Content Ideation: Our Agency’s Top 12 Ways to Find Infinite Content Ideas

A solid SEO content strategy follows some basic principles.

You must find profitable seed keywords, create topic clusters, and develop content ideas. Unfortunately, 57% of B2B marketers admit that content production iчф their biggest struggle.

That’s what this article will help you solve.

We’ll use our agency’s experience in SEO content ideation to offer you:

• 12 ways to find infinite content ideas, including two of our agency’s unique techniques
• The best tools we use in our SEO agency
• Insider case studies and tips

Let’s dive in.

1. Use SEO Tools

Solid SEO tools help you dive deep into the uncharted territories of content ideation. Here’s what we typically use:

1.1. Ubersuggest

Ubersuggest is a solid keyword research tool that gives you valuable topic ideas. It also dishes out the crème de la crème of titles, complete with social media rankings. 

Here’s what its “Content Ideas” section shows for the seed keyword “ice cream:”

Plus, Ubersuggest’s new Keyword Visualization tool helps you get a detailed keyword overview with questions, comparisons, prepositions, and more.

You can filter all this by keyword difficulty, search volume, and CPC to get more profitable search terms.

Here’s what that looks like for our seed keyword “ice cream,” after setting the keyword difficulty to low:

1.2. Google Trends

Think of Google Trends as your content compass. It doesn’t just show trends; it reveals the heartbeat of public interest. It’s essential for understanding the ebb and flow of what’s hot and what’s not.

Aligning your content with these trends helps you ride the wave of public interest.

1.3. BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is your Sherlock Holmes in the world of content. It doesn’t just track trends; it uncovers what your potential link partners are eyeballing. It shows you the nitty-gritty: shares, social engagements, key sharers, your backlink profile, and top trending content.

It’s like having a crystal ball for content relevance.

This helps you create fresh, relevant content both for your target audience and potential link partners. These types of content are called linkable assets, and they’ll bring you a huge influx of editorial links and organic traffic.

1.4. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is our go-to for its versatility and ability to uncover the hidden gems of content ideas.

You can use it to:

• Check your website and see your top-ranking content, organic pages, and organic keywords. See what content type your audience likes the most and replicate the top-performing content pieces.
• Conduct competitive analysis and uncover keyword opportunities by mimicking your competitors’ content marketing strategy or tapping into missed opportunities.
• Add keyword modifiers to your seed keywords to get more long-tail keyword ideas. For example, adding “in + location” allows you to target several local audiences.

For example, copy-paste a list of the 50 US states in the “include” filter and see what pops up for your seed keyword:

Insider tip + insider story: Use Ahrefs to filter out the obvious and zoom in on unique seed keywords.

Say you’re in the cold-press juicer market like one of our clients – Hurom. Your go-to terms might be “juice,” “juicer,” and “cold-press.” Pop in a competitor’s URL into Ahrefs, apply a filter to exclude these terms, and voilà, a treasure trove of untapped keyword ideas emerges.

One of Hurom’s competitors is Nama.

Here’s what Nama’s keyword strategy looks like after we excluded the search terms above, along with the brand name “Nama:”

Notice: Remember, you’re looking for seed keywords, not the long-tail keywords you’ll end up using in your content calendar.

From this example, the three seed keywords you can use are “pulp,” “strainer,” and “lemongrass.”

Insider tip 2: Don’t stop at Ahrefs. Tools like SEMrush or WriterZEN are your allies in uncovering related terms and questions for your editorial calendar.

2. Use Content Ideation Tools

Topic generation tools replace brainstorming sessions so you can find quick angles that resonate with your target audience. Incorporating these tools into your content ideation process helps you maintain a steady stream of ideas for your content calendar. They are especially useful when you’re stuck or need to broaden your range of topics.

Here’s what we typically use, and you can do it too:

• Neil Patel’s Answer the Public: This tool generates questions and phrases that people are actually searching for online based on your keyword. It’s particularly useful for understanding your audience’s specific queries so you can create content that directly addresses their needs and interests. Plus, you can select the search engine, location, and language.

