces the most shared recent content within any subject, curating clusters of authority sites.

Simply input a core keyword like “email marketing” and filter to the past year, and you’ll receive an index of the top blogs and articles dominating shares around that category.

This instantly provides a snapshot of sites writing coveted advice readers can’t resist spreading to one another. Who stands out with readers’ stamps of approval makes prime competitive analysis.

Ahrefs

The Ahrefs Site Explorer reveals websites that share significant searcher mindshare through prominent keyword rankings overlap.

Input any domain and sort their top-ranking keywords by volume. Scan for sincere sites also targeting those high-value terms. Confirm their authority by exploring their backlinks and search traffic metrics.

You’ll swiftly gain perspective on who consistently appears battling for ownership over core topics your readership craves. Assessing their strengths is prudent competitive maneuvering.

Step 2: Survey Competitors’ Evergreen Content

With core competitors flagged, it’s time to dive into their archives and uncover recurring evergreen content themes warranting your review and reimagination.

“Evergreen content” refers to posts with little dependence on fleeting news relevance that continue delivering value years later. For example, comprehensive guides, product recommendations, creative inspiration, and actionable self-improvement.

This evergreen inventory offers a higher-level view of each competitor’s long-term content philosophy beyond recency biases that ignores more foundational themes in favor of chasing traffic spikes from trending hook posts.

Identify the following to gauge their established angles:

Formats they default towards like listicles or Q&As
Length and depth tendencies from quick-hit to dissertation
Most frequent categories covered from news commentary to how-tos
High-level topic patterns that emerge like industry insider secrets

Observing competitor evergreen content strategies through a wide lens accentuates systemic content gaps to capitalize on.

Competitive Analysis Tools Part 2

We’re leveling up beyond initial competitor identification into extracting actionable intelligence from their expansive archives. Additional software can produce smart shortcuts here as well.

BuzzSumo

We’re going back to BuzzSumo to double click into their impeccable data sets and filtered views. Simply add your list of pre-determined competitors to the “Domains” filter function.

You can now run various keyword searches while limiting results to just that handpicked competitive cohort, exposing what specific topics each emphasizes and overlooking.

The “Most Shared Ever” toggle then shows their perpetual evergreen winners versus recency bias. Golden pure apples-to-apples analysis!

Google Keyword Tools

Google Keyword Planner and autocomplete are quick manual filters revealing competitors keyword targeting and thus content patterns.

Input a competitor’s domain into Keyword Planner’s site search bar and note the “Keyword ideas” tab suggestions indicating what terms Google perceives them ranking for.

Do the same in Google search by typing “site:competitorURL.com” then reviewing search predictions. Highlight keyword themes not prominently echoing across other competitors for gaps.

Step 3: Evaluate Competitors’ Search Rankings

The next analytical layer involves directly searching and scanning the first several pages of Google results for a handful of your most valuable keyword targets to determine precisely who consistently appears outranking others.

This illuminates direct head-to-head domain competition visibility. Who are you perpetually battling for ownership over these critical search terms?

Conduct this ranking analysis for:

High-traffic generics like “email marketing tips”
Popular sub-themes like “email automation workflows”
Wide interest long-tails like “how to segment leads from email sign-ups”

Aggregate those consistently appearing in the top 3-5 encrypted spots for these key queries with further investigation into why Google favors them over alternatives for that subject based on on-page authority and backlink signals.

Use tools like SEMrush and Ahrefs for reverse-engineering underperforming pages against their rankings with factors like:

Page speed and mobile optimization
Heading tag hierarchy
Image alt text usage
Embedded video elements
Quality backlink acquisition

Reverse engineer what allows competitors to outplay you for sought-after search real estate and development methods for closing gaps.

Step 4: Identify Under and Overserved Content Categories

Compiling intelligence from evergreen content analysis plus high-visibility search rankings grants perspective on competitor content biases.

Certain subjects, formats, and angles will emerge as disproportionately popular across sites compared to more sparse coverage of other viewer interests.

Categorize blog post topics across competitors on a spectrum spanning:

Oversaturated: covered broadly with strong depth by multiple big players
Appropriately Served: addressed by a few sites but with room for further voices
Underserved: lacking meaningful or updated coverage despite clear viewer interest

This highlights prime opportunities to distinguish your authority.

For example, an oversaturated category around email marketing may be segmentation and onboarding best practices due to maturity.

An audience-interest area lacking TLC based on search demand could be conflict resolution for blocked emails.

Shift the bulk of content production towards neglected topics readers crave answers for.

Prioritizing Gaps By Audience Insights

Further validate underserved content area prioritization through additional audience intelligence gathering:

Search Volume: Confirm target keyword demand through tools like Google’s Keyword Planner, displaying global monthly searches. Prioritize targets with over 1,000 lookups.

Reader Surveys: Ask readers directly what subjects they want you covering more of or currently struggle finding advice for. Tally requests.

Forums Activity: Monitor online communities like Reddit around your industry sorted by recent activity rates. Spikes suggest hot topics lacking answers.

News Events: Note emerging societal developments, technologies, and paradigm shifts ripe for an explainer.

Matching gaps with demand indicators compounds content ROI.

Step 5: Brainstorm Original Post Ideas and Angles Around Gaps

Having charted strategic content gaps indicated by competitor monitoring and audience insights, it’s time to ideate posts guaranteed to offer novel value.

Start by cataloging gap topics, themes, formats, and questions depriving readers best. Extract 8-10 contenders showing promise.

Then brainstorm deliverable ideas and angles centered around each gap.

Tactics For Unique Ideation

Push past tropes and generics to uncover truly inventive interpretations on each gap:

Contrast: What opposing perspectives bring drama, debate or added context?
Analogies: How does an entirely separate category relate in clever comparison?
Show, Don’t Tell: Develop multiple examples, case studies, or conversations that dance around the core subject from diverse directions
Slant Topics For Controversy: Take a strong stance on issues divided by perspective to spark reactions
Implications-Focused: Extrapolate gap concepts into predictions, future developments, and hypothetical scenarios

This mental expansion unearths tertiary considerations beyond surface commentary on gaps.

Identify 5-10 gaps with accompanying inventive post ideas to progress into outlines and drafts.

Bonus: Idea Optimization Checklist

Before deciding which contenders to allocate time producing, run each draft post premise through optimization filters:

✅ Audience-Centered Relevance: Will this directly solve struggles cited by the readership? Does it introduce a truly novel and applicable angle on their expressed interests?
✅ Search Desirability: Are keywords targeted aligned with valuable search volume lacking saturation? What terminology can be integrated for discoverability?
✅ Linkability: Does the post take a strong stance likely to elicit external citations when arguing sides of hot issues? Will the uniqueness attract attention?
✅ Adaptability: Can this idea expand into an ongoing series? Is an email course or social discussion possible from it? Does it connect multiple other dots for the readership?

Greenlit gap-fillers passing these tests signify lucrative blog growth potential.

Conclusion

Committing to routine competitor analysis unveils perpetual inspiration for topics and post formats uniquely qualified to command respect and readership as an authoritative industry voice.

Counterprogramming against mainstream thought online requires intention. But gratifying curiosity where competitors consistently lack pays reader loyalty dividends. Always be scouting the next intriguing content gap.