5 Powerful Words that Show Surprise + Writing Prompts
1. Shock
I was utterly shocked! I had never seen anything like it. It walked up to and I stood deathly still. It smelled me. I thought for sure my life was over. But then something very strange happened that I still have a hard time explaining to this day.
2. Startled
“Hey, Jane!”
“Ahhh!”
“What?!”
“Oh, nothing! You just startled me is all!”
3. Bewilderment
I was dumbfounded. Struck by complete bewilderment. What had led him to do that? And today of all days.
Did he not know that would be the dumbest thing he could do today? And yet he did it anyway?
After all, it was Valentine’s day. Who does that on Valentine’s day?
4. Disbelief
I stood there in disbelief. How could I have known the events that would follow? How could I foresee the monumental change that about to befall our entire town?
5. Astonishment
As the pie slowly dripped down my face, I couldn’t hide my rage and astonishment. I didn’t want to. All I wanted to do was find another item of sticky dessert and smush it all in her hair and face and dress. The stickier the better. Oh and the stains, I wanted to find one that would stain everything she owned. I wanted to dump a truckload of pie into her new car and house, but what I did next surprised even me.
5 Powerful Words that Show Surprise + Writing Prompts
If you enjoy Powerful Words that Show Surprise, Storytelling and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
If you enjoy Powerful Words that Show Surprise, Storytelling and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
5 Powerful Words that Show Surprise + Writing Prompts
Use power words to take your reader’s attention.
Draw their eyes and attention to where you want it the most.
Wake the reader up from zoning out while they are reading your piece.
Use power words strategically to get them from idea to idea.
Use simple power words that are easy to understand but that pack a punch compared to other boring words.
Write powerful words to keep your sentences interesting to your reader.
Don’t lose them by not drawing their attention back from losing focus.
When doing freelance writing projects use power words to write better-converting headlines and subject lines.
In blogging use power words in the titles and subheadings.
In emails use them in headlines and subject lines.
Don’t overdo it. Don’t try to force many into any one sentence unless it calls for it.
Hopefully, this fast short post helps you think through some of your own writing and where you can incorporate simple power words in a meaningful, natural, and effective way.
Hope this helps!
Happy writing!
5 Powerful Words that Show Surprise + Writing Prompts
If you enjoy Powerful Words that Show Surprise, Storytelling and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
If you enjoy Powerful Words that Show Surprise, Storytelling and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
If you enjoy 5 Simple Power Words and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
If you enjoy 5 Simple Power Words and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
Her skin is striking compared to last week. The only thing that could make sense of it is that ointment she’s been putting on religiously every night.
Write power words to grab your reader’s attention.
They draw the eyes to our headline or sentence.
Use simple power words that are easy to understand but that pack a punch compared to other boring words.
Write power words to keep your sentences interesting to your reader.
Don’t lose them by not drawing their attention back from zoning out.
When doing freelance writing projects use power words to write better-converting headlines and subject lines.
In blogging use power words in the titles and subheadings.
Hopefully, this quick short post helps you think through some of your own writing and where you can incorporate simple power words in a meaningful, natural, and effective way.
If you enjoy 5 Simple Power Words and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
If you enjoy 5 Simple Power Words and writing in general, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
So you dream of being a writer now what? 5 Practical Thoughts If You Want To Get Paid To Write
If you don’t treat writing like it’s your job now, then it never will be.
In order to get paid to write we need to be disciplined and passionate.
Get paid to write:
#1 To get paid to write we have to finish what we start
Hard truth: Writers get paid to write because they finish their writing projects.
I dare say we creatives are all guilty of starting an amazing project only to get bored with it when it becomes REAL WORK and run off to get started on the next fun, shiny item (at least most of us are willing to admit that).
The thing is if we never finish a book we will never be published writers and never get paid to write.
If we never finish a project we will never be freelance writers and if we never finish a blog post and actually hit that beautiful publish button we will never be bloggers.
Sad but true.
Push through, finish the writing project, and get paid to write.
If you enjoy 5 Practical Thoughts If You Want To Get Paid To Write and writing fiction, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
Doesn’t matter what it is, if we don’t start making a daily goal for ourselves then we may never get paid to write or become proficient and finish any projects and that’s where the dream dies.
Don’t let the dream die.
When you make your daily goals, start small.
Write for 10 minutes a day, not an hour
100 words a day vs 1000 words a day
Read a page for inspiration, not a whole chapter
Create one post today, not 10
Work on the project for an hour before lunch, not 8 hours before lunch.
Etc
You know yourself so don’t let us stop you from trying to do more, but as a general rule starting small means getting more done in the long run.
If you don’t start somewhere, you’ll never start and you’ll never get paid to write.
If you try to take on more than you can handle then you’ll dread doing it and nothing will get started.
100 words a day may seem small, but 100 is better than 0 words a day.
And more often than not if you start with such a small goal in mind then when you actually sit down to write you’ll quickly find yourself writing more than 100 words at a time.
Sometimes just sitting down and actually starting is the hardest part.
It’s like jumping off a ledge. There’s nothing to do but do it.
Also, create LONG TERM goals. Above ^ are just examples of daily goals and starting small. But long term goals make a big difference too.
This year I want to create a blog (See here if that’s you)
This year I want to start freelance writing
This year I want to finish my book
This year I want to quit my job so I can get paid to write full time
These are all good writing goals for people that love to write, but they must be broken down into smaller daily goals or they might never happen.
Create your daily small goals with your long term End Game? goals in mind.
#3 Let the process change you
We either build good habits or bad habits. There’s little in between. But it can be subjective
Writing for some is a good habit.
For humans dreaming of being writers, paid writers it’s a MUST habit.
But don’t just do it to write, enjoy the process.
Don’t ever lose the enjoyment of letting words roll onto the page.
It helps with focus.
It helps with clarity.
Thinking is one thing, but seeing our words on a page and then being able to shape the sentences in revision into one entity helps us map out deep concepts that can translate well into other areas of our lives.
If you can take a character through a trauma maybe you can figure out how to help yourself and others deal with some trauma as well.
Being able to see things from the bigger picture vantage point helps bring clarity to the smaller scenes.
#4 Being published is much harder than just writing for fun
If you enjoy 5 Practical Thoughts If You Want To Get Paid To Write and writing fiction, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
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If your dream is to be a published writer we think that’s great, but we want it to be known that being published isn’t some sitting on the beach sipping pina colada’s job. It is a job. And it is work.
For some, it is a more enjoyable work, but for the unexpecting, it could be quite stressful.
And we don’t want you to be stressed. We want you to be prepared and educated 🙂 ready to dive into any challenge that may come your way being a published writer.
Being published means serious deadlines.
And serious deadlines mean elbow grease and sweat.
To get paid to write books as a published writer means seriously writing and revising every day.
A writer has all the time in the world to work on a story…until they are published.
After being published, professional writers are expected to meet strict deadlines and they are expected to create additional books in less time than they did create their first books when they were not yet published.
When you’re not published, nobody is waiting for you to finish anything.
When you’re publishing an entire company is waiting for you to hand them a completely finished and polished book ready to be sent out to market.
Thankfully in today’s publishing world, you can be self-published through market places like Amazon.
This doesn’t mean your book would be advertised like a publisher does, but it does mean you have more time to work on it and potentially earn more from it if you publish it yourself and the publishing company isn’t taking out a big chunk.
If you enjoy 5 Practical Thoughts If You Want To Get Paid To Write and writing fiction, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
One of the greatest and hardest skills in life is learning how and what to say no to.
Not just in writing but in all areas and seasons of life.
None of us enjoy disappointing other humans, especially humans that we care about. So learning what to say no to so you actually have time to write and do things that are important is a tough daily challenge.
Learning how to chunk out time out of our busy day, every day, to say no to everything else is tough to do.
Being able to take time to write, can be a daunting task depending on what prior commitments we already have.
Spouse
Kids
Job
School
Pets
Family
Friends
Etc
You name it, everyone has commitments.