‍

• Answer Socrates: Similar to Answer the Public, Answer Socrates is a tool designed to help you find questions related to your keywords. It’s effective for identifying how people seek information about a topic, thus providing you with a range of angles to explore in your content.

• HubSpot Blog Topic Generator: This tool is particularly user-friendly. You simply add your seed keyword, hit the “generate topic” button, and it provides a list of potential blog post ideas. It’s a great way to quickly come up with topic ideas that are both targeted and varied.

3. Write About Your Audience’s Problems

Addressing your audience’s problems means leveraging data to pinpoint them accurately and then solve them through content.

Here’s how you can gather this vital information:

• Sales data: Your sales data reveals much about your customers’ challenges and preferences. Look for patterns in the products or services that are most and least popular, and analyze customer feedback associated with these sales.
• Social listening: Social media platforms are treasure troves of insights. Analyzing comments, shares, and the most engaged-with-posts paints a clear picture of what your audience is interested in, their pain points, and the types of solutions they seek.
• Chatbot interactions: If your website uses chatbots, check your visitors’ questions and concerns. These interactions can provide direct, real-time insight into your target audience’s problems.

Don’t overlook the goldmine of audience behavior data from your SEO tools like Ahrefs, Google Search Console, and Google Analytics.

Insider tip from our agency: We use Ahrefs, but if you don’t have the budget, install Google Analytics and go to Behavior > Site Content > All Pages to see the issues your audience resonates with the most.

Use the data to identify common questions and address them in your content.

If there are recurring issues or queries about certain products or services, create content that addresses these. It shows that you are listening and willing to offer solutions, enhancing trust and engagement.

Insider tip: Use this data to create buyer personas for each audience segment and then create forms of content they want to see.

4. Ask Your Audience Directly

Directly engaging with your audience and paying attention to their input helps you create relevant and engaging content. Plus, you can build a stronger relationship with your potential customers. This approach ensures that your content strategy continuously aligns with your audience’s evolving needs.

You can use a slew of tools here:

• Instagram Stories: First, create a story posing a specific question or a series of questions related to your field. Encourage your followers to respond. You can also use polls to gauge interest in potential topics.
• Sales interviews: Your sales team is in direct contact with your customers and can provide insights into the common questions and concerns they raise. For example, people may be dissatisfied with your product descriptions or feedback tools. Compile these insights to create a list of potential content topics.
• Surveys and feedback forms: Use platforms like SurveyMonkey or Google Forms to create surveys. Share these through your email list or social media channels. Ensure the surveys are concise and to the point to encourage maximum participation.
• Social media posts: Create posts on platforms like LinkedIn or Twitter asking your audience what they want to read about. Encourage them to comment with their original ideas or questions.

Insider tip from our agency: Never underestimate the power of your blog’s comment section, which can get your content ideation process out of a rut.

Comments make your website more dynamic and relevant, which can positively affect your SEO. Plus, when you respond to comments, it encourages return visits, boosting engagement.

Monitor these comments for recurring themes or questions, which can power your content creation process. For example, if you’re a B2B company, you can use these insights to create:

• Case studies and success stories if your audience frequently asks about the effectiveness of your services or products
• How-to guides if common technical questions or challenges are mentioned in comments or surveys.
• Industry insights and white papers when your audience expresses curiosity about market trends or future predictions.

5. Use Other Platforms

Expanding your content ideation horizon means looking beyond traditional SEO tools and your website. Here are just a few platforms that we use to power our content strategy:

• Amazon Book Listings: Start by searching for books in your industry on Amazon. Look at the titles, but more importantly, delve into the table of contents of these books. They often outline key topics and subtopics that you can use as inspiration for your content.
• Wikipedia’s table of contents: Enter your seed keyword in Wikipedia and explore the table of contents of relevant articles. These sections effectively break down all the subtopics related to your keyword, offering a comprehensive overview of what your content could cover.
• Industry podcasts: Listen to popular episodes and note the topics they cover. Podcasts often discuss current trends and issues in the industry, which can be lucrative content ideas.
• YouTube videos in your niche: Pay attention to the titles, descriptions, and even the comments to understand what viewers are interested in and their questions.
• Slideshare presentations: These can provide insights into popular topics and how to structure and present content in an engaging way.
• Quora: Search for your seed keyword and see what questions people ask. These are direct insights into the information your potential customers want to see in your content calendar.
• Reddit: Find relevant subreddits for your industry and browse through the discussions. Reddit can give you a raw, unfiltered view of what your audience is interested in and talking about.

