5 ways to make sure you never run out of content ideas

When I chatted to my audience and did a survey at end of 2020, one of the questions I asked was, “What's holding you back? What's your biggest challenge when it comes to starting a podcast?” And one of the answers that came up quite a lot was the worry that you would run out of content ideas and the worry that it would be really hard to stay consistent.

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How to never run out of content ideas for your podcast

Today I'm sharing five ways to make sure that you never run out of content ideas for your podcast or for your future podcast. And if you haven't launched your podcast yet, I would highly recommend you jump on my free podcasting masterclass.

 

#1 – Survey your audience

We can guess what's going on in their heads as much as we want, but until you survey them you're not going to realize what their real struggles are. And every year I do a big annual survey. I offer my audience a $5 donation to a particular charity in return for each person who answers my survey. We had over 200 people who completed my survey at the end of 2020, which was awesome because it was over $1000 to donate!

 

#2 – Build into your email sequences

The second way to make sure you never run out of content ideas is to build it into your email sequences. When somebody is downloading a freebie from you, they would hopefully get added to your email list and you hopefully have an email matching sequence in place that they receive after they get the freebie. All you need to do is in one of those emails, ask a question. Just be like, “Hey. Hit reply and let me know what your biggest challenge is when it comes to launching a podcast.” Simple. That's all it is. You'll be surprised how many people do this. A lot of people hit reply and let you know.

 

#3 – Get on a Zoom call with people in your audience

Jump on a Zoom call with a few people in your audience. Pick out five really engaged followers or those three email subscribers who always reply to every email you sent out. Jump on a Zoom call with them, one on one, not all at the same time, and deep dive with them. Ask them, “What's your challenge? Why is this a challenge? Why is that a problem for you?” Really get to the why, the crux of the issues, because it's going to give you a lot of content for both your free products and for your paid products. When I say free products I mean your free content and your paid products.

 

#4 – Put up a question sticker on Instagram Stories

For example, “What's holding you back from launching a podcast?” might be a question that I would put out to my audience. Or, “What's holding you back from creating a digital product?” And then see what people reply and start one to one conversations with them in your DMs. Say, for example, somebody replied through my question sticker asking, “What's holding you back from starting a podcast?” and they said, “Well, I'm worried I'm going to run out of content ideas.” I would reply to them and start a conversation and say, “Well, what makes you think that you're going to run out of content ideas? Have you spoken to your audience? Why haven't you spoken to your audience?” And really, just figuring out a little bit more about the problems and how you can add value to their lives.

 

#5 – Always be listening to your audience

Pay attention to comments. Pay attention to what your audience is posting in Facebook groups. Look at what they're asking. What are they afraid of? Where are they getting stuck? Where do they need help? Pay attention to these things. And whenever you notice something that could potentially be an idea for a piece of content, make a note of it. I have a folder in my notes on my phone where I just brain dump content ideas. I'll often be reading a book about something completely unrelated and it'll give me an idea for a piece of content so I'll make a note of it. Otherwise, when you go to create your content these ideas will not be anywhere to be found. So, if you got them somewhere handy then you can refer back to them.

 

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