And we’re not saying to give any of them up, but it’s time to cut 10 minutes out of the day to write and more than likely that 10 minutes may have to be taken out of movies, video games, T.V., and Netflix time (Say it ain’t so!)
Tis true. A fair amount of us wouldn’t want to admit, but our leisure time, whatever that may be personally, might be taking up too much of our time if we seriously want to get paid to write.
If you can’t find just 10 minutes in your day to write or at least put down 100 words on the page a day, maybe writing isn’t actually what you want to be doing anyway 🙂
If you enjoy 5 Practical Thoughts If You Want To Get Paid To Write and writing fiction, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
If you enjoy 5 Practical Thoughts If You Want To Get Paid To Write and writing fiction, you might love owning a domain of your own where you can write about it? Ever want to own your own domain name (Yourname.com)?
Bluehost hosts your blog so that you can own your domain and make money blogging. Check them out only if you’re interested in making money blogging; otherwise, go for a free blog instead 🙂
11 + Things You Should Know About Your Main Character Before You Start Writing Chapter 1
We spend so much time thinking about the story and the plot and what we want to happen and why and then… we start writing chapter 1.
We start writing only to find that we don’t really know our main characters very well.
Have we ever taken the time to see what it would be like to sit down with them and have a cup of coffee to see what they would be like as a person in the real world?
Imagine you are sitting with your main character on a nice sunny breezy day outside a coffee shop and their name is Thor.
“Hi Thor, how are you today?”
“I’m marvelous and this brown liquid you have served me, what did you call it again?!”
“Hah, Thor, that’s coffee.”
“Ah! Coffee! I love this stuff! It makes me feel so alive and ready to conquer all my foes! I’ll take 3 more pitchers!”
“But Thor that much might make your heart race very fast.”
“Good! Indeed, I hope it does! I’ll take 5 more in that case! Bring them at once bar maiden!”
Silly though as it may be, it can be quite fun to think about what it would be like to sit and talk with your main character in various scenarios and even in their realm.
What would it be like to be their sidekick on an adventure?
What would it be like to walk with them through a quiet field?
What would it be like to go with them into a bar or tavern?
What would it be like to go on a 10-hour road trip with them?
What would it be like to go on a high-speed car chase with them?
By knowing upfront how they would act in a certain situation we can put them into almost any scenario and not betray their character. This is one simple way to make sure we write a good main character compared to a lousy one.
How would they act if they were sad?
Characters show sadness in different ways. Some bottle it up and try to manage it on their own.
Others immediately wail out and tears are flowing.
What pokes the heartstrings of your character? What would make them a little sad and what would be devastatingly sad to them?
When we are able to make our characters realistically sad it will have an effect on our readers too.
How would they act in anger?
Are they the type of character that can’t handle their anger and they act vengefully? Or do they act cool and calm no matter what comes at them?
What would make them angrier; their best friend getting punched in the face or their own face being punched?
Does injustice make them angry? Or could they care less? Does their own suffering make them angry or does seeing the suffering of others make them angrier?
What would devastate your character emotionally?
What things could your antagonist target in your character’s life that would devastate your main character?
How would they feel emotionally and react to someone messing with:
Their brother or sister
Their mother or father
Uncle
Best friend
Acquaintance
Stranger they see
Shop owner
Their teacher
Their relationship or crush
Their waiter or waitress
Their car
Their grades
Scholarship
The sports team (cheating)
How does your character react to change?
Change comes in many forms and it is a brilliant idea to introduce change to your character while you are writing about them to see how they would react and what the consequences would be.
Are they forced to move away from home?
Did the school just kick them out of one class with their favorite teacher to a class with a terrible teacher?
Did they lose their job? Did their boss quit? Did they get a new assignment with a different team?
Did they not make varsity this year compared to last year?
Does your character make friends easily?
Whether or not a character has friends and makes friends easily says a lot about them. Are they the life of the party or a good personal listener?
Or are they a loner and have a hard time relating to others in any form?
How do they normally react to the idea of spending an evening around strangers? Do they thrive on meeting new people or do they hate the idea?
Do they have many friends? Do they have just a few friends? Or do they not really have any friends?
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What are the character’s major fears?
Know what your character fears and how this affects the plot. Some characters fear getting into certain situations.
They may fear being on stage or swimming with sharks. They might be afraid to talk to a popular person they like.
Other’s experience fears of certain things.
They may fear certain animals or bugs like snakes and spiders. Those are a bit cliche, but you could make them afraid of other things like certain flowers or butterflies. These types of fears give our fictional characters more depth.
What are your character’s minor fears?
Writers often think of major fears without thinking of minor fears. You can give your character more humanity by giving them a slight fear of rats, bats, or spiders. Things people are commonly slightly afraid of.
Everyone has minor fears, things that might make them jump or scream. They might run out of the room because of these fears, but they won’t become debilitated or break into a sweat or start crying.
What are your characters not afraid of at all?
We can make entertaining and interesting characters by writing that they have no fear of more commonly feared things. Make them not afraid of sharks, speaking, cliff jumping, sky diving, or bank robbing. Think of common major fears.
Is your character a planner?
Does your character plan out what they do? Do they know what they are going to do tomorrow or not?
Are they extremely spontaneous or do they plot every move they make at the grocery store?
If plans don’t go their way do they get impatient and lose their cool? For planners, the plans they make are EXTREMELY important to them, so if anything goes outside the bounds of the plan that can make the entire event a COMPLETE and utter failure.
For someone that is more spontaneous, they actually enjoy just going and seeing what happens. They’d rather not have a plan at all and just enjoy the adventure.
Is your character spontaneous?
Does your character jump first and think second? A spontaneous character can be easier to write sometimes because you can easily make something up as you for their actions.
Planners have to be planned out and stick to the plan.
On the flip side, your character could be a hardcore planner where their plans almost NEVER work out. This could be entertaining and interesting to watch how it plays out for a character that experiences a lot of stress and turmoil just by plans going out of whack.
Does your character have a habit of lying? What do they lie about?
Do they lie because they are afraid of getting caught? If they do lie but not easily, what first prompts them to lie? Why would they give in to the temptation and who are they willing to lie to and about what?
A character’s personality and traits are a complicated web of thoughts, habits, and emotions, but know how they would think about and react to things is a great place to start figuring out just who this new character you have in your mind REALLY is.
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In order to beat writer’s block, you’re going to need to figure out where you’re at in the writing process.
In order to know where you’re at in the writing process, you are going to need to know what the writing process is.
What is the writing process?
The writing process goes as follows:
You get an idea.
You start to write that idea out
You finish writing that idea out
This sounds really simple and it is. The hard part is figuring out why you specifically are suffering with writer’s block.
Do I have writer’s block because I don’t have an idea?
In order to start writing you MUST have an idea.
An idea is not complicated in itself.
An idea is like, I want to write about a bank robber, but the bank robber isn’t nasty or mean she’s actually extremely polite and kind. She just gets a job at banks and figures out a nonconfrontational way to rob it and then disappears.
How do I start writing about my idea if I have writer’s block?
Writer’s block happens for different reasons at different times.
If you don’t have any idea of what to write about than it is time to do some reading and researching and thinking and sitting down and just making a giant list of ideas until you find one that you just love the idea of writing about.
If you already have an idea but you are having a hard time actually sitting down and writing that is a completely different beast altogether.
IF I have an idea what about writer’s block is stopping me from writing?
This is where you have to dig deep down and be really honest with yourself.
Are you having a hard time getting the idea in the right words or are you having a hard time actually sitting down and physically doing the work of writing.
Some of us fantasize about the idea of being a writer and being famous for a story and making lots of money and being called an author, but if we are honest with ourselves we don’t actually love the work of writing.
Let me make something very clear: The real work of being a writer is finding a place where we can sit or stand and write manually or type words on a page that cause others to want to read those words.
If you don’t like the idea of getting alone in your mind and creating words that lead to interesting words and paragraphs then you don’t actually like the work of a writer or author.
