How to Come Up with Ideas to Write About for Your Articles

I make my living writing web content which isn't always the easiest thing. Like most people I sometimes have periods where I'm just not sure what to write about, or where I run out of ideas or topics. Since if I don't write I don't get paid, I've come up with a number of techniques to help me come up with ideas for what to write about. Here are the techniques I use to jog my brain and come up with ideas for my writing.

1. Make a list of topics you are interested in. This may sound strange because after all we know what topics we like don't we? Not necessarily, yes you probably know what you like, but what you may not realize is there may be more than one topic possibility connected to what you are interested in. For example, maybe you are interested in fashion, there are a number of topics that you could focus on such as teen fashion, fashion fads, fashion for the middle-aged woman, or even fashion as it relates to modeling which can be somewhat different than what the average person wears.

2. Brainstorm subtopics. Choose a topic from your list of topics and either circle it or put a line under it and then write down as many subtopics as you can think of that would fit under that topic. This can give you many ideas for your articles that you may not have thought of before.

3. Check out other article places online and see what other writers are writing about. This can give you ideas in that maybe you will read something and think of a completely different angle on the same topic for example. Also, you might want to take the opposing viewpoint and write an article countering what you've just read.

4. Read blogs on topics that interest you. Blogs are a great way to get ideas for articles because they are so varied; someone has an opinion about any topic you can imagine. Reading these opinions and thoughts by others may jog your brain into a whole new idea(s) for an article(s).

5. Make a list of things you know how to do. You'd be surprised how much fun it is to write an article explaining how to do something. Most everyone likes to learn how to do something new once in a while. This works especially well if it is something that not everyone knows how to do.

Always writing, and looking for new ideas will keep your articles fresh.

Credit: Jane M. Sawyer and www.morguefile.com

Copyright: Jane M. Sawyer and www.morguefile.com