If you’re a freelance writer, you probably do some kind of blogging, at least for yourself if not for your clients. And even if you’re some other kind of freelancer, blogs may play an important part of your marketing, too.

But there’s possibly nothing worse (at least in my mind) than sitting down during your scheduled “blog time” and staring at a blank screen. (Well, maybe the only thing worse would be getting your eye poked you by a rhinoceros). Here are some ways to avoid that from happening (the lack of blog ideas, not the rhinoceros thing): 

  1. List your industry and some of the keywords that come to mind. Are there topics that come directly out of this “foundation”? Consider ideas like “[keyword] 101” or “advanced [keyword]” or “ten ways to succeed at [keyword].
  2. Go to Google’s Keyword Tool and type in your industry and keywords. Broaden your foundation list (see above) and create new blog post ideas in a similar way.
  3. Next, go to Google Alerts and sign up for all of the keywords and industry words and have them sent to your inbox. (To keep your inbox clean, create a folder in your email and filter all emails from Google Alerts directly into that folder so you don’t have to look at it all the time).
  4. Visit Google Trends . You’ll do 2 things here. First, type in your industry and keywords and see how those topics are trending. Blog about why the topic is trending the way it is and how you think it will trend in the future. Google will point to news sources that could be helpful.
  5. Second, while still on Google Trends, look at some of the trending topics. At first, some of them may seem random and irrelevant, but consider how they could be combined. If Lindsay Lohan is a trending topic, consider some ways that you might write about her in a relevant way for your audience. For example, “Five lessons that Lindsay Lohan should learn about [your topic]“.
  6. Go to Twitter Search and type in your industry and keywords to see what people are saying on the topic. Use one or more tweets to inspire a post.
  7. Go to LinkedIn and search for your industry and keyword. Look in LinkedIn Answers and in LinkedIn Groups for questions, answers, discussions, and experts in the field who have something to say. You can respond in your blog to give you own opinion (instead of in an answer or by participating in the group). Also, consider interviewing an expert you find on LinkedIn and post a transcript of the interview on your blog (with the interviewee’s permission, of course).
  8. Read what your target market is reading – including blogs, magazines, and forums. Write down some of the ideas you read about, some of the questions they have, and some of the insights you gain, and blog about those. Collect them together into helpful categories and write several posts in a series.
  9. Read broadly. After you’ve read what your target market is reading, start reading other things, too. Read about stuff that interests you. Read about stuff that doesn’t interest you. The key here is to get out of stuck-in-a-rut thinking so you can make new connections for your readers.
  10. Create top ten lists: Pull together resources or tools that are relevant to your readers and create a resource list. Make top ten lists of people in your industry or people in history who are relevant to your readers. Or must-visit websites. Or industry trends. Or things not to do.

Once you’ve run through this list, you should have dozens of blogs that will last you for a while. But don’t wait until you run out to do this again. Keep at it by brainstorming more ideas.