This very fact is to be considered when you have an idea, but you find it much easier to turn on Netflix, play a video game, go on social, go out with friends, and the thought of actually sitting down and writing seems bleh.
What do I do if my writer’s block is actually me not liking the physical work of writing?
This may sound blunt and it is. If you want to get past this type of writer’s block, you will have to stop what you’re doing and just go sit somewhere and start typing words.
It doesn’t have to be a million words the first time and every time you sit down to write, but I would recommend treating it like physical exercise.
Start small. Start by writing 10 words at a time and in time if you find that you can sit down to write 10 words then most likely you will feel like writing more.
The biggest problem for this type of writer’s block is not knowing what to write. Its the daunting feeling of feeling like writing takes a lot of work.
And writing can be a lot of work, but if you don’t just sit down and start writing something as small as ten words in a session you will never write anything you want to. You’ll just keep putting it off and procrastinating.
What if I have an idea and I’m trying to sit down and write, but I just stare at a blank page with a blinking line?
This is the real writer’s block and I’m going to give you the BIG but not so crazy secret to crush writer’s block and never have it be a problem for you again.
RESEARCH.
AND
READING.
Instead of staring at a blank page, start to read and think about and research the idea that you want to write about.
Let me give you some practical ways to research say BYE BYE to writer’s block.
EXAMPLE: Let’s say I just got a story idea and I want to write about an orphan girl in Vietnam during the Vietnamese war and her journey to find life family and love amidst war and being orphaned by that place and war.
Even though I have this idea that I like if I go immediately to the blank word document I still have ABSOLUTELY no idea how to write about an orphaned Vietnamese girl during the Vietnamese war.
So what should I do instead?
I should start reading about the Vietnamese war. I should read about orphans. I should read about young girls during that time and in that place and what their life and culture were like to deal with.
If you start to think this way and you start to read anything about what you want to write you will instantly start to have the knowledge to work with for the next time you pull up the blank page.
And I recommend that you write as you are reading and researching.
If you think of something while you are reading DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE WATI TO WRITE IT DOWN.
I can’t stress that enough. You will almost always forget your ideas if you do not write them down right away.
I recommend keeping a writer’s notebook near you while you are researching.
What if my idea is about fictional stuff and I can’t research it historically?
If you want to write about dragons, vampires, werewolves, unicorns, and leprechauns read about dragons, vampires, werewolves, unicorns, and leprechauns.
Exact same principle, different reading subject matter.
I hope this helps! Now gt out there and write something!
IF you have a specific idea and you are having a hard time figuring out how to research it, PLEASE feel free to reach out and I’d love to help you think of ideas for how to research any specific subject.
Leave a comment and I’ll try to get back to you soon!
As a Blogger, Why Making Viral Content is a Bad Blogging Strategy
If you are a blogger don’t get caught up in the wrong thing.
If you are a blogger and are wasting LOTS of time on trying to make EVERY post written a viral post you may be putting your energy into the wrong place.
This is a terrible goal and a waste of time for most any blogger and I’m going to tell you why:
1. The amount of time you put into the blog post is unlikely to amount to its “viralness.”
There is absolutely no guarantee that if you spend a bunch of time trying to write a post that you think we’ll go viral that it will.
It can be surprising what audiences like and don’t care for.
I use Pinterest to drive traffic and I am often surprised as to what pins people love and ones they don’t. I’ve created many thinking oh they’ll love this one. And crickets…
At the same time, I’ve had some that I threw together in a minute and they went viral, which really shocked me and made me realize:
As a Blogger, the goal shouldn’t be to spend most of our time and energy figuring out what goes viral and trying to make that.
Our goal should be to create more content as a blogger and adapt as our audience reacts.
Which brings us to our next point:
2. Our goal as a blogger should be to make lots of quality content.
This idea as all ideas should be taken with a grain of salt of course.
As a Blogger, you should definitely spend some of your time researching what people in your niche like and want to read.
The point is, when we first started we probably spent too much time on research and not enough time on building a habit of just creating and letting things flow naturally.
So as a blogger spend some time researching, but most of the time and energy creating.
3. Are you using your research time efficiently?
As a blogger, you should create while you research your topics.
Don’t make the mistake of researching a topic for a week without jotting down post ideas or even writing a post as you go along in your research.
As you’re reading, (if you are a blogger) great ideas will come to your mind. You should write them down.
Either write them in notes, or feel free to start putting them in your next blogger post and revise later when you’re done researching.
4. By creating more blog content that is well done your odds of it going viral go up exponentially.
It’s almost like a time bomb waiting to go off.
The more you create as a blogger the more likely you will create something that people will latch onto.
The less you create the less likely you will create a blog post that goes viral.
I personally found that the time I put into making something go viral didn’t work as well as making lots of content and then when one of mine did hit a nerve with my unique audience trying to create more blog content like that and better than that.
Convert your energy as a blogger into creating lots and lots of good content. Learn your unique audience and give them what they want.
Try this for yourself and let us know how it goes!
5 Tips For Being a Better Storyteller that Hollywood No Longer Cares About (Apparently)
To be honest, in the recent making of movies and books there has been a push toward moving away from good dynamic storytelling to “trying to be different” and being “politically correct.” To have an agenda beyond telling an amazing story to viewers and readers.
What happened to the good ole’ days when you wrote or told a story so that the audience enjoyed it and it was good?
What happened to just being a good storyteller?
It would be one thing if they added in a few beliefs that add to the story or make it better, but when they blatantly add this type of propaganda and material at the expense of the story being told well and executed well it can be quite disappointing.
And let me state very clearly, I have absolutely no problem with beliefs and moral being in stories, BUT only if it makes sense and makes the story better. The problem I’m seeing heavily these days is when the writer cares more about their worldview and message than the story itself. This makes for poor writing and poor storytelling.
If you are going to be a storyteller and in the storytelling business, be it movies, TV, Books, etc. You should really take a hard look at why you are telling a story and if you like it yourself.
One of the keys to knowing you are headed in the right direction is to like what you are creating so much that it makes you curious to see where it will end up and you enjoy people reading or watching it.
If you are telling a story and you yourself aren’t entertained by it, why would anyone else be and we as creators that want to excel should be asking ourselves, “will anyone else enjoy this?”
It’s a hard question, to be honest with ourselves, but if we are going to make stories that readers enjoy we have to put ourselves in their shoes.
Is my story compelling?
Does it have a good flow?
How does the ending make my readers feel? Resolved and appreciative or unresolved?
If we aspire to be great storytellers we must appreciate and take note of the fact that our readers are “investing” their time to read what we write.
They take a “chance” on us of whether or not at the end of the time they have given to us, will they feel like it was worth their time?
Asking yourself good questions like this on a regular basis as a writer can help keep you on the right track for why you are a storyteller at all and how you can make the future of storytelling excellent compared to where it has ended up today with certain over-glorified “critics?”
In a world with story saturation, too many writers just trying to be different, and not keeping their main priority on telling a compelling story, can we do better?
I think yes, we can! 🙂
All that to say, you can use certain storytelling tricks that have been around for ages but have been neglected as of late in Hollywood and other major storytelling productions.
These tips and tricks are not so “secret” as one might think, but if you didn’t know them from studying the art and foundations of storytelling they might appear new to you.
So let’s dive in!
Keep these in mind the next time you are writing and you will do yourself and your readers a huge service:
Plot Must Move Characters And Characters Must move Plot
Create Good Plot Questions but Leave None Unanswered
Great Stories Have Characters That Change Respectively With Time And Experiences
A Boring Story Shouldn’t Be Written As An Excuse To Write One Exciting Scene
A “Secret” Message Behind The Story Shouldn’t Dictate Or Override The Direction the Story Takes
# 1 Plot Must Move Characters And Characters Must Move Plot
In reality, we have coined a little phrase. You may have heard it in a science class before. It is “cause and effect.”
To be a great storyteller we must think of cause and effect when writing.
In a great story, the author has done an amazing job of using cause and effect between characters and plot in such a way that you as the consumer didn’t think much about it. You just accepted it because well IT MADE SENSE.
