Let Me Pick Your Brains I

[Mickeylayne]

Hiyahowyadoin? So glad I found this board. I see alot of profuse writing on this website...authors popping out 10-15 articles a day sometimes! For that type of writer, and ALL writers for that matter, here's my question: How do you avoid the "That's Been Done Before Syndrome?" Here's an example: I'm sitting one morning having my coffee and hoping I can write a bit today. What to write about? Here it comes, sneaking into my thoughts....what hasn't been done? I look down at my coffee. Maybe I'll write about coffee. Naaaawwww......everything that the world needs to know about coffee has already been written. How avout the increasing prices of coffee and why it goes up? NNaaawwwwwwww....that dead dog's been kicked to the curb already---probably a dozen times. Giving up on coffee, I turn to my nectarine. Hey! An article on how to grow nectarines! Yeah! Ring the bells, that's unique. Well, you get my drift.

I'm an average person with a smattering of knowledge about a smattering of subjects. At the risk of insulting ANYONE, the authors who pop out 10-15 articles a day just simply CANNOT be knowledgable in that much stuff! So first and most importantly, how do they come up with their subjects without the "That's Already Been Done" song running through their brain, and second, how do they come up with the myriad of subjects they write about? Do they, like me, sit down to their coffee, stare into the mud, and ask themselves, "How can I pick up this subject and make it interesting? And, if they do that, HOW do they do it?

[Celeste Stewart]

Well, first of all, EVERYTHING has already been done, so don't worry about it.

Second, webmasters need original, unique content so that they don't get dinged by the search engines. So a website selling coffee beans might want a "History of Coffee" article. Not only would this information be interesting to the website's visitors, it would provide those valuable keywords that will drive visitors to his site.

Sure, dozens of articles detailing the history of coffee likely exist - but the webmaster can't just copy and paste those articles, nor would he want to (due to plagiarism and being dinged by the search engines). Instead, the webmaster wants his own unique article covering the history of coffee. That unique article may be up for sale right here on CC. If not, he can commission one of us writers to write it for him.

This doesn't mean rewriting a Wikipedia entry about the history of coffee, it means finding credible sources, maybe the Coffee Bean Council or Associated Union of Coffee Growers (I made those up), and researching coffee's history. Then, creating your own article detailing this history in your own words.

So go for it. If coffee has your imagination perked (ugh, couldn't help myself), go ahead and write up a dozen articles on coffee: history, brewing, roasting, the decafination process, home roasting tips, grinders, using coffee as an ingredient, etc... They've all been done before but none have been done exactly the same way you will do it.

Also, my husband used to question how I could write about topics that I'm not an expert in. For example, a couple of years ago, I was working on an article about fossilized seashells and he couldn't understand how I was "qualified" to do so. I told him, "You don't have to be a scientist to interview a scientist."

[Mickeylayne]

Thanks, Celeste...I never thought of it that way. One of the things you pointed out had never occurred to me, either. The fact that a website can't just go in and "cut and paste" an article on another website. It dawned on me that, even though a particular subject has ALREADY been covered a million times, those articles are unique to the writers. So, as you said, if a website/magazine wants an article on the history of coffee, they need a FRESH article on the history of coffee. HHmm.......this I can understand.

[Celeste Stewart]

Yes.

Also, just because the topic has been done a gazillion times, it doesn't mean it's been done to death. Try a fresh angle - like "Coffee through the Ages: From Pharaohs and Prime Ministers to Peasants" detailing the role coffee has played throughout history amongst the different classes (again, totally made up, I have no clue if Egyptian kings drank coffee though I'm guessing Aztec leaders probably did).

[Mickeylayne]

Wow! this is great! I think I'm on the right track...I have something started already! You're al inspiration1

[Celeste Stewart]

Glad to help. Seriously, you can take any topic and break it off to fit all kinds of different niches. Still stuck on coffee yet need to write an article about parenting? How about, "Breastfeeding at the Coffee House," "Should Teens Drink Coffee?," "Caffiene and Your Teen", or "Coffee Houses for Kids - Are Yuu Setting Up Your Teen for the Bar Scene?" . . . No matter what the topic happens to be, I bet you can make it your own - even though the topic is well represented!

[Mickeylayne]

Thanks, Celeste! I got to thinking as I wrote in my personal journal yesterday....I could probably take things from my journal as well. Like, I just recently was ranting about when to "let go" of our kids and "let them fall," so I've already begun an article on that issue. I'll bet that coming up with ideas for articles is sort of an art. Not just something you do, functionally. Like drinking, eating, etc. It's like, you have to sort of have a light go on in your head....you have to find the WAY to generate ideas. Once you "have the hang of it," you've got it. Then it's like a poem I read a long time ago that went SOMETHING like this: My thoughts sit like a huge ice block in my brain...then something, something...(can't remember) and they melt and run down my arm and into my pen. Sorry...all the words escape me, but it's so appropriate. I think the author's name was Ron McClean, or something like that. He also wrote:

I went for a walk today. I found a squished up caterpillar, a Coca Cola can and you. Of all the things I found, you were the best.

Okay....your daily dose of random, bizarre poetry. Free. but I agree with the author on this...you're the best, Celeste! (How's that for poetry...and I didn't even try!)

[Celeste Stewart]

Hey, I'm right up there with Coca-Cola and squished caterpillars ;)

[cgardener]

I just had that same thought on my frugal living blog. There are so many frugal living blogs, and how many ways can you tell someone how to save money? Most of it has been done and redone and overdone. So I finally came up with something I could do, that while it's been done, it hasn't been done like this. My readers love it! It makes it easy for them, and gets me page hits from them every day.

Sometimes a different presentation of the same information helps.

[melissan]

Check any monthly women's magazine and look at back issues from a year ago, ten years or even fifty. Likely there are articles about: How to Make Your Love Life More Spontaneous, How to Get Your Children to Eat More Vegetables, How to Lose the Last Ten Pounds. How to Have the Cleanest House in the Shortest Amount of Time. Most content is recycled with a new spin on it.

Good luck in your writing ventures.