How to Research for a Blog Post

The quality of effort you put into research contributes immensely to the success or failure of your blog post.  Many posts probably already covered your topic, so you want to distinguish your new post from the noise.

You have to investigate why the target reader is battling the problem of your topic. The fresh perspectives and ideas from forums, social media, podcasts, topic research tools and the likes help you conceive unique angles. And these angles can help distinguish your value proposition from the noise.

How do you go about doing quality research for your topic? In this guide we've shortlisted some of the easiest, but yet, highly effective research techniques you should practice.

Let's get right into it.

Research Online Forums

Check forums like Quora and Reddit to find out what  your target audience are asking about. It helps you understand why they're in search of your topic. Research these platforms for related topics your audience is already searching for.

Sort out and gather unique themes and ideas from their contributions in threads, topics and comments. Engaging with people's comments and views in forums also establishes you as an authority and familiarizes you with your audience.

Relevant discussions in forums expose you to your post's specific pain points and trends. Other discussions can be noted down for future topics.

Check out Social Media Platforms

Look into social  media comment sections on X and Linkedin to access people’s opinions and concerns about your topic. Leveraging social reactions strengthens and brings more originality into your research.

Identify communities on Facebook that are relevant to your blog's niche, network with other bloggers for brainstorming and collaboration of content co-creation and promotion.

You can also visit Feedly to discover relevant topics and ideas suitable for your niche. Feedly gathers information about social media, news and the web at large into a place where you can assess updates on any topic you find interesting.

You will also relate to the latest trends which will add more credibility to your content.

Scrutinize your competitors’ posts on social media to identify weaknesses and strengths, point out their weaknesses and find out if they are addressing their audience's challenges in their content and elaborate on that.

Host AMA sessions on X and voting polls on LinkedIn to assess your target audience and understand what content will be beneficial to them.

Leverage Research Tools

Shortlist related and trendy post ideas using BuzzSumo.

Find focus keyword ideas using Semrush or Ahrefs and strike a balance between search volume and difficulty in keywords. Optimize with the keywords to improve SEO.

Use Google related searches tool to discover more queries that are related to what  Google users have looked up. For example, “how to cook octopus” could be their searched term.  Suggested searches might include, “mistakes to avoid while cooking octopus”. Develop your topic idea from these relevant search queries.

Ubersuggest is a keyword research tool to generate longtail keywords. On the left-side menu, under keyword search, you'll have to click on content ideas and input your keyword ideas on the search bar, for example; if your keyword is marketing, you'll get several suggestions like, “what is marketing”, “Digital marketing” and so on coupled with number of visits to each suggestion.

CoSchedule's Headline Analyzer helps you improve your post's headline. Simply type in your topic, voice and audience, and it will generate headlines that you can choose from.

Portent Idea Generator is another tool for creating appealing titles for your content. To use it, you can type in the theme into the search bar, and it will generate creative titles for you.

Research Already Published Contents

Researching published articles from other publishers can inspire what to include in your blog post and key points to focus on. Highlight citations and quotes from other publishers in your content to add credibility.

Look out for ebooks, content written by your field experts, newsletters and press releases to filter a wide range of information to your readers.

Industry experts have written many stories and experiences about the audience's experiences and challenges. Leverage these stories to come up with multiple ideas.

A press release might not be directed at blog content, but it has several broad public significant impacts and also gathers information from captivating reports and popular publications to make your content engaging.

Google News Articles is a basic avenue to get important information, quotes and stories.

Listen to Podcasts

Connecting with other researchers on podcasts will also give you an idea of what to focus on. Some podcasts are shot in an interview format, note related answers given by the guest.

The podcasts below can be a source of inspiration.

AskPat

AskPat with Pat Flynn. He streams his podcast everyday a week and makes it interactive where he attends to questions from listeners in regard to blogging and e-commerce.

ProBlogger Podcast

ProBlogger Podcast with Darren Rowse. He has over 270 episodes where he makes life easier for bloggers by revealing a variety of topics like producing contents, placing ads and many others that can help you relate with your readers.

Profit.Power.Pursuit

Profit.Power.Pursuit. Podcast with Tara Gentile highlights the entity of creative pursuit. She discusses topics ranging from blogging and other creative projects you may think of analyzing. Tara features amazing guests in her podcasts who can give you highlights on their encounter as business owners, business experts and public figures.

Listen to How They Blog Podcast

This podcast is directed by Kat Lee and it is highly recommended for every blogger. She features successful bloggers and they review skills, techniques and patterns you can use to make great contents. They also feature mental health guidelines for bloggers outside content creation sphere. Guests featured on the show are people who are highly experienced.

Take notes of important key points that you can include in your article, focus on details, quote guests and break down logical statements.

Podcasts present a timeline of recent news coverage you can talk about in your article.

When you go through all of those podcasts, you'll realize that they are featured on specialized topics on different episodes that will help you choose an idea you can work on.

Final Note

Asides from insights, information and ideas that you'd discover from podcasts, clear understanding of your audience, a good use of research tools, keyword research, all make your research process easier.

With these, your audience would be able to interact, be aware of current trends and information in the industry and also stay glued to your blog, which is every blogger's dream.