This is huge in good storytelling. If what’s happening in your plot doesn’t motivate your characters or your characters don’t motivate the plot in a natural cause and effect sort of way, you will have many readers stopping mid-sentence questioning why or how something important happened in your story instead of accepting it without question.
Here’s a good example of using cause and effect.
For example: Polly loves chocolate chip cookies, but Polly’s mom said “No sweets on Tuesdays.”
So it came to pass that on one Tuesday afternoon poor Polly waited till mommy dearest went to the grocery store. On her way out, mommy said, “Remember, no cookies today Polly, so stay away from the cookie jar.”
Polly said “Yes, mommy dearest!” and out the door, mommy went.
Polly watched through the window as mommy pulled out of the driveway and down the street until she was completely out of sight.
The coast was clear, Polly sprinted to the cookie jar and looked inside. The Chocolate Chip cookies looked more golden brown and more crispy than normal. Polly loved when they were more crispy with a little bit of chewy in the middle.
Something inside Polly told her that she should listen to mommy and she gave her word that she wouldn’t eat them, after all, it reasoned we can have them guilt free tomorrow. That’s not so long to wait, is it?
Something else inside Polly pulled and tugged relentlessly without words the urge to eat them all in one sitting!
Polly listened to the latter and she reached for the lid and lifted it.
Just then she heard a terrifying growl behind her!
She dropped the lid and turned around to see a terrifying giant hairy monster towering above her.
“Get away from the cookie jar!” it roared.
Polly screamed and ran into the other room.
Now at this point, if I’ve done a good job of using the plot to motivate the character and the character to motivate the plot, a good cause and effect relationship if you will, then you won’t be questioning the plot or Polly’s actions based on what you know and are learning about her.
If I’ve done a really good job as a storyteller, then you might even be curious about what’s going to happen to poor Polly next.
If a writer is doing their job well than readers will almost always be wondering, “what happens next?”
This silly little story will hopefully help you see how you can make your characters move and motivate the plot and how your plot can motivate them.
By saying that Polly loves chocolate chip cookies we give the audience motive as to why Polly would have an internal battle about taking the cookies when she knows she shouldn’t.
This also takes liberty to assume that most readers understand the conflict of knowing they should obey parents and authority figures but also knowing the inner struggle of wanting to do something their authority has told them they can’t do (I didn’t explain that in the story because it is what we call an “assumed law” or “natural law.”)
As far as plot goes we set it up that the plot is Polly isn’t allowed to have her favorite treats on Tuesdays. By declaring that the protagonist loves something but can’t have it sets up a problem for the protagonist that makes the reader intrigued as to how they will resolve that problem. So we used the plot to motivate Polly to lie and then disobey and we used Polly to carry the plot along from her first problem to her second even bigger problem (the big hairy monster appearing behind her.)
If you’re doing your job well as a storyteller you will find unique and clever ways to use what you reveal to readers about the plot and about the characters to affect each other in a delightful give and take, cause and effect game.
This game goes back and forth until you decide it’s time to resolve all the big questions and problems that lead to a resolution. Also use the plot to reveal more about your character and use your character to reveal more plot points, major and minor.
# 2 Create Good Plot Questions but Leave None UnansweredStoryteller
A personal pet peeve of mine in stories I watch or read is loose ends or unanswered questions. Actually both my wife and I will sit and talk about a show after we watch it and talk about whether there were holes in the plot.
Sometimes the storytellers bring up these really great questions that pique your curiosity and then they do absolutely nothing with it. This is a HUGE letdown. I can’t tell you how many times my wife and I have watched what seemed like it was going to be a great show only to be let down by unanswered questions and plot holes.
Either they switched writers in the middle or the writer was trying to get away with something by making you curious to get your attention but then being too lazy to really have a good answer for that question. <—don’t do this to your readers.
Creating curiosity for your readers is a great service to them and a tool for making your writing more interesting, but only if you are going to give them the joy of answering the question you made at some point in the story.
As a storyteller, it is like making a promise to a friend. Any time you purposely create a question for your audience you are making a silent promise to them that you are going to answer that question later on. They are counting on it.
If you create a question with no intent to answer it just to keep them reading you are cheating your audience and they will lose interest in your work because there is no pay off in the investment that they have made by buying it and reading it.
Creating Curiosity in your Story and Why
Everything in your story must move the plot or the characters forward. If you create a question that leads your readers forward your answer to that question also needs to push the plot forward, help create character depth, and be enjoyable.
If you are going to create curiosity in your reader, make sure the payoff is good and clever. Give them what they are looking for, THE ANSWERS to their curiosity 🙂
# 3 Great Stories Have Characters That Change Respectively With Time And Experiences
This one is more of a personal opinion than writing code, but if you want to make your characters more realistic and more interesting, they are going to develop and change slightly as your time with them goes. Not all of them should change. Some should be static and not change, but some should also change with time and experience.
There are many factors that come into play with character change.
How much time are we spending with the character?
What type of trauma are they going through?
How old are they and what have they gone through in their past?
How do other characters react to their change?
Is it dramatic or subtle?
These are just a few important factors but there are definitely more.
Unless your character is very old and we are only with them a day or two they should change in some ways as we go because real people change as they live.
Some things about them don’t change and some things do.
Is it a growing-up story?
Do they cut their hair and start wearing make-up?
Is it more dior?
Do they start drinking and smoking heavily?
It is a complicated task but worth thinking about and including in your writing as an up and coming storyteller.
For example, in Lord of the Rings. Gandalf does not change much and this is appropriate for his character, but Frodo and Samwise do go through a deep maturing and change.
# 4 A Boring Story Shouldn’t Be Written As An Excuse To Write One Exciting Scene or Idea
This seems like a no brainer, but it should be said. A good story isn’t made from a motive of putting certain ideas into it. In recent films and writing you can tell that a good story isn’t always the motive of why something shows up in a story, sometimes the writer wants to share a political message or write a pretty looking scene. Things like this should not be motivations for writing a story or adding them in.
And all annoying political messages aside, some writers want to write about an amazing battle or a dramatic conversation, or an intergalactic space race. By all means, write what you want to, but we should watch out for writing entire novels around wanting to write out one battle.
There is nothing wrong with writing neat ideas that come up, but some of these ideas should go through a writing process.
They should be written as a short story first so that way you can enjoy writing and write what you want and get it out on the page, but give it time to marinate and look to expand it through a process that makes sense. Be wary of looking to write a big long book, just to make one specific scene come to life. You might find that the rest of the book is a letdown.
And at the same time, don’t be afraid to start with an idea and see where it ends up.
There are always two sides to a coin. I know for a fact that many wonderful stories started with a small idea and grew from that so definitely write any ideas you have down. I don’t mean not to write your ideas down and create many short stories along the way.
What I mean here is if you are going to create a beautiful scene or share a message or create an amazing battle don’t be lazy about making the story the best it can be and putting it in seamlessly and cleverly.
Be a storyteller, not just a writer.
In my opinion, I think that great stories should be written from the motive of writing an amazing story. That’s usually when the story turns out good. It is that simple.
It used to be that companies had to make good stories to be seen and heard. Now companies are so huge that they continue to make content with other motives.
I would love to see new writers and storytellers rise up that are interested in telling a story because it’s good and enjoyable and they want to serve their audience.
# 5 A “Secret” Message Behind The Story Shouldn’t Dictate The Direction the Story Goes
Some would say that the meaning behind your story is more important than the story itself. I would disagree.
That would mean that adding a scene or changing the ending to send the message instead of creating a well-made story is more important.
That is a horrible idea. Have you ever been reading an amazing story only to be let down by the ending and realize that the whole point was some political world message?
Disappointing isn’t it?
I mean think about it from a reader’s point of view. When you go into the book store and start browsing, what are you thinking?
“I’m looking for an enjoyable read. Something that will entertain me in the genre that is my favorite. I would love to find something that’s so good that I can’t wait to tell my friends and family about it.”
