Often times, bloggers will run into that inevitable “writing block” that can leave them stumped for hours or even days. Most of us, including me, have experienced this at one point or another, and getting past it can be difficult to say the least.

I wanted to share with you a trick that I use whenever this happens to me, and while it may not be the only answer to this problem, it’s definitely a workable one.

What to do?

Bloggers are, in a way, artists. They need to follow all the steps that an artist follows before creating a masterpiece, but obviously on a smaller level. I’m talking about getting inspired, putting words on paper (or on your screen), and then finally crafting it together. A blogger, no matter what niche he/she is in, always hopes to talk about the next big thing within their niche before anyone else does, and that’s understandable, because being the first to talk about a popular subject can often times land you a decent amount of search engine traffic (depending on how much weight your blog carries in the SE’s).

The best thing I know to do, is to head over to a part of Google called “Google Hot Trends“. It’s simple really, on that page, you’ll find the hottest searches of today’s date. It will list 100 hot trends on what’s being searched for at the moment.

Now if you’re a celebrity blogger, you have it made – because from a little research I’ve done, usually at the very least 50% of searches revolve around celebrities. However, the other searches being done typically revolve around big news stories or other current events that have people talking. You can take advantage of this info, because if you write about one of these topics (as long as it relates to your blog), you really can’t go wrong because you know there is going to be an audience for it.

For instance, here in the USA, the tax rebates issue is pretty hot, so someone who blogs about general happenings would be wise to write a creative article based around the tax rebate or stimulus subjects. Even internet marketers or pretty much anyone could write a post about how they’re going to spend their tax rebate checks on advertising or their various projects. I’m just brainstorming, and that’s the whole point. Sometimes just a simple word or phrase can spark your imagination enough to get creative and pump out a decent article.

There is all sorts of other data you can dig up through hot trends, whether it be the volume of activity on any given subject, or even searching for hot trends on a previous date. Dig back a couple days or a couple weeks, and you may find a pattern that you can craft a series out of.

And it’s wise to note that at the bottom of the hot trends page, Google states:

“Google Trends aims to provide insights into broad search patterns. Several approximations are used when computing your results. Please keep this in mind when using it.”

In other words, the phrases they mention may not be the exact keywords someone is typing in, but it includes those plus all sorts of variations.

Long story short, if you’re in need of some ideas, this is just a quick place I visit to see if anything flips a switch in my head. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t. Hope it helps some of you in search for ideas!

Bonus tip: Wouldn’t it be cool if someone who blogs about celebs would actually find all the celeb names for that day on the hot trends list, and make a post about each one….talk about huge traffic potential!

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