Do you ever feel you’ll run out of content ideas?

When you’re on a roll with thinking about and sharing content, one feeling that might creep up on you is that you’ll run out of content.

It’ll be dry by the end of the week.

I won’t have any more to say.

I’ll say all the best bits, all the valuable stuff and then poof – nothing.

It’s quite funny really isn’t it – imagining we’ll write or share ourselves dry.

But the reality is very different. Especially when you’re sharing from a place of creativity and intrigue. This usually means you’re sharing from a place of inquiry (of yourself and to others) and exploration rather than the expectation of finite results and need for an absolute outcome.

The reality is different because I find the opposite happens. When you share apparently all you can, you realise there’s so much more you need to share on each topic you’ve already shared.

I can now picture it like a car park. In this instance, an almost full one.

You drive around each level to find a space and not until you get to the very top do you find that one. But next time, you realise there’s some space on level 1 instead of level 7 so you park in one there this time. And the next time it’s level 3. Each time you go, you find a different spot, in a different level; still in the same carpark though.

How you share what you talk about, your expertise, your brilliance is the same.

Your business is held up by specialist area of support – that’s usually your niche, and any micro niche you work in, your expertise and skills, and your chosen best audience you want to work with – and this means there’s main topics you’ll likely always cover (the levels – there might be around 5 or perhaps up to 10 but usually not hundreds).

And within those main topics, there’s lots of ways you can cover the same overarching area. With lots of angles you might choose to come at it from, so you’re always covering similar things but with a new take on it all, with your own clear opinions, new case studies, even a model you developed, and more.

Plus new services you offer, new skills you have that help you talk about, say, level 3 even better next time etc.

Oh also – you might go back to exactly the same parking spot, but YOU’VE changed, you’ve got something new to say about that parking spot this time. Oh, and, and, you might NOT have something new to say or share on exactly the same thing but then how often do YOU need to hear/see the SAME thing to buy into it? A few good times right?

In reality then, it’s actually kind of overwhelming how much you could talk about – all the little details you can cover because of how much you specifically know that no-one else does. It COULD blow your mind. And for some of us it does. We’re tied up in knots thinking it over and over, whether we should cover X part or Y part or this type or that type.

Really all we need to do is come back to our core understanding of our favourite people to work with, their specific needs (at the deepest level we can describe it because they then recognise themselves in what you’re saying!), our expert take on it for them to know we deeply understand, and our clear, very clear, way of showing how we can support them further. Sometimes you spell that out in manageable ways with clear ‘if you want to work with me’ style call outs. Other times you leave it open. For discussion, chat, reflection. Or you just end the share/post because that’s what you needed to be able to share it sooner rather than later (like I do a little too often I must say).

Getting into the habit of knowing you will ALWAYS have plenty to say and worrying about the details later, I believe, is a wonderful way to know you’ll always be able to generate the leads you want through public channels like social media, and your more intimate spaces like any group you hold or your email, without worrying you’ll dry up and need to re-think your whole business.

On that note – how does that fit into my time away from public channels recently?

That time away was intended due to needing to reduce my brain capacity and focus on client delivery. It was also the need to rest, and recharge. And I wasn’t thinking I have nothing to say, or that I’ve dried up and can’t produce content.

I actually just didn’t WANT to – it didn’t feel right, I wasn’t in the right headspace or feeling and I didn’t want to produce scheduled content just because I needed to stay present on social media.

I had the luxury of being quiet for a while – the luxury because I’d earned it through the work I’ve done on my business these last few years, through reputation allowing me to be quiet for which I’m incredibly grateful, and then for the NEED to do it anyway.

I always knew, and know still, I value QUALITY content over any amount of it. I’d rather read 1 amazing post from someone once a month than 12 pieces of something that frankly won’t help me. But that’s VERY subjective on what’s ‘quality’ content, and what will and won’t help me. So don’t be fooled into thinking you can guess what everyone wants and needs. But please, please, go by what you KNOW to be highly valuable based on what you’ve done before, what you’ve LOVED producing and getting feedback on, what’s been easy AND powerful to create, and keep doing THAT.

Oh and that content you’re brewing, stewing and waiting on? Just start, and post, the damn content – you’ll realise how good it was, and how much you want to edit it AND how much more you could say on it all, only once it’s out there!