When have you ever walked into the romance section thinking, “I hope I find a romance with a secret message hidden in it about being respectful to the President no matter whether I agree with them or not?”
No, no one has ever looked for that. If someone is entertained by politics they look for books on politics and so on.
So be a better writer than these “secret message” writers that trick their readers into reading their message when really the reader is looking to be entertained.
If you are going to put an important message into your story, be sure that it makes sense and makes the story better. Make sure that it adds to the story and doesn’t destroy it in the end.
What are your thoughts about amazing storytelling?
Do you agree or disagree that Hollywood cares more about a message than telling a good story?
What is a tip you would add to tell better stories?
What advice would you give other storytellers?
Do you think the storytellers of Hollywood are doing a good job?
What is your favorite genre as a storyteller? Do you feel like that genre is being treated fairly by the storytellers that are influential right now?
It is the Amazon you love, for work. Make workplace procurement easier with convenient delivery options, simplified purchasing workflows, multiple payment options, and a competitive marketplace with business-only pricing and quantity discounts. Anyone who makes purchases for work (eg. procurement specialists, office administration, IT departments, etc.) can create a FREE account for their business. Customer must be from a verified business in order to successfully create their Amazon Business account.
Update: See My Updated Page views, close-ups, and saves at the bottom of the Page! It’s WAY more than 34K!And as Always Thanks for your awesome support!
I just had a Pinterest Pin go Viral with 34K views and 396 saves in 24 hours: Here’s What I Learned
You’re already too late
Promote, promote, promote and promote some more
Some pins are for specific articles and some are not?
What goes viral and why?
The other day I woke up to check my Pinterest and found this:
12.6K views overnight might not sound like much to you, but before this, I had only had pins with 4K or less (and these pins only got that far from ads mind you). So to wake up to this was exciting for me.
And what made it even better for me, this pin was completely organic.
I DID NOT use Pinterest ads to get this pin noticed.
In fact, I had published this pin a week or weeks earlier and forgot about it. I didn’t think this pin was very good, to be honest.
It was very exciting and as the day went on it just kept growing and growing. I couldn’t stop checking my Pinterest and my site to see what was going on and trying to make the best of it.
Before 24 hours was over I had 34K organic views and 396 organic saves of my pin, and it didn’t stop there.
So here are some things I picked up from this event and where it ended up leading.
I hope you can use these insights to make a good Pinterest Marketing Strategy and avoid some mistakes I made!
That’s right. By the time your pin goes viral, you are already too late.
If you haven’t planned for the virality than you missed opportunities to capture emails and send people to the URL you desire.
Things you should consider doing before your pin goes viral to get ready for the traffic:
Make an email capture funnel.
Create an email capture form pop up for the URL attached to the Pin
Create a lead magnet for gathering emails. Capturing emails happens MUCH more effectively if you give visitors something for their email. Create a free piece of content they’ll want and offer it to them for their email.
Make sure you have a good landing page created for capturing emails.
Use a Viral Pin ahead Strategy when creating pins:
Understand that certain pins that carry the same URL as the Pin that went viral will also do well with the virality. These can be referred to as “sibling pins.”
Sibling pins carry the same URL and sometimes boost each other on Pinterest based on how the other “siblings” are doing.
Plan ahead when making pins and linking back to your site which pins and links you want to have more attention when a viral pin occurs.
By planning ahead you can control which pins will carry more traffic to your site and which pages you send people to.
Pins go viral fast and without much notice, so prep for it beforehand so you can make the most of it when it happens.
Promote, promote, promote and promote some more.
When a pin goes viral on Pinterest you will want to make sure to push it out to all your social channels to keep the flow of traffic from it going.
The more fuel you put under the fire the longer it will last and the more the attention will spread further.
You can make ads. You can make ads on Pinterest, Google, and FaceBook.
You can tweet it.
Send it to your FaceBook page.
Mention it in your Facebook groups. (I got some extra following from doing this.) Invite your friends to like it and pin it. Whatever you can think of, make sure to keep the fire going.
Even though the initial burst will make you very excited the reality is that it will boom for about 2 days and then turn into a passive trickle to your site.
Use the momentum to make it reach as far as you can.
Some pins are for specific articles and some are not?
I did what is apparently considered to be a Pinterest no-no.
I started putting my home page as the link to many of my pins.
There was a method to this madness (I’m still not sure yet if it was the right one.)
When I had sent people to my specific pages they would read for 1-3 minutes and then leave. I didn’t like this, but I did notice if I sent visitors to my home page they would check out more of my pages, but this did make my bounce rate go up, so still working out the kinks.
Pinterest traditional wisdom would say you should link your pins to specific articles and optimize from there. I’m not sure what I’ll do specifically yet, but I have changed my pin strategy a little and I’ll try to keep you updated on what’s working for me.
Another interesting insight from this event.
Since some of my pins are not for specific pages, they are quotes and tips and things like that. Pins that are like that share extremely well, BUT they don’t generate as many clicks as pins that lead to articles that make people curious.
Since the pin that went viral was more of a quote pin, even though I got TONS of shares, it didn’t lead to many clicks.
So it should be considered, if you want good clicks from your pins, consider this fact.
I’m not going to change this part of my strategy, I like creating these types of pins, but if you want to get more clicks from your pins, make sure they are pins that make people curious and teach something people want to learn, that way when your pin goes viral it will lead to clicks instead of just shares.
It looks good. The typewriter gives it a good look to go along with my “writing” niche.
It has a touch of humor to it, but nothing very funny. (In other words, it didn’t go viral because it was funny.)
I think the biggest thing is that it lists an older movie that writers can watch and enjoy and also learn some writing lessons from. (It’s an easy way to learn more about writing and doing it in an easy and entertaining way.)
My guess is that most 18-24 year olds haven’t heard of the movie “Finding Forrester.” (Which is the majority of my audience.) Make sure you set up a Pinterest Business account to figure out your audience stats if you have not yet.
I don’t think people saved it because it looks cool or what it says, I think they saved it because they thought “hmmm, I’d like to watch that movie later, but I’ll forget it later. I’ll pin it and then I can just look it up here.”
That’s just my thought with this one.
So what’s the takeaway?Try to make pins that people will want to try later, they are more likely to repin it. When a bunch of people repin it so they can try it later it’ll go viral.
And another key lesson to take away from this is you never know what is going to catch on. I’ve created a lot of pins that I thought were sure to catch on quickly that ended up going nowhere.
This pin I didn’t think would go anywhere and it reached the farthest out of all my pins so far.
So if you love to create, don’t be shy, just put it out there. You never know who’s looking for what you love creating.
IF you want your pins to be more Viral you need to try Tailwind.
Tailwind posts your pins for you and it posts them at optimal viral times for your subject matter.
How to make money blogging: 11 simple steps to start blogging for money
How to make money blogging:
Through affiliate links
Sponsorships
How to make money blogging through ads
Make money blogging through digital products
Through a membership subscription site
Use your blog to make money through clients
How to make money blogging through reviews
Drive traffic to your site
Choose a blog host
Choose a blog domain name
Choose your blogging platform
1. Make money blogging with affiliate links
Many bloggers make a decent living by using affiliate links on their blog sites.
An affiliate link is a website link in their post that when clicked on and used pays out money.
Affiliate links can pay out for several reasons:
Payout for a purchase through the link (most common)
Payout for signing up for something
Payout for clicks (uncommon)
Payout for taking certain action through the link
A good example of a company that pays out for a purchase would be Bluehost. They have an affiliate program that pays out a decent commission when someone uses your link to buy their web hosting service.
A sponsorship is basically when a company hires you to do a specific post or campaign for them on your blog. They pay you an agreed amount to make the post and promote it. It is another way for companies to use your blog to advertise to their ideal customers.
Expect to get sponsorships after creating heavy traffic to your blog consistently.
Getting sponsorships is closely related to getting freelance work, but you’re not gonna get a sponsorship without a blog or a large social following.
If you want to look for sponsorships to monetize your blog you are going to need to create more traffic to your blog through social media and SEO.
