Infographics continue rocking. And rolling.

See, you may knock one out of the park with a blog post or another content type and earn links and social media shares, but something unique happens with a killer infographic …

It not only captures attention, it gets reposted. All over the place. And your brand goes with it, rolling across the social web like tumbleweed. Of course, it’s gratifying, but it’s also great for extending the reach of your brand and its message.

Ideas for infographic: three great places to start

The great big list of infographic ideas—Below is an infographic I created, which features 25 concepts and themes that might work for your next infographic. It’s not going to give you your topic, but you’re bound to find a style to shake ideas loose.

Other infographics—It shouldn’t surprise you to learn many of the 25 ideas I visualized for you came from a deep dive into, yes, infographics. I went surfing on sites like Visua.ly and Pinterest where I knew I’d find them. I did some image searches. I recommend you do the same. Look at the infographics ranking high in your niche. Obviously, tuning into your market’s blