Every day, I am on the hunt for ideas. Ideas for writing, marketing, revenue generation, client projects, and more. Here are my favorite online brainstorming tools I use for idea generation for myself and my clients.
- Answer The Public: Answer The Public is an awesome free online brainstorming tool that generates potential questions around a topic. Just enter a word or phrase into the box and hit the [Search] button and give the website a few minutes to churn up some results for you.
For example, here is the map that shows up when I enter the word “brainstorming” and search. It generates 75 possible questions in just a few seconds. Looking through these questions, I see a bunch of great topic ideas for article writing for an online course.
But Answer the Public isn’t done yet! Answer the Public generated a total of 373 results. In addition to the first map, there are additional maps and report modules that include prepositions, comparisons, alphabetical, and more.
Reading through an Answer The Public generated report is like a candy shop for brains! The service provides a generous amount of information for free but does have pro versions for agencies and those who need a higher level of access and searches.
2. Mind Maps: A mind map is a diagram used to visually organize information. It’s like an outline, but more fun! You start with a central topic and then write down sub-topics around it. Then you can move the topics around by dragging and dropping them wherever they make sense in relation to each other.
I use mind mapping for brainstorming, planning, training, and taking coaching notes. And I can share all my mind maps online.
My favorite mind map program is MindMeister. Here is a MindMeister demo video I did so you can see how I use it.
3. CopyAI: CopyAI is an AI-powered writing tool that helps generate ideas from your writing. It’s like a personal assistant for your brain: it reads what you’re writing and offers suggestions for new topics, titles, and more. CopyAI includes tools for name generation, startup ideas, blog post titles, article writing, viral ideas, and more.
You just write or paste some text in the box and hit [Create Content] and CopyAI generates multiple versions for you. Then you copy the text portions you want and assemble them in the writing panel.
Here is a CopyAI video review and demo I did so you can see it in action.
4. Miro: Miro also does mind mapping, but the main reason I use Miro is for its excellent themed boards. You can find board templates for lean canvas, Kanban, SWOT analysis, flowcharts, idea napkins—and the list goes on!
While mind maps are great for free-flowing ideas, these board templates help direct your thinking to be more focused and to answer key questions.
You can share your Miro boards with others online.
5. Brainstorming.Social: Of course, our list wouldn’t be complete without mentioning our own online brainstorming community.
We’ve built our community around the idea that brainstorming is best done in a brainstorming group, with experts and other people in forums and live online brainstorming sessions.
Our members can use our community to get expert advice, benefit from different perspectives, and tap into the community’s collective wisdom. You’ll never be stuck in a rut again!
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