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How To Brainstorm Article Topics

By Steve Shaw

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 24May2009 Word count: 773 Viewed: 197 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

Article marketing is attractive to so many people because you don't need to be any sort of SEO guru to do it.

Yes, you can increase your search engine rankings and drive traffic to your website with little to no technical expertise--that's great news isn't it?

The accessibility of article marketing is what makes it a perennial popular online marketing tool. Where the challenge pops up is in the creativity department. Article marketing requires steadily submitting articles, so you need to be constantly generating ideas for articles.

Where most article marketers fail is not in anything technical--it's in simply not submitting enough articles.

Have you ever sat down to write an article and found yourself twiddling your thumbs not knowing what to write about?

Have you ever procrastinated writing the articles that you know you need to write to the point where you've totally fallen out of the habit and you're months behind your article submission goals?

Have you ever dreaded sitting down to write and felt like it was near torture to crank out another article?

Have you ever given up on article marketing because you just couldn't get into the habit of writing?

You're not alone--so many people experienced those same feelings of "Oh no--it's time to write another article."

But I have a solution for you. This is a solution that I came up with after getting fed up with wanting to submit more articles and not being able to come up with ideas fast enough.

Here's my trick:

I do a brainstorming session every month or so. That's just one brainstorming session to create enough article ideas to last me at least a month, but possibly several months.

When I sit down for my brainstorming session I ask myself these questions to spark ideas:

1) What can I teach a beginner in my field?

As experts, we can sometimes forget that most of our customers are in the "beginner" category.

If you can tap into the mindset of a person new to your niche, then you have unlocked a treasure chest of article ideas. After all--who needs more information than a beginner?

Beginners need to know everything--they may even need an article explaining what your niche is and why they should be interested in it.

Here are some other perks for writing for newbies:

*Articles on basic principles are often the easiest to write. In beginner level articles you're relaying ideas that you know backwards and forwards, so you don't really need to rack your brain to get the ideas down on the page.

*Articles geared toward beginners have the added bonus of increasing your target market--if you can peak the interest of someone who is vaguely interested in your topic, you can ignite a flame of interest in them.

Remember, everyone has to start somewhere--your target customers don't just naturally know everything there is to know about your field. Many times they need you to hold their hand and walk them through the front door into your niche.

When we're thinking of article topics, sometimes we can make the mistake of thinking only about articles on our own skill level, but don't forget about the beginners!

2) What can I teach an intermediate person in my field?

This is a person who is familiar with your niche and who might have years of experience, but who still has room to grow. Imagine a person who has learned the basics and is gaining more confidence--most of the time when people get used to doing an activity or learning a new concept, they want to progress and grow in knowledge.

What can you offer someone who is beyond the basic stage but who wants to advance?

Quickly jot down your ideas and don't worry about how the ideas will translate into articles. When you've completed your brainstorming session you can tweak your article ideas and possibly weed out any that aren't strong enough. Also, ideas that aren't strong enough to stand on their own may still have a place in one of your articles.

3) What keywords are my potential customers typing into Google to reach sites like mine?

You can discover this type of info by using a keyword suggestion tool such as WordTracker. Use the keywords you come up with as idea ideas by writing an article around each keyword.

Doing a brainstorming session for article ideas really help you write more efficiently.

And always be ready to write down new ideas--keep a pad of paper and pen with you in the car, at the gym, at the grocery store--many times when the ideas start flowing you're nowhere near your desk!

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