6. Use Google

Google, the most widely used search engine, offers powerful tools that can be instrumental in content creation. Here’s how we make the most of Google’s features for finding content ideas:

• Google Autosuggest: When you start typing a query in Google’s search bar, it automatically suggests related searches based on popular queries by other users. This feature, known as Google Autosuggest, helps you find long-tail keywords and understand what people are searching for concerning your primary keyword.

• People Also Ask: Below the top search results, you’ll often find a "People Also Ask" section. This area lists questions that are related to your search query. Common customer questions can be standalone content topics or part of a larger article.

Insider tip from our agency: After identifying a promising long-tail keyword or a question from “People Also Ask,” you can delve deeper. Re-enter these queries into Google and observe the new Autosuggestions and “People Also Ask” questions. This iterative process can uncover even more specific and targeted content ideas.

You may even learn that eating ice cream at night is packed with health benefits!

7. Subscribe to Industry Newsletters

Industry newsletters are more than just regular emails; they are a window into the heart of your industry news.

We love these newsletters. They help us stay informed, foster creative thinking, and give us fresh content ideas that resonate with different audiences and niches.

Here’s why you can consider it:

• Stay on top of industry trends: Newsletters feature the latest research, innovations, and shifts in the market, which can inspire timely and relevant content.
• Gain multiple perspectives: Newsletters bring together diverse viewpoints from various industry experts, thought leaders, and practitioners in your field. This diversity enriches your understanding and can spark ideas for different content angles.
• Understand topics that interest your potential link partners: By subscribing to industry publications that your peers, competitors, and potential link partners read, you gain insight into the topics they find valuable. This knowledge helps you power your content calendar with relevant topics for content creators in your niche, increasing the likelihood of earning backlinks and collaborations.

8. Use Your Own Experience

Leveraging your experiences is a powerful and authentic way to generate high-quality content. Besides, it builds trust with your target customers.

We honestly love sharing our journey.

We’re not just bragging about our expertise; we want to reveal ourselves as practitioners who understand industry challenges.

Remember: This approach can differentiate your content from generic online information, adding a layer of authenticity and credibility.

Here’s how to turn your unique journey into engaging content:

• Case studies, strategies, and mistakes: Sharing your case studies and strategy provides tangible proof of your expertise and can greatly benefit your audience. Talk about specific projects or campaigns you’ve executed, what worked, what didn’t, and the lessons learned. Your mistakes and the insights you gained from them can be particularly valuable, as they offer a realistic view of the challenges in your field and how to overcome them.
• Content about your tools: Write about the tools and technologies you use in your business. This can include reviews, how-to guides, and comparisons. For example, if you use a specific CRM or marketing automation tool, share your experience with it, why you chose it, and how it has impacted your business.
• Statistics from your business: Share insights and statistics from your sales, customer service, or any other aspect of your business. For instance, if you’ve noticed a particular trend in your sales data or surveyed your customers, these findings can be turned into compelling content.

For example, if you run an e-commerce platform, you might analyze and share data like “X% of our customers prefer mobile shopping over desktop” or “Here’s how many of our clients use social media influencers effectively.”

Such content writing showcases your expertise and provides valuable, data-backed insights to your audience.

Orbit Media is a treasure trove of such examples:

9. Refresh Previous Content

Refreshing previous content is a smart way to maximize the value of your existing work while keeping your content up-to-date and engaging. Besides, you save time and resources and also reinforce your key messages.

