Writing a blog is easy enough. The hard part is maintaining it. And while lack of motivation for upkeep can lead to neglect, it’s continually having to generate content that often leads bloggers toward project abandonment. In regards to this, Slaughter Development’s founder has some good advice.

Recently, Robby Slaughter provided a guest post for Delivra’s Blog, emailchatr. In his post, You Have More Content Than You Realize, Slaughter dives into a question we often receive here at The Methodology Blog: how do we produce so much content? Below is the brief post that outlines an answer as eye-opening as it is simple.

When people check out our productivity blog, they sometimes ask me how we come up with all of our content. “There’s no way I could write that much about our organization”, they say. My reply is always the same: “You have more content than you realize.”

Naturally, it’s easy to debunk the “content generation is hard” by listing open-ended questions. Here’s a bunch just off the top of my head:

• How did your company get started?
• Who was your first customer?
• What’s the biggest misconception about your industry?
• What do you hope to accomplish next year?
• Who is one of your strategic partners, and why?
• What great idea did you have that turned out to be a flop?
• What’s a great story about how you saved the day?
• What’s industry innovation most excites you?
• What are the legal issues in your industry?
• How do you go about finding new employees?
• What’s something that tells you that a customer is going to work out well?

Answering any of these prompts will of course make great fodder for your email marketing campaigns. Think of any brand that you currently follow—wouldn’t you love to hear someone inside their organization talk about any of these topics? We all adore stories.

It’s easy to complain about the challenge of generating story ideas for your online marketing campaigns, but in truth the real challenge is deciding what not to say. Once you begin to share your beliefs and your experiences, the content floodgates are open. It’s often harder to stop talking than it is to keep the conversation going. That is: once you actually begin.

If you are looking for inspiration when creating blog content, consider subscribing to our weekly newsletter. The brief electronic update highlights recent posts on The Methodology Blog and provides additional information on Productivity Short Talks and upcoming events. Don’t hesitate, get into the conversation today!

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Tags: better blogging, blogging, blogging faster, blogging ideas, guest blogs, improve blogging, productivity