3. Make money blogging with ads
Ads is an easy simple no brainer way of making money with your blog.
If you generate traffic daily, there is no reason for you not to have a few ads making you extra money.
Ads work when you get views and clicks. The amount of money you make per view or per click is completely up to the program you sign up with.
There are program stipulations you need to be aware of for each program. Some are more lenient than others, but some won’t accept your application if you don’t have enough site views.
It might not be a good money maker starting out, but if you have a decent flow of traffic it can be a very passive income as you just set the ads on your page and that’s all you really have to do. After that, the amount you make really depends on your traffic.
Be aware that having ads on your page can slow your page down and some readers will not stay as long based on the ads getting in the way of your good content.
Also, be sure to communicate with your ad program and know how many ads they are going to add to your pages and how that will affect your traffic.
4. Sell digital products on your blog
At some point along your blogging journey you may decide it’s time to make your own informational products and promote them on your site.
You can make:
Ebooks
Online Courses
Books
Guides
PDFs
Subscription memberships
Online Courses are doing very well right now and if you want to make more as a blogger than this might be a great route to head next.
With an Online Course your skills in blogging, writing, and communication can transfer very well.
I’ve taken online courses that are mostly videos, some that are mostly writing, and some that are a great mixture of the two.
It doesn’t really matter what medium you choose to focus on as long as you deliver AMAZING content that changes people’s lives when they purchase it and learn from it. That’s at least how I feel as someone that purchases online courses.
5. How to make money blogging through a membership subscription site
Membership sites are like FB groups on steroids. Some are FB groups that are made private until you subscribe. Or you can include private FB groups in your online courses as well.
Either way you want to have continual posts in your membership community that daily move the group forward and creates TONS of worthwhile information for your memberships to want to be a part of.
The key to making great consistent money through a membership subscription is that once someone tries it they have the feeling that there is valuable information they’ll be missing out on if they lose access to it.
At that point, you can grow a consistent monthly income from the members only site alone.
Any membership site can have churn out, but the more you are able to have a consistent valuable discussion going on and add value to the group weekly and monthly the less churn out should be.
6. Use your blog to get paying clients
If you like working with people more than just writing than you will absolutely love finding clients to work for.
Client work is challenging. You have to know how to get what is in their minds onto your page.
Some great tips for landing clients on the first try:
Decide beforehand to ask good quality questions
Know which questions you are going to ask before the interview
Treat the client like a friend you are having coffee with
Listen intently
Repeat Important information back to the client and they will feel understood and that you care
Listen more than you talk
When you hear them state their problem, be sure to address how you are going to solve it
Doing well with clients means being a good communicator and serving the client.
If you don’t like that idea then client work might not be for you.
Freelance writing is 50% working on communication with clients and 50% writing.
That ebbs and flows given the client and the freelance writing you are doing for them, but just know that writing for clients is not purely writing like blogging for yourself, it takes a lot of communication skills.
Reviews are a great way to share with your readers what you think about a product or service.
What’s better than getting to try amazing new products and then getting to tell people about them?!
It’s nice because you can be honest in a review and just say what you like and what you don’t and you don’t really feel like you’re selling anything to anyone.
After you share your honest thoughts on it, you leave it up to your readers to make a good choice and get the product or not.
Reviews are an easy way to make money as a blogger.
8. Drive traffic to your site
Blogging isn’t ALL writing.
A good amount of the work you will put into any successful blog will be promotion and figuring out ways to get eyeballs looking at your site.
You have to drive traffic and keep traffic. Both can be difficult and have different but key strategies.
Driving traffic is a mixture of using social media to spread the word about valuable information and products on your site and using SEO best practices.
Keeping traffic is about setting up promotions to your blog that turn into LONG LASTING sources of traffic.
Long lasting traffic comes from strategic guest posts and automated or manual social media systems you set up.
9. Choose a blog host
If you want to make money blogging you will have to get blog hosting and own your own domain.
Ad networks and affiliate programs won’t work with you unless you own your website and clients most likely won’t take you seriously if you send them to a free blog page.
Kinsta is more expensive, but you pay for what you get. Their hosting creates faster site speeds which leads to better SEO and is better for sites that have high amounts of traffic.
Choose your blogging platform. You should take a few moments to understand the difference between wordpress.com and wordpress.org.
Understand that they are not the same and they are vastly different in user friendliness depending on how you want to make your site and the versatility of what you might be looking to monetize with it.
Just a couple things, wordpress.com doesn’t allow you to use free plugins but wordpress.org has a massive amount of free plugins to help you make your blog everything you want it to be.
I personally use WordPress.org. So far I like it and I REALLY enjoy the resources and the free plugins I can use.
Overall, there are many strategies to making money with your blog and I would definitely recommend doing a little bit of everything.
You should definitely do your best to diversify your blogging income then if one doesn’t work out you have more to rely on.
I would also suggest working on one or two at a time. Focus in on one form of income and make it work really well. After you nail down one or two forms of blogging income you will feel ready to get another one working for you.
Did I miss any blogging forms of income?
What income do you like best?
What income works the best for you?
What is the easiest way you have made money blogging?
What should I ask myself when I’m wondering, “what should I write about?”
It is that fateful moment again.
You have gotten out of bed. Brushed your teeth and showered.
The aroma of coffee (or tea, I’m drinking more tea these days personally) fills your kitchen. You pour that beautiful hot steamy comforting liquid into your #1 Boss Mug that you unashamedly bought for yourself since you work from home.
You make your way to your favorite nook to write and you get into your brain stimulating position.
You stare at your computer screen and here it comes…”What should I write about?”
You sit for a moment staring at the screen. Then out the window. And think again, “What should I write about today?”
You wait and wait for inspiration to WOOSH through your door and slap your brain and the words to start flowing masterfully and…nothing.
The dreaded question we ask ourselves every morning doesn’t seem to help much when we are stuck in the vaccuum of our own head. But not you.
If you are reading this you are one of the smart ones that knows in order to get the words flowing ideas must come from elsewhere and you are here to find them.
I hope that this post helps you find that spark to get started today and many days from here on out 🙂
22 Things to help you think through the question, “What should I write about?”
What you can look forward to in this post:
Start with simple writing prompts: What are you passionate about?
What do you already know a lot about?
What relevant events are going on?
What do you have strong opinions about?
Is there a controversial topic that’s ‘hot’ right now?
What do you want readers to take away from your writing?
What do you want readers to do with your writing?
Do you want to write fiction?
Look at your other posts to see if you can go into details about something you previously covered broadly
If you already have a following, have you asked them what they want to hear about?
Have you used Quora?
Have you checked Twitter?
Have you written about a time you failed?
Take one of your popular posts and write about it from a different angle.
Check the comment sections of other bloggers and influencers in your niche.
Can you write about a mentor and how they helped your business succeed?
Have you written an income report to let your readers in on what’s really working and what’s not for your business?
Have you written about your readers’ problems and how to solve them?
Have you shared with your readers your writing routine and detailed the different aspects of how you work through a blog post from start to finish?
Have you written about a problem you are in the middle of discovering for yourself?
Have you shared about a negative comment you received and how you turned it into a good thing?
Have you shared with your readers a recent time you were personally refreshed by a blog post you recently read?
Enjoying What Should I Write About: 22 Writing Prompts to Give You BIG IDEAS? Take a moment and consider sharing this social-friendly image to say thanks and feel free to comment with your thoughts below! 🙂
What Should I Write About: 22 Writing Prompts to Give You BIG IDEAS
1. Start Simple. What are you passionate about?
When you are asking yourself the question, “What should I write about?” the easiest writing prompts to write about is to share about things that you are most passionate about.
Something that you are either very knowledgeable because of experience is easier to write about than something you have to spend hours and hours researching.
On the flip side, you can choose a topic or subject that you know little about but may find interesting to write about and do the research knowing that you are going to enjoy it compared to looking into a subject you care little about.
Another convenience of writing about what you are passionate about is that it’s easier to write about things you care a lot about and have enjoyed thinking about.
