FAQ 5: how do I keep coming up with new ideas for posts?

... the short answer: you don't

This post is part of series where I answer some of the questions I am most frequently asked about social media. To browse or read the rest of the series click here.

Writers often come to me feeling like you’re in a losing battle with Instagram because ‘feeding the beast’ requires more creative energy than you have - or want - to give.

Keeping up with the volume of posts Instagram requires is like running on a treadmill set to sprint until your lungs are bursting, your heart is racing, and your feet slam flat-footed into the rubber.

Except this time, before you shoot off the back and land in an undignified heap on the floor, someone - me - reaches over and presses a button, and the treadmill slows to a walk…

Before you read on I’d like to invite you to read FAQ 4: I have nothing to say. What am I supposed to post about? if you have not done so already. The suggestions I make in this piece will work best if you’ve thought about the ingredients you want to put into your soup (I promise that will make sense once you’ve read FAQ 4;-).

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

Three ways to slow the content treadmill

1. Reuse idea(s) but change how you present them

Within Instagram this can mean turning a reel into a carousel post, or a static image and caption into a reel, but this also works off Instagram. You can take a punchy sentence from a Substack or newsletter, and turn it into a reel or, if you’ve written a long-form piece with some story-telling followed by advice, you might turn the advice section into a carousel post for Instagram.

An example of this is how I turned the questions at the end of this Substack post:

into this Instagram carousel:

Revisiting ideas repeatedly (in different formats) will also give your account a clear identity. This will clearly communicate to new people what your account is about, and will make it more likely the algorithm will suggest your account to people who will be interested in it (based on the kinds of content they habitually interact with).

Finally, by exploring the same idea in different formats, you may find that you engage different sections of your audience. An audience member who rarely reads through a carousel post, may watch a video, and vice versa.

And so the treadmill slows…

Bonus tip to help with choosing which posts to reformat: identify which posts, podcasts, blogs or articles have got the results you want to see (this might be shares, conversation, new people in your community etc), and reformat those. In my example, the original Substack post is the best performing post I’ve written so far. I was interested to see how these ideas would perform on Instagram and… it is my top-performing post (for engagement) in the last month!

2. Simplify

A common mistake writers make when you’re creating their Instagram content is to over-complicate it. You try to say too much in too little space and forget you are on Instagram (not Substack ;-).

Instagram is best suited to bitesize teasers of the ideas, opinions or expertise your audience can explore further by reading your full-length work. If you want to introduce nuance into a conversation, you should do this over a series of posts. What might be one Substack post, or one chapter or theme in your book, becomes several Instagram posts.

And so the treadmill slows some more…

One example of this approach is how you can break down a common question for writers - why are you writing this book? - into several ‘sub’ questions such as: what inspired the original idea? Why are you the right person to write this book? Who will benefit from reading this book? Why is this book needed? Why are you writing this book now? What do you hope to achieve with your book? How do you want to affect your readers?

One long piece of content that might struggle to maintain your Instagram audience’s attention, is now seven separate pieces of content, much better suited to the behaviours we typically see on the platform.

3. Give each post a ‘job’: to educate, inspire or entertain

When simplifying your content, it can be useful to think about the ‘job’ you want each post to do. Do you want the post to educate your audience; entertain them; or connect with them?

Hold these ‘jobs’ lightly as what it means to educate, entertain or connect with your audience will vary depending on what you are writing about and what they are interested in. And don’t feel like you have to twist and contort every idea you have into these ‘shapes’ - this is simply one way you might squeeze more value out of your post ideas and slow the treadmill even more…

An example:

The idea: I want to write some posts about maternal mental health as this is a theme in my novel

Educate: statistics about the rates of maternal mental illness in the UK

Entertain (held lightly): an extract from my novel when the main character is experiencing symptoms of mental illness while she is pregnant

Connect: a personal story about my own experience of mental illness after my first child was born. This could be general or a specific moment.

But won’t people get bored?

When I suggest this approach to breaking down content, and simplifying or repeating ideas, writers are often concerned their audience will get bored.

I PROMISE this is not something you should worry about:

• some audience members will be new and won’t have seen the previous posts

• not everyone in your audience will see your post. Most of the time only around 10% of your audience will see your content. On a really good day this might rise to around 30%. but rarely will most people in your audience see what you’ve posted. If you only use every idea once, that’s a lot of people who will miss out!

• not everyone who sees your post will remember it. Most people will come across your post mid-scroll and the information overload of spending time on Instagram is real. Give them a chance to enjoy or connect with your posts by giving them more than one opportunity to do so.

Slowing the speed of the content treadmill is essential for sustainability on Instagram, especially for writers who are working on projects on top of a day job and/or caring for a family.

I hope you will come walk with me…

Thanks so much for reading this week’s FAQ. I’d love to hear from you if you’ve found this post useful, or if any of the tactics I mention here are already working for you, so please let me know in the comments.

Next week I’m relaunching my content inspiration workshop, SPARK! This is a 90 minute group workshop during which we work through a series of prompts to transform how you link your reader, your book/ writing, and your Instagram content so you can craft posts your ideal reader will care about. If you’d like to hear more, make sure you’re following me on Instagram.

Photo by Dan Gold on Unsplash