Here are a few strategies we’ve used for some of our clients:

• Break down larger topics: If you have comprehensive guides or lengthy articles, consider breaking them into smaller, more focused pieces. For instance, a detailed guide on digital marketing can be split into chapters focusing on SEO, content marketing, social media strategies, etc. This makes the content more digestible and allows you to cover each subtopic more deeply.
• Develop relevant content ideas from successful social media posts: Analyze your social media channels to identify posts that received high audience engagement and many comments. These social posts have already resonated with your audience, so use them as a springboard for more detailed content. For example, a popular Instagram post about a quick marketing tip can be expanded into a full blog post or article discussing that tip in detail.
• Enhance old content with multimedia: Review your older content and see where you can add value with images, videos, infographics, or interactive elements like quizzes. Visual elements make the content more engaging and help you explain complex topics more clearly. For example, an old blog post about data analytics can be spiced up with infographics showing key statistics or trends.
• Convert content into new formats: Transform your existing content into different formats to reach a wider audience. Turn a well-received blog post into a video, a podcast episode, or a webinar. Each format appeals to different audience segments and brings new life into your message. For instance, a popular article on leadership skills can be converted into a video series offering tips and real-life examples in a more dynamic format.

10. Challenge Industry Norms and Statistics [The Evil Twin Technique]

The Evil Twin Technique is a creative content ideation technique that explores the opposite perspective of a commonly held view or practice in your industry.

Here’s how we applied this technique in various blog content and guest posts:

• Identify a common belief or practice: Start by pinpointing a widely accepted belief, standard practice, or popular trend in your industry. This could be anything that is generally considered a best practice or a ‘must-do’ in your field.
• Flip the perspective: Once you have identified such a belief or practice, flip it to its opposite. For example, if the standard advice is always to use email marketing, your evil twin perspective might be, “Why Email Marketing Can Be Ineffective for Your Business.”

Remember: Delve into this opposite perspective and explore it fully. What are the potential drawbacks or limitations of the common belief? Are there scenarios where the opposite might be true? This analysis can lead to interesting insights often overlooked in mainstream discussions.

The Evil Twin Technique is effective because it pushes both the content creator and the audience to think outside the box, challenging assumptions and encouraging a more comprehensive understanding of various issues and practices in your industry.

11. The Coin-Flipside Technique

The Coin-Flipside Technique is another straightforward yet effective method we use in our content process by simply looking at the other side of an existing topic.

This approach involves creating a complementary piece that explores the opposite angle of a previously covered subject.

Here’s how we typically go about it:

• Identify previous content: Start by reviewing your existing content, particularly pieces that were well-received or covered core topics in your field. This could be anything from best practices and success tips to favorite tools and strategies.
• Determine the opposite angle: Consider the inverse perspective for each piece of content you’ve identified. If your original article were about what to do, the flipside would be about what not to do. For example, if you wrote an article titled “5 Best Practices of Content Writing,” the opposite angle would be “5 Mistakes to Avoid in Content Writing.”

Insider tip from our agency: When publishing the new article, reference and link it to the original piece. This boosts SEO through internal linking and offers your audience a comprehensive view of the topic. Readers interested in what to do will also learn what to avoid, making your content more rounded and useful.

12. Ask ChatGPT

Using ChatGPT for content ideation and generation helps you create more tailored content.

That’s because ChatGPT allows for a conversational approach to ideation.

You can input your initial ideas or questions, and through its responses, it helps refine and expand those ideas. This interactive feedback loop can lead to more nuanced and audience-relevant content topics.

Plus, ChatGPT has a vast database of knowledge and learning, so it can offer a wide range of ideas, covering various angles and perspectives you might not have considered.

And, of course, it can assist in the actual creation of content. It can help draft outlines, suggest headings, write introductions, or even create entire pieces of content.

Real-life example: If you’re a tech company looking to create content about AI trends, you can start a conversation with ChatGPT about the latest developments in AI, common misconceptions, and future predictions.

Wrapping Up

In this article, we’ve armed you with a comprehensive set of strategies and tools to master the art and science of content creation.

From leveraging advanced SEO tools to our agency’s unique techniques like the Evil Twin and Coin-Flipside, we’ve shown you how to keep the well of ideas flowing.

The essence of generating infinite content ideas lies in maintaining curiosity, adaptability, and strategic thinking, always aligning with your audience’s evolving interests.

That said, if you ever hit a creative roadblock, remember our SEO agency is here to help. Our expert team of SEO writers crafts engaging, insightful content for companies and provides top-tier white-label writing services for other SEO agencies.

Set a free strategy call, and let’s unlock your full content potential.