Try this little writing exercise:
Focus on: describing your passion.
Try to write this: I love [your passion]. I love doing this because [talk about what excites you and what you find rewarding about it]. Or I love thinking about [your passion] because [talk about why you like it.]
Example: I love writing because the English language and the art of storytelling is fascinating.
Now go deeper.
Google: [your passion]
Read an article or 3 that pop out to you.
As you are reading pause and write down facts, opinions, quotes, etc, that stick out to you as things that will be important to others as you read them.
If you do just this one exercise you will have enough information and inspiration to write a blog, journal, essay, project, etc.
Just this one writing exercise can take you far if you use it well when you are wondering, “What should I write about?”
2. What should I write about: What do you already know a lot about?
Going back to the first point, it’s easiest to start with something you already know a lot about. Choosing a topic that you already have a great knowledge base on is simpler to share than something you have to go out of your way to find out about. So, when you are having trouble knowing what to write about start with topics you already have a large base knowledge with.
It will take less time, to begin with. You won’t have to take long research breaks and you’ll enjoy writing about something you know very well and have put a good amount of personal time into.
When you’re thinking, “what should I write about?” try this simple exercise:
What do I know about already that I have spent hours learning how to do?
Make a list:
Exercise
Health
Fitness
Music
Art
Your profession
Supplements
Finance
Tech
Gluten free
writing
Research
At home recipes
How to get your kids to sleep
How to get your kids to eat strange foods
How to get more readers to your blog
How to potty train your pet
How to get stains out of shirts
Etc
You can see in this list that nothing is off limits when it comes to knowing a lot about something.
No matter who you are, you may know something more than someone else about a given subject
How to get my little brother to stop sneaking in my room
How to get my kids to get along on a car ride
What movies are family friendly
What are star constelation names
What are some ways I can save money grocery shopping
How can I save time grocery shopping
How do I relieve back pain
If you have done something and figured out how to do it its worth writing about because someone else is going to be looking to do that same thing eventually.
How do I level up faster in this game
How do I get my boss to treat me with respect
How do I make friends
How can I get my brother in law to think I’m cool
How do I learn to type faster
How do I sleep better
I hope the point 🙂
Any topic is up for grabs and you might just be surprised to find out what you know how to do very well that others are looking to read about 🙂
So the next time you are thinking, “what should I write about?” think about anything in your life that you know how to do or know a lot about. And write as if you were telling someone else how to do that thing.
3. What relevant events are going on?
Another great thing that can be very interesting to write about depending on the day would be an event that is relevant.
This could be carried out in three ways.
You can write about a worldwide event that everyone is thinking about and talking about.
2. The other path to carrying this out is to find a relevant event in your specific niche.
Maybe you want to write about fashion and it’s fashion week.
Maybe you want to write about marine life and it’s shark week.
Whatever your niche may be there are almost always big events going on that have to do with your main ideas or relevant ideas.
3. You could write about a specific event in your life that is relevant to your subject.
If you write about fashion you can write about what got you started in your love of fashion.
Or you could write about a controversial situation that happened to you and your fashion. Maybe your friend said your outfit was ugly behind your back and you found out about it?
If you are going to write about an event try to include these tips:
Make the title short and powerful
2 title examples:
Bad- This week is fashion week and we are so excited to see all the different colorful items that the designers will be showing us.
Good- 7 Outfits From Fashion Week That You Will 100% Regret Not Seeing
Or
9 Outfits From Fashion Week that Will Shock Your Socks Off
A little over the top, but it tends to work and I think you can see the difference.
Give tasty info at the start but don’t give away everything
If you are going to write about the event give a few exciting details away at the start but don’t give away the entire cake in the first 3 paragraphs.
Give them something enjoyable to latch onto but save something delicious for the end.
Stick to the facts Jack
Make sure to give your reader really good information and facts not JUST opinions.
We can most certainly include our opinions about the event but make it in small fun doses that give extra personality to your writing.
Name drop
If you can drop important famous heavy hitting names into the writing, don’t be afraid to do so and if it happens to have fun information about the person feel free to add that as well. Personally I would say stick to the facts and don’t let it turn into gossip or slander.
You most certainly don’t have to use all these tips, but use the ones that you think are relevant to the type of event you are writing about.
If you are trying to figure out, “what should I write about?” a great angle to go from would be to consider what relevant events are occurring.
4. What do you have strong opinions about?
If you are still wondering, “what should I write about?” it is easy to find many words when you think of ideas you have strong opinions about.
Sometimes it is easy to punch out a quick article when you have a strong opinion compared to trying to write about things you have no opinion about or haven’t thought about at all.
The stronger your opinion the better and if it is about controversial topics, that’s okay!
It’s okay to have a strong opinion about something and share that opinion knowing that in the comment section you might have people agreeing and disagreeing with you.
The fact that it’s controversial might make your writing have more reaction.
Here’s an exercise to try:
Make a list of topics you would rant about with a close friend or at the dinner table
Religion
Politics
Healthcare
Equality and inequality
Things at work
Things at home
Dating habits and practices
Movies
TV Shows
I’m sure that even in this list you may have seen a topic that you feel like it would be easy to rant and rave about.
Go ahead and write about it in your journal. On your blog. Maybe you have a story you could share with your readers about any of these topics.
If you are looking for something to write about today consider writing about a topic that you have strong opinions about.
5. Is there a controversial topic that’s ‘hot’ right now?
If you are wondering, “what should I write about?” controversy is great for storytelling and marketing.
If you have an opinion about a topic that is a hot button for a lot of people, write about it.
If you have a blog, make a post. It’ll be a great way to get some good comments and conversations rolling.
If you have an essay due and you think that something controversial going on in the world today could be an interesting topic for you to dive into then write about it.
Don’t wait for inspiration to come smack you upside the head if you are thinking, “what should I write about?” go find that inspiration and write about it.
6. What do you want readers to take away from your writing?
When you’re thinking, “what should I write about?” a great and effective tool is to put yourself in your potential reader’s shoes for a moment.
How often do you ask yourself questions like these before writing:,
What do I want my readers to learn from this?
What do I want my audience to run away with?
Did I do a good job of delivering great information that helps them?
What will they say to others about what I wrote for them?
Writing is a great way to give back to people. If you have figured something out or had some great success with a particular field, a good place to share with people how they can better their lives is in your writing.
Did you write a personal note to someone to say thank you?
Will your professor appreciate what you put into your writing?
Will your blog readers really enjoy the way you put together your post?
When you are wondering, “what should I write about?” think about the end person who will be reading it?
7. What do you want readers to do with your writing?
When you are pondering, “what should I write about?” thinking about what you want your reader to do (if anything) will really help start you writing on the right track.
Figuring out what you want to say in your writing is paramount, but figuring out what you want your readers ‘to do’ is a key piece of the puzzle.
If on another hand you want your friend to mention your wedding card you sent them, be sure to include a meaningful quote and some personal thoughtful sentiments in it.
Depending on what your medium is will determine how you go about getting the person reading to action.
When the question pops up, “what should I write about?” decide on what you want your reader to do when they are done reading.
8. Do you want to write fiction?
When you are wondering, “what should I write about?” it’s important to note what style of writing you are doing.
It is good to know if you want fiction or nonfiction. Do you want your writing to be about inspiring poems? Or do you want it to be factual information?
Do you like teaching? Or do you like creating?
If you enjoy teaching than it might be a good idea to write blog postsabout stuff you’re learning and enjoying yourself, whereas if you like creating characters and a story you might enjoy creating a blog that is a bunch of riveting short stories or poems or whatever writing style you’re passionate about.
If you are thinking, “what should I write about?” know what your writing style is that you are getting into.
9. Look at your other writing to see if you can go into specific detail about something you previously covered broadly.
When you are wondering, “what should I write about?” you can sometimes look no further than your own writing.
You can find a good amount of writing prompts directly in posts you have already written.
