Social media posting, especially on Instagram, needs to be consistent and engaging to captivate an audience.
With social media being a nonstop platform, you need to be consistently producing content to stay relevant, but how do you do this ALL the time.
As you are reading this, you will be thinking, but yes, how can I never run out of content? Easy, there are many methods you can use and many steps you can take to ensure you never run out of those content ideas.
What you need to always remember is, you don't want to be creating content and posting to Instagram because you have been told "you must post daily", you need to make sure what you are posting will add value and engage your audience. It is all about the balance between quality and quantity.
Ask Your Target Audience What They Want
Your target audience is the one reading and engaging in your content (so that is what you want to achieve). Ask them what they want! Go on your IG stories, create polls and ask the questions!
Direct message your potential or current clients and find out what they are having trouble with, what their pain points and concerns are! Then you start forming content ideas from what they are telling you!
It might be that you think you know exactly what they want, so you create content based on your thoughts, but if you aren’t getting the engagement you want, ask and find out!
Also, if you check in every three months, you will continue to generate content ideas.
Use Third Party Websites to Help You
What if you don’t have a huge audience yet? Or what if they never answer your questions?
Simple, use platforms like Ubersuggest, Google Trends and Answer the Public. These sites use what is being searched across the internet to form suggestions and topics for you to discuss.
Once you start producing content on these topics, you will find more engagement and more connection with your target audience so then you can revert back to the above suggestion.
Keep track of all these topics using an excel or Google sheets document, that way you can keep track of what you have already produced content around, and you know when you are getting low on topics and need to research more.
Create Content Using "The Four Pillars of Content Creating"
What are the "four pillars of content"? It is a framework created by Content Queen, and it uses four different themes you can adapt to create content. Under each pillar, you can write ideas and suggestions to fill in the gaps.
These include:
- Inform: This is all about informing your audience around "who you are", "what your business is about" and "what you can offer"
- Educate: you want to use this pillar to educate your target audience around your niche and industry, these are the value-added long-form Instagram posts
- Engage: This is where you ask people to interact and have their input. You can use these to have a conversation with your audience and also weave these into your educational and informative posts
- Fun: the ‘behind the scenes’ of your business and the types of IG posts that make your business unique! These are always enjoyable pieces of content to create. Don’t be afraid to be personal here! What inspires you?
You can use these pillars to start mapping out your content using that excel sheet or Google doc mentioned earlier.
Plan Your Content in Advance
Planning is the key to staying on top of your content and to ensure you always have the ideas flowing. When your Instagram content is on your mind, you will always be looking out for content ideas in your everyday life.
But the best way to get these ideas flowing is by having a plan and a strategy. Plan out your objectives for Instagram, how often you want to be showing up, and what type of content you will produce. Weave this in with the content pillars, and you will have yourself a little plan. This way, you will know when you are showing up and what topics you will be discussing.
Have Objectives Around Your Content Creating
Make sure you set goals around your Instagram content. What do you want to achieve? What is your main objective from your page?
Have monthly, quarterly and yearly goals, that way you know what you are trying to achieve, and you can plan your content accordingly.
Once you have the goals in place, it will be easier to understand the types of content ideas you will need to be producing and the call to actions you need to add in each post.
Be The Expert in Your Industry
Once you become an expert in your industry/niche, it makes it a lot easier to brainstorm content ideas.
If you are constantly researching and learning, you will ALWAYS have topics to talk about with your audience.
As a business, your goal is to be the resource hub for your existing and potential clients/customers. So, the more information you provide your audience, the more they will come to you, not just to buy but to educate themselves.
If you use your Instagram to provide this information as well as promote your business and your products/services, it will be a great mix for engagement. Plus, it allows you to fill your feed with more than just sales posts.
Final thoughts
To never run out of things to talk about on Instagram, you need to do your research and immerse yourself in your industry and niche.
Once you focus your energy on the content, you will be creating. You will always generate topics to discuss. When you start building engaging content, people will be asking you questions which you can be using for content and conversation on IG.
Whenever you get a question, note it down, it can be used to discuss on your social platforms. It is all about looking deeper than just on the surface or at the obvious.