Note: I’ve posted an update to this post to reflect Google’s new interface.
Here’s a tip for you to get ideas for content for your blogs, articles and products. It’s using Google to find the latest chatter about your topic.
Let’s say my topic is “motivation”. I want to write a chapter or article with suggestions on “how to stay motivated”, but I’m not really sure what would be a good, realistic example or what angle to take. So my first thought would be to find out what people are having trouble staying motivated to do these days. This is what I’d do:
I’d go to Google and search for “how to stay motivated”. What’s going to show is a list of the most popular articles or sites, most linked to sites, and most SEO’d sites.
This is not what I want. I want to find the most recent chatter and discussion about “how to stay motivated” – what people are talking about and asking about motivation. Where can I find that? Blogs of course! So I’d click on Show Options. Then select Blogs. Now, to find the most recent discussions, I’d click the Past 24 hours. This will let me see what the most recent blog posts and comments have been about my topic. Also, I want to make sure the results are sorted by relevance.
It appears here that people are really wanting to know how to stay motivated to lose weight. There are a few posts about staying motivated for your business and sticking to your goals, but most of these are about fitness and losing weight! That’s what I’d probably write about.
Now, when taking this approach, keep in mind that there are many people who create niche sites using Blogger and WordPress. They will highly optimize their articles in order to gain high rankings in the search engines. If you search for a popular keyword phrase, like “how to lose weight” you might want to check out to make sure it’s not a niche blog because these won’t truly represent what people are really talking about.
I hope this helps!
Follow me on Twitter: melaniekissell
Wonderful tips and wonderful lesson, Gwen! This is so helpful.
With my busy, crazy life and work schedule, this type of mini tutorial is perfect for me!
Any way I could keep you in my back pocket?
Melanie
(#blog30)
Melanie Kissell´s last blog ..Fabulous Follow Friday Friends
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Excellent tip – I didn’t even know this and I live on Google! Thanks Gwen. Especially using the example about how to stay motivated. That might help some of us 30 dayers as we come sagging down the stretch.
Great post too with the screen shots. Livens things up and allows the visual folks to really get it fast.
Terrie
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/HeatherBestel
Thanks so much for this Gwen – I didn’t know about this either and will be having fun with it very soon.
I agree with Terrie about the screenshots – makes it much easier to understand.
Really appreciate this post.
much love
Heather x
Heather Bestel´s last blog ..I was part of something special today!
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Great information Gwen. I like the screenshots too, nice job!
Another great place to do research and find out what people are talking about on a subject is Twitter Search. You’ll see all kinds of comments, links to articles and blogs, and questions people have. It works great and is up to the minute.
Deb Augur´s last blog ..WordPress 3.0 is Coming With Major Changes
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I love to use Google, but never thought to use it this way to come up with ideas for writing. You could also use this technique for blog commenting too! Hmm…Gwen you always get my brain going..=)
Jaime´s last blog ..My Fab 5 – Online Gurus
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In response to Jaime’s comment:
Hi Jaime,
LOL, well dont let your brain run away. I see that Google changed their home page again, so now I have to redo my screenshots – grrrrrr!!!!
Gwen
Follow me on Twitter: gwenatanner
In response to Deb’s comment:
Hi Deb,
Very good tip, I will try that out too. I’m still trying to figure twitter out. I’m sure its one of the most simple things out there to use – but Twitter and Facebook still get confusing to me LOL
Thanks for visiting,
Gwen
Follow me on Twitter: TheHighRoad
Gwen
This has got to be one of the most helpful posts I’ve read in the past month. Top 5 to be honest. This is helping me put together my new teleseminar series. You ar a JEAN-yus!
Peace
Follow me on Twitter: gwenatanner
In response to Vernon’s comment:
Hi Vernon,
Thanks, of course Google has updated their home page so now I have to update the post LOL
Thanks for visiting,
Gwen
Follow me on Twitter: brightwings
hi Gwen,
Now this post is so valuable. I’ve been using google alerts for selected keywords but this is even better because it’s the results are much more relevant.
And I had not even thought about ways to get really current info on what’s happening in several of my target markets.
Thanks for sharing an extremely useful and easy tip today!
Nancy
Nancy Boyd´s last blog ..Who Can You Help, Part One
[...] profitable. Hours spent on keyword research, scrolling through forums and Yahoo Answers, reading current chatter on blogs – a big chunk of time is spent understanding their target market. But once that’s [...]