How to generate endless content ideas and publish in minutes to improve your content marketing ROI

One of the most important aspects of content creation is coming up with great content ideas. If you don't have good content ideas, you're not going to be able to write effective copy.   

But content creation is both art and business. It takes skill and creativity to write copy that is both persuasive and engaging. Also, business, especially for B2B marketers, because the goal is to generate a specific result, such as more page views and website traffic, lower bounce rate, and getting someone to buy a product or subscribe to a service.   

So, how do you stop overthinking and start publishing for better content ROI?  

In this blog post, I'm going to share a 4-step marketing ROI formula you can use to generate ideas without an extra marketing budget, build brand awareness and improve rankings with your content marketing efforts.   

Step 1: Choose your topics  

Focus on the WHAT.    

WHAT broad topics do you want to write about that will help the customer journey? Now take the broad topic and add specificity around:    

• Price  
• Problem  
• Industry  
• Location  
• Situation  
• Experience  
• Personas 
• Target audience    

If you’re an expert in the topics you’re writing on, you become the reference. If not, share things from other experts in the field.    

Now, it’s time to finalize an approach you want to take while writing your ideas down and turning them into concrete marketing content.  

Here’re some of the options:   

1. The ‘How’ path  

Explain the here’s how ‘the topic’ works. Make it actionable. For example, you can talk about digital marketing.   

• Tips  
• Analytics tools  
• Advice  
• Resources  
• Frameworks  
• Case studies 
• Templates  
• Guides  

2. The ‘Breakdown’ path  

Go analytical and show the data.    

• Trends  
• Numbers  
• Insights  
• Reasons  
• Examples  
• Teardowns  
• Content marketing metrics   

3. The ‘You can’ path  

Explain your topic that shows the process and inspires readers to take inspiration from your approach.    

• Lessons  
• Mistakes and reflections  
• Personal and growth stories    

4. The ‘Why’ path  

Talk about the observation and why you wrote the content the way you did.   

• Fears, failures, and struggles  
• Observations and comparisons  
• Why a piece of advice is wrong  
• Myths around how the audience has been misled  
• Why something is/isn’t going to give you a return on investment   

However, to scale your output, think like a strategist. You have to produce more content from a single idea.   

Like taking a report and turning it into a blog, or taking a blog and choppin' it up into different social posts.    

This is what is called a Content Waterfall and here's how it works.    

Step 2: Capture inputs  

Existing content can be a great input for content creation. There are published resources like Blog posts, Ebooks, Webinars, Email newsletters, etc. These are typically longer-form content pieces.  

Other inputs aren't fully polished, but you can use them for creating newer high-quality content as they are the most unique and impactful. This type of content includes:    

• CEO emails   
• SME interviews  
• Internal team strategy sessions  
• Leadership team townhall meetings    

For any marketing team, the ROI of content marketing lies in taking out the real talk from unpolished content and sharing it with your audience. Set benchmarks accordingly.   

Step 3: Finalize outputs  

Any content you create needs to fuel your content marketing strategy. This way you only focus on the ideas you need and figure out how to use an idea in different ways again and again.      

For example, to raise awareness around experimentation and increase the number of leads, I might look at the pillars for building a culture of experimentation and decide I need two posts on LI based on this topic.   

Once, you know what content supports your strategy, only focus on inputs that will best support your cause. Avoid repurposing everything because you can. Prioritize insights from unpolished content, Top-performing evergreen content pieces, and in-depth analyst reports.      

For content marketing success, the bottom line is don’t sacrifice quality for volume. Only use or repurpose content that’ll bring results and improve web traffic alongside conversion rate.   

Step 4: Map your ideas and publish  

When using your idea, you have two options: Repurpose existing content into a new format or recycle ideas to take parts of a piece of content and create something entirely new. Like taking a video and using it to create an infographic that can be shared on social media platforms. For better content performance, every marketing plan or new content should make sense.  

Here’s an example of how an in-house plan or content marketing campaign could look like:    

• Marketer's strategy report  
• Conver it into a sharable PDF  
• How to guide  
• Podcast pitch  
• Linkedin Carousel (top 10 tips)  
• Create an interactive landing page showing the best observations  
• LinkedIn post for Subject Matter Expert 1(SME)  
• Social media post for Subject Matter Expert 2(SME)  
• Blog content around talking heads (key takeaways)  

Focus on the buyer’s journey of your potential customers. Choose topics and words that’ll also help you improve Search Engine Optimization (SEO), bring more organic traffic, and rank on search engines.   

That's a wrap! Now, you're ready to generate endless ideas, create your content waterfall and improve your content marketing ROI. And we understand. You might need help with the actual writing and optimization part to move fast and make things happen.  

That’s where AI comes into the picture. It’s the talk of the town and we tested the 7 best ai tools for marketers that can help you publish content in minutes and provide lifetime value to your readers. Check out the blog to go from ideation to publication right away.