How To Spin Ideas Into Gold

By Colleen Walsh Fong

Have you ever wondered where professional writers get their ideas?

It’s easy. And it’s not. That is, it’s easy to explain, but not always so easy to do.

If you use blogs, articles, and newsletters to grow your business, or to communicate with your clients you know it can be difficult to come up with things to say. For starters, there’s really no such thing as too much content. The most successful blogs produce new content every day and at least 3 times per week.

Yes, really.

Most businesses, regardless of size, don’t have the time or the ideas to dedicate to such regular communication. So they try to write once per week, and often default to a monthly blog post or newsletter.

Some communication is better than none, but this is an area where more definitely is better. One of the most successful ad campaigns of the 20th century featured finicky grocer, Mr. Whipple, chiding customers for squeezing the Charmin. For years the commercials played relentlessly on TV, much to my chagrin. I found them exceedingly annoying. But guess which brand I’ve stocked in my home for decades? Charmin. Go figure. The commercials rankle, but the brand is stuck in my brain.

This fact has two important communication implications for businesses:

1. Communicate frequently with customers;

2. Share the communications everywhere you can.

Which brings us back to my original question. Where can you get enough ideas to communicate regularly with your clients, or those you would like to turn into customers?

World Wide Wonder

The answer is everywhere. Some of your ideas will come from new products or services you want to announce. Or to awards you have won, or events you are hosting or participating in. But most businesses don’t release new products or services every day, nor do they have daily announcements that will grab readers’ interest.

Good writers borrow from the world around them and usually from their own experiences.

I write every day. So when something happens to me I naturally start thinking about how to write about it. I consider ways to relate the occurrence to a point I’d like to make. Title ideas rush through my mind.

Most of my writing is for clients. Staying current with our popular culture makes it easier for me to help them make their points in a way that will grab readers’ attention. One week I binge-watched the first season of “Orange is the New Black.” The next week I got an assignment to write an article about mixing greys with pastels for a home décor magazine. They loved my title, “Grey is the New Black.” Borrowing from my own life paid off. Literally.

Before I start on my client work each day I write my journal pages. They’re just stream of consciousness about what’s on my mind. Lots of my ideas come from my journal pages, and many days I take a few minutes to compose a short blog post for my own amusement or satisfaction. Later I’ll often take one thought or idea and spin it.

My Halloween article, Scary Story, is an example of this process. It was on my mind so I knocked it out in about 20 minutes. I felt better for having written it. The article was published to a national audience via Patch.com, and based upon the clicks it generated I’d say it amused lots of other people too. So, I started spinning to see what other topics I could generate from this single idea.

Rumpelstilt Spinning

That’s a mouthful, but it’s the name I gave to my idea-generation process. Like Rumpelstiltskin of fairy tale fame, I try to take one ordinary thing and spin it into gold, or several other article ideas. It’s one of the tricks of the professional writing trade.

Here’s how it works. Let’s use my Scary Story example above. Take a minute or two and read it before you continue.

I wrote Scary Story about my personal experience with a medical condition and the doctor treating it. But when I synthesized its essence I found I was really writing about customer service. If you read my article you know that I received terrible service from the doctor’s back office employees, and that bad service impacted my recovery process. So I thought about other times I’ve had bad customer service, or had employees who gave bad customer service. I gave myself 2 minutes and here’s what came into my mind:

· What happens to sales when customers are unable to get help in your store?

· Will you get return business from customers when you miss your due date?

· How can you retain clients who have experienced bad customer service?

· How to train your employees to provide good customer service.

· Why does customer service matter?

· The impact of customer service on your bottom line.

· Do you know what your employees are telling your clients?

· The impact of standing up a client.

· Is your business immune to the side effects of bad customer service?

· Are your employees trained?

After 2 minutes I put my pen down and looked over my list. I could easily write different articles about each of those items. What’s more, I could easily spin each of those articles to relate to multiple audiences. In other words, I’ve just spun gold. I’ve found a valuable topic because it has wide reach. That makes it great content for branding a product, service, or business.

I use the art of spinning every day. When you communicate with your clients you should use it too. And remember, we’re here to help you with that process. Just contact us when you’re ready to start the spinning process.

Colleen is a custom copywriter specializing in producing professional writing services for businesses.