January is just a few weeks away. Are you wondering what you’ll be writing about on your business blog in the new year? Take some time this week to pause and reflect on the past year. The questions people asked, the lessons you learned, the highlights, challenges, surprises, and wisdom you’ll carry into the new year, those are all potential blog topics.
You don’t need to write the blog posts now. But this is a great time to make a list of topics you’d like to cover. When you know what you’re going to write, the process is a lot easier.
Here are some examples of how the past year’s experiences can lead to blog topics for your new year:
1. What were the most common questions you were asked this year? Jot down the top 3-5 questions. The answers to those questions can become 3-5 blog posts for the new year. You know those will be valuable posts for your clients and prospects because they’re already asking these questions.
You don’t need to write those posts yet. But if you want, you can make a bullet-point list of how you’ve answered each question for clients. That will prompt your memory when it’s time to write. It’s easier to build on a list than write from scratch.
2. What were your highlights of the year? Successes, surprises, things you want to remember, things that could encourage your clients? Jot those down. Highlight the ones you’d enjoy writing about. Make a bullet point list of the main highlights and the ways each story would help your clients. Those are more blog topics for your new year.
3. What were the biggest challenges you faced this year in your business? How did you overcome them? What lessons did you learn? What wisdom will you carry forward?
For challenges, you can write a problem-solution blog post. Describe the problem. Then list the solutions and the outcome. Close with how this challenge helped you and brought you to a better place going forward.
Again, you don’t need to write the post today, unless you feel inspired. Just create a bullet-point list to capture the highlights, so you’ll remember when it’s time to write.
For lessons learned and wisdom, a listicle blog post is great. A listicle post is a bullet-point list with short explanations after each point. Listicles are simple to write. And they’re easy for your readers to follow. They’re shareable too.
Jot down 3-5 lessons learned this year. Write a list of the takeaways, the wisdom you’ll carry forward. Your listicle will almost be done, and you can just polish it when it’s time to publish.
4. One more approach you can take is to look at the blog posts you published in the past year. See which ones had the most engagement. Consider how to repurpose and republish those top posts in the new year.
Can you update those posts? Present them from a new angle? Use new examples? People love to read repurposed posts. They appreciate the reminder and the new insights. Others may have missed the original post and will benefit from the repurposed post.
If you take some time this week to reflect, while the events of the past year are fresh in your mind, jot down ideas, make bullet point lists, you’ll have a head start on your blogging for the new year. Go ahead and assign some of those topics for January, and you’ll be ready to grow your blog.
As the new year unfolds, make notes as you go along: lessons, breakthroughs, questions, highlights. That way, you can keep a running list of topics. You’ll never have to wonder again what you’re going to blog about.
Best wishes for your blogging and business success in the new year. Be blessed.
Janet Eriksson 