"Spur of the moment" leads to great content
How cool is it when random thoughts become content?
That's why it's important to have your antennas up at all times!
Some of the best ideas for content creation are the ones that happen spontaneously when you least expect it.
You are going about your business, and all of a sudden, the inspiration hits you - and the next thing you know, you’re feverishly writing down an idea nugget before it escapes your consciousness forever.
Man, those moments really charge me up, :)
This is exactly what happened when I was going through some old notes and paperwork that was collecting dust in my home office.
As I was hovering over the machine doing it’s thing, I thought, “hey, this looks pretty sweet, lemme take a picture of this.” Instantly, the mood to write a story to attach to this image and leverage it for social struck me.
Now, I know - on the surface, it seems like a pretty ho-hum activity to share with my audience, but, it’s not the activity that’s of value to share - it’s the sentiment and motivation behind the activity that I felt would be an interesting thought process to highlight in a post.
So, I expanded on the idea nuggets I captured in my phone, and created this social post:
I know it’s not exactly sexy to take a photo of a shredder mid-shred, but, to me, this photo symbolizes so much more than aesthetics - it represents a catharsis!
For years, I would pile up so much paperwork and notes, that I had 4 gigantic cabinets full of stuff that traced all the way back to elementary school!
Notes from high school, college, grad school - I had all of it stored in my apartment, taking up space.
A part of me found it hard to let go of these things because they helped shape the person I am today, but, coincidentally, I don’t want to show up in the world as a hoarder who just keeps stuff stacked in his home.
So, a conflict of interests built up in my mind, and, ultimately, I opted to wipe the slate clean and rid myself of this clutter.
Those shreds represent the path to who I am, but, it’s the clean slate that allows me the space to now truly show up in the world the way that I want, :)
Do you have similar issues with letting go of old papers and stuff? How do you deal with it?
Leveraging a somewhat pedestrian activity such as paper shredding into a vulnerable post that reveals a glimpse of how I think, act and evolved as a person is a very effective way to create an intimate connection with your audience.
As a way to compliment my branded lifestyle portraiture posts day-after-day, I sprinkle in posts like this as a way to give my audience the full picture of who I am and why I do what I do, making me relatable to those I serve - reminding them that I’m a human being figuring out how to best show up in the world just as they are.
This is an extremely important aspect and benefit of content creation - and it’s one of the foundational elements that I impart on my clients who take part in my, one-on-one idea generation program, the Idea Nugget Incubator.
In this program, you will learn how to retrain your awareness to be able to effortlessly identify spontaneous moments as they happen throughout your day as potential image content posts, and not only be able to secure the idea in your phone, but also, be able to think about the types of photos that would effectively, visually punctuate the stories you share.
Interested in learning more about the Idea Nugget Incubator? Go check it out here.
PS - For those of you who aren’t in the know, I mail out these blogs 3x a week, and lemme tell you, they’re a real party, so, if you’d like to get in on this, sign up for it here and I’ll throw in a free gift for you, because I care, :)