Have you ever experienced writer’s block? Of course you have. It’s that feeling of dread and helplessness in coming up with new topics to write about, despite countless hours of rattling your brain. It’s a very frustrating experience, especially for school marketers like you.
Fortunately, you can reduce incidents like this by preparing a content calendar, which you can use to plan and schedule topic ideas in advance. By using a content calendar, all you need to think about is how to write each topic.
Once you have the content calendar template ready, you can use some techniques to breeze through several topic ideas. Here are six ways to fill your school content calendar:
- What blog topics can you revisit and what were the commonalities between your most read blogs?
Look back through past blogs. Are there any topics that you could use again and are there any new angles you can look at within that topic? Marketing is an ever growing and changing discipline so it is possible that since you last blogged about a certain topic it has changed or developed. Looking at high performing past blogs can be a good place to start and give you a good understanding of what works well for your school. - What are other education bloggers blogging about?
Now don’t think for a second that you should be copying other bloggers, but looking at other relevant blogs can be a great way to identify topics to cover. You might read a blog that prompts your own thoughts on the topic or gives you an idea for a different topic. A common theme that has been observed is the more you read, the more you write, and the better your writing becomes. - Set up regular blogging topics.
Have an assembly every week? Then you’ve got something to write about each week. A weekly assembly wrap up would be a great way for parents who can’t make the assemblies to catch up on the news and events of the week. - Look in the news.
Are there any school related news articles in the media? Putting forward the school’s opinion on relevant news is a great way to stay up to date and remain transparent. Have there been any studies relevant to your school that might be of interest to your readers? Studies and surveys that support your school’s position are a great topic because they not only give you something to blog about but they also support your school. - Look inward to other media.
Do you have a fortnightly newsletter? Look through it and find relatable topics. For example, if there’s a short section of the newsletter on the new school canteen menu, you could do an article on health regulations in school canteens. Next month you might find a piece in the newsletter congratulating a student on reaching the state finals in running, and so, you have found another topic, extra-curricular sports. - Guest bloggers.
Engaging guest bloggers doesn’t just mean you don’t have to write the blog, it is great for networking and search engine optimisation (SEO) too. Using a guest blogger brings a fresh perspective and writing style to your blog. It also, almost always, results in more links in your blogs since you will likely link to the guest’s own blog. Using links in your blogs increases your likelihood of being found online through SEO which is important. This is because Google ranks a page with more links higher in a search results list. Not to mention the fact that the guest may mention you in one of their own blogs which creates a new source of traffic to you. They may even ask you to guest blog for them, which is another great way to increase traffic to your own blog.
By using these six tips, it should be easier for you to generate new topics and fill up your content calendar. We hope that you have fun coming up with great topics!
