Business Inspiration

Where Can Content Come From?

Looking for ways to generate interesting, relevant, useful, valuable, searchable, remarkable content? Consider using the following to help get your content generation juices flowing:

  • You could describe your product/service
  • You can teach people how to use your product/service
  • You can inform customers about news and relevant information to their needs beyond your product/service
  • You can tell stories how others use your product/service
  • You can let your customers tell the stories and describe what’s most meaningful to them
  • You can help your customers help other customers use your products/services
  • You could just listen…what are they saying about you, your company, your products/services, your competitors, your industry and more
  • You could also do nothing at all

Sometimes generating content can be as easy as asking someone to have a conversation.

Where do you get great content from? I'd like to know.

~Keep the learning going, pass it on!

You could describe your product/service

You can teach people how to use your product/service

You can inform customers about news and relevant information to their needs beyond your product/service

You can tell stories how others use your product/service

You can let your customers tell the stories and describe what’s most meaningful to them

You can help your customers help other customers use your products/services

You could just listen…what are they saying about you, your company, your products/services, your competitors, your industry and more

You could also do nothing at all

Where Do You Find Your Inspiration?

To look at something differently, to recognize something you’ve never seen before, to feel for something in a different way, to realize something could be done that was never done before—all of these things can be the result of being inspired. Here are just a few ways people experience being inspired: a sound, a smell, an article, a picture, a lecture, a meal, a sculpture, a piece of wood, a stack of $100 bills, a child being given a glass of water, a cancer victim crossing a finish line, a smile on someone’s face after experiencing you or your business. Being inspired can lead to innovation and action.

When I’m inspired I can describe a problem in a new way, develop new material, create a new service or product, connect with a prospect I never could connect with before, reconnect with old customers to discuss something new. Finding inspiration helps me and those I work with to be fresh, interesting, motivating, engaging and worth other people’s time. Being inspired can be inspiring to others.

I find inspiration in blogs that I follow, websites I watch, people I keep up with in the industries that they influence. Inspiration comes from articles, programs, lectures, books, pictures and the world around me. There’s inspiration everywhere. When I stay focused on one project or task and I don’t take the time to look around in my business, in my customer’s business, in my industry or the industries of my customer’s customer then I find myself falling short on inspiration.

Here are just a few of the many places I turn to for inspiration: Wall Street Journal, www.wsj.com, Chris Brogan: www.chrisbrogan.com, Tech Crunch: www.techcrunch.com, AdWeek: www.adweek.com, American Marketing Association: www.marketingpower.com, Social Media Today: www.socialmediatoday.com, International Erosion Control Association: www.ieca.org, travel to new cities and countries, my local museum and parks, talking to my existing customers regularly and reaching out to new customers and learning about their business and industry.

Where do you find your inspiration? What have you done to inspire others? Two great questions you can explore as you grow your business and your customer’s business too!

Let me know where you find your inspiration and how you may have inspired others by posting a comment here.

~Keep the learning going...pass it on!