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How to Come Up With Better Ideas
My three-step method for coming up with better ideas for articles
If there’s one thing you should know about this article, it’s that the ideas you think are shaped by what you consume. Therefore, if you want better ideas, the simple answer is to take in better information.
Easy, right?
Friends and colleagues often ask me how I am so prolific with generating content. At first, I confess it was a matter of summarizing and regurgitating content I had read or learned previously. But almost everyone does that these days with books, and while you can come up with a creative angle to your article, it likely won’t impress a lot of readers.
Then, I started writing about my personal experiences. Although I have a lot to share over the many decades I have been alive, again, this source quickly peters out. I found that readers are not interested in my life or my stories, only in what they can use to improve their lives — i.e., what’s in it for them?
Since I have transitioned to writing five times a week, I knew I needed to develop a system that could help me generate ideas. As long as I had good ideas, I could worry about the writing, marketing, and formatting later.