If you have a blog or social presence you can even look in your comments to see if commentators have left you details you can write about. Whether it is in the comment section where you have answered some questions that could be turned into blogs or you can scan your major points of a broader post topic to see if there is a major point that you can write another 600 to 1,000 words on.
If you are thinking, “what should I write about?” look at your past writing and see if inspiration has been staring you right in the face.
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10. If you already have a following, have you asked them what they want to hear about?
When you’re thinking, “what should I write about?” have you ever considered straight asking your followers, “Hey! What should I write about?”
Have you made your readers feel comfortable enough that they know they can ask questions and receive answers from you?
Have you asked them directly in the posts or in the comments what your followers are interested in hearing about next?
When you are thinking, “what should I write about?” look no further than your peeps.
11. Have you used Quora?
Thinking, “what should I write about?” consider looking at the questions people are asking on Quora and how many answers they’ve received.
Quora is a great site to be a part of the conversation.
What makes Quora great about getting superb writing prompts is that people are literally just asking questions there.
They go to this site to find answers. So make sure you are there and ready to help out and answer their questions.
All you have to do is just browse through the most popular questions related to your niche and presto! You’ve got great material that you know people all over the world are interested in.
When you are thinking, “what should I write about?” download the Quora app and start scrolling not trolling.
12. Have you checked Twitter?
“What should I write about?”
“Have you checked twitter?”
Check out the most popular tweets going on in your subject matter and run with it.
For any social site these things ebb and flow in popularity, so be sure to stay up to date and take advantage of when certain topics are going viral.
If you are trying to promote your blog, do your best to get into the conversation and be helpful and relevant so that when the right time comes you can drop your post into the conversation naturally to get more viewers on your page.
Thinking, “what should I write about?” a little birdie told me to check Twitter.
13. Have you written about a time you failed?
People love a great story.
And if you’re still thinking, “what should I write about?” they love a great comeback story.
We as humans eat that stuff up because we all fail and we all want to know that it is possible to succeed even though we fail. We resonate with each other and learn through others’ failures and successes.
Don’t be shy to write about a time you biffed it majorly and then how that turned into a reason for you to get back up, try again, and crush it the next time around.
When you are wondering, “what should I write about?” try writing about a failure in your life.
14. Take one of your writings and write about it from a different angle.
Wondering, “what should I write about?” try writing about something you already wrote about but from a different angle.
If you have a blog and one of your posts went viral or maybe just one that is very popular on your blog, take a moment to think about if you can write this post or story from another angle.
Seeing it from a fresh perspective might resonate with more of your followers and it might help you see things from a new light as well.
“What should I write about?” try thinking outside your own box.
15. Check the comment sections of other bloggers and influencers in your niche.
When you are concerned, “what should I write about?” check other bloggers comment sections.
You can tell if its going to be a good topic if you see it repeated by many commentators or if it’s a topic that is highly debated.
Have you perused comments to see if there may be a great comment to expound upon?
Did someone ask a great question that you can answer in a post? Or did they add some advice that makes you think about another topic you can go into even further?
An easy way to see this is to look for comments that got lots of conversation going. Find a comment that went on a little bit of a buzz or maybe started a good discussion and use that to create another amazing post.
“What should I write about?” look at the comments and reviews.
16. Can you write about a mentor?
“What should I write about?” what mentors have you had?
Maybe you took an online course that shared some information with you that really helped you succeed whereas before you were failing.
Perhaps your mentor has an affiliate program and you can add some good reviews about the product because you have used it and learned from the person and have good insight to give.
See if you can help your readers by posting a clear and concise review of the product.
Maybe you had a teacher or professor that inspired you?
Fitness instructor?
Parent?
Pastor?
Older sibling?
It could even be a book they wrote.
When you are concerned, “what should I write about?” think about people in your life that have inspired you and what that lead you to.
17. If you have a blog have you written an income report to let your readers in on what’s really working and what’s not for your business?
If you have a blog and are wondering, “what should I write about?” consider starting a monthly blogging income report.
Many bloggers feel comfortable sharing the income they are making through their blogs.
They share what they are making through sponsored links, through freelancing, and through affiliate links.
I have seen this work very well for them and their blogging business as it can be used as social proof for them for affiliate products they write about.
Can you share a report and how can you make that information benefit your readers?
“What should I write about?” consider starting a monthly blogging income report.
18. Have you written about your readers’ problems and how to solve them?
A lot of internet searching comes down to some simple user facts.
I have a problem and I am searching for an answer.
Think about how many times you’ve done that this week.
“Hey Siri, where’s a good place to eat near me?”
“Alexa, what time is it in London?”
“Hey Google, do I strain the noodles before I add the salt in?”
You may not have asked any of these exact questions, but think about the ones you did ask and think about your exact wording.
It is very common that as consumers we ask very similar questions.
Use Google’s keyword planner to see how many people are looking up what you’re wanting to write about.
So since we know people are looking up answers to their problems it should be an easy writing prompt for you to think of a common problem many consumers need help with that you have already solved for yourself.
That makes for a great writing opportunity and now you have plenty to write about since you’ve already gone through the problem yourself and came out the other side with a solution.
“What should I write about?” Solve your reader’s problems.
19. Have you shared about a negative comment you received and how you turned it into a good thing?
If you have a social presence or blog and you’re thinking “What should I write about?” consider writing about a negative thing someone commented about your post.
As humans, we love reading about a good controversy. I mentioned this before.
This is why it could be easy to take a negative comment you receive and turn it into a good thing for your writing career.
One of my email mentors does this frequently on his email list.
Someone will reply to his email negatively and say horrible things about his style, marketing tactics, and character at times.
He will almost always write about the negative feedback and spin it into a good thing he can teach his email list.
Now you could take this and retaliate and say all kinds of firey things back to this person, but I wouldn’t recommend it.
I would instead take the opportunity to thank the person and explain how they are missing out on great information or how a comment like that is completely justified and that they have valid points.
But you have to decide how you would deal with negative comments on your blog or social presence.
“What should I write about?” Write about a negative comment.
20. Have you shared with your readers your writing routine and detailed the different aspects of how you work through a writing project from start to finish?
If you’re wondering, “what should I write about?” it might be inspiring and helpful for your audience to see into how and why you write the way you do, especially if you are in the writing, freelance writing, and blogging niche.
For me, one of my key secrets is outlining.
Outlining sounds awful and boring and to be honest it is!
But once you get the hang of it and you are doing most of the foundation work in your head it becomes second nature and is extremely useful. (Thanks, Mrs. Louden! My English teacher.)
I used to think it was useless as a kid, and it was because my essay had all of 3 points, so pretty pointless as it would be hard to forget three points, but in a post like this with 22 points, it is EASY to forget where you are, where you came from, and where you’re headed next in the point.
“What should I write about?” Share your writing process with you readers.
21. Have you written about a problem you are in the middle of discovering for yourself?
We already discussed writing about a problem and solution you have already found, but are you brave enough to write about a problem you are in the middle of and the fact that you haven’t found a solution yet?
Could you create a post while you’re in the midst of the problem and write the post live and update it as you solve your own problem?
There are several ways you could take this, let me know if anyone does as it sounds like an interesting writing experiment!
22. Have you shared with your readers a recent time you were personally refreshed by a blog post you just read?
Considering the question, “what should I write about?” What have you been reading lately that inspired you?
Don’t back away from paying it forward and sharing about a recent post that you read on someone else’s blog that really inspired you or helped you get out of a rough spot.
Do you have a blogging mentor of sorts?
Reach out to them and see if they don’t mind you reviewing a post that you personally found helpful.
You can even let them know about it and see if they’d like to link to your review.
Especially if you give them social proof of high praise they might be likely to send some of their readers to it so they can see how the mentor’s writing helped someone in the real world on a completely different blog.
You never know how much helping someone else out will help you.
Don’t be afraid to invite others along with you on your path to success as a writer.
Did you enjoy this post?
Did you find a prompt that helped you?
What did you end up writing about from reading the post: What Should I Write About?
If you found your prompt here, feel free to share a link to your post in the comments.
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