The other day I wrote about content farming and blogging.

For the past 3 to 5 years there has been a trend in the online world. Large companies were being rewarded with natural traffic and ad revenue for creating an immense amount of content. Eventually the goals of those sites became the sheer volume of content pages they were creating. The trend resulted in the loss of quality.

Today, Google is making an effort to reward sites that create quality content. One example of the issue is when an original source of great content doesn’t even get recognized by a search engine like Google for having the original content. In some of these situations it will be a more popular blog or aggregating site that is rewarded for content.

Now, I feel Google has always tried to provide the best results for web users. It’s in Google’s best interest to have happy customers. I think things just got a bit out of hand, it’s been acknowledged, and the future looks bright for web users.

The obvious point of that article was that business blogs need to step up to the challenge and deliver the best content they can. Frequency and consistency are still important. Finding a balance of quality and quantity is key.

But the most common question I get is…

What do I write about?

Business Blog Topic Ideas

Here are a few of the ways you can create content web users find valuable. A few will be obvious and a few will surprise you I think…

Interpretation

This one is my favorite and it’s what I want to start the list with.

It’s the age of information and with the saturation of info there is a need from people for interpretation. People are looking at the news and happenings in the world and wanting to know how to react, how to understand, and how to live.

A popular blogging method is to take the news relevant to your business blog, cite the source, perhaps share a paragraph or so of the original news on your post and then spend the rest of the post providing your insight and interpretation of the news. What does this news mean for your customers? How will this news affect your customer’s lives?

Interpretation is important. It’s in demand. Interpretation is a great way to use a piece of information that is not yours and using it for 10-20% of the content and then expanding on it with 80-90% of content that is your interpretation.

On my own blog, Country Music Life I find success by providing my own interpretation of new country songs. I’m not the first to report that a new song is out at radio. There is no way I can stay on top of the latest news in the country world. It would be hard I find it best if I just wait for others to start reporting on the new songs. I listen and then provide my interpretation of the song. It seems to be valuable for some people.

This is a quality way to write content.

Advice

Advice columns are nothing new. People have been seeking advice on all kinds of topics for ages. In the age of information there is still a need to share insight, knowledge and advice with people.

You’re the expert in your field. With your blog you’re trying to help your potential customers and sharing your best advice and insight is a great way to get their attention. Share the things no one else can possibly share and you’ll be seen as a leader in your industry.

I guess this post could be an advice post. It’s certainly not the best example, but it’s an attempt.

Unique Research

Research is tough. It takes the right mindset to take hours and hours to find information and even when you have the information you have to organize it in a way that makes sense to people.

The value in research is the results and how those results affect the way people view the world.

Unique research that impacts the way your customers see the world is something valuable and when you hit on something that really impacts your customer you’ll find you have a blog post that can grow extremely popular in your industry.

I tried it recently on CML with First Country Hit Song Research.

Case Studies

Case studies take a lot of work. Good case studies take time. The reason a good case study takes time is because there needs to be a long period of change from nothing to strong results to impress potential readers and customers. When done effectively case studies are great, real world, examples of success you and readers can improve.

Unique News

It’s tough. It really is tough, but providing unique news is still a great way to provide quality content. It’s a tiring game of trying to get the biggest scoop, but there are always new blogs and sites out there that get a scoop and make it big. It’s possible you could get a big scoop in your industry and become an authority figure.

Summary

Creating quality content has always been important.

In the past few years though there was a little sideways action in the web world. Content farming became a way to gain traffic and revenue. There was more of an incentive to favor quantity over quality. Now, that trend is getting back to something useful for web users again and it’s a good trend.

For you, this means finding the blend between quantity, consistency, and quality.

I hope the ideas for blog posts above help you find the successful blend for your business blog.

Harvest Time image courtesy of Brian Forbes