At The Australian Financial Review there used to be a cherished tradition. For every major news event a small group of reporters and section editors would retreat to a room with a whiteboard and hammer out a dozen angles on the story—who did it affect, who wins, what happens next, what did this person think, can we interview so-and-so and on and on. All the angles—good ones, bad ones and plain dumb ones—were written on the whiteboard.
Then, after half an hour or so, the editor would invariably enter the room, erase the whiteboard and say: ‘OK let’s start again’.
Infuriating as the process was, it created a rare skill in those who suffered through it repeatedly. They began to get really good at generating ideas for content.
As major news events came around, the AFR was known for its ability to quickly file dozens of news pages of thorough, innovative and insightful stories.
The lesson we took is that generating ideas is a skill that can be learnt—and must be practised.
This post aims to distil that skill to its 10 component parts.
Know your audience. Who are they, what are they doing, what do they need and how do they think? Content must be targeted at an audience. The best way to know your audience is to talk to them. The second-best way is to talk to the people closest to them. That means anyone in your organisation with a direct line to the audience—salespeople, marketers, the call centre.
Listen to the audience. Once you know them, keep an ear open to what they are saying. Most of an organisation’s best content comes in response to answering questions asked by the audience.
Talk to each other. It’s really hard to come up with good ideas on your own. They must be stress tested by other people. The people in your organization that have all the raw material for your content, the subject matter experts, are the ones you should approach first.
Anyone can come up with a good idea. Diversity of thought creates better outcomes. We often see people from the same function trying to generate ideas. It can be very difficult because there's no diversity of thought or experience in the room.
Put opposing views in the same room. The friction between differing views is a terrific source of strong content ideas.
Read. Read other publications, other people’s work, your competitor’s output and all the various information that comes into your office on a daily basis. Even read material not related to your work. It’s a similar principle to diversity of thought – the more diversity of material you consume, the better the ideas that you will generate.
Repeat. Your audience’s needs change and new groups of people come through looking for your content. This means great ideas can be repeated and still find relevance with new audiences.
Calendars. Knowing the major events your audience are interested in gives you an easy way to plan content.
Ask really dumb questions. When you ask a so-called dumb question in a crowded room often plenty of other people strain to hear the answer. When you work at a company and you’re deep into a subject, it’s easy to overestimate your colleagues and customers’ knowledge.
Do it regularly. Generating content ideas isn’t something you want to do once a year. If you don’t do it regularly you don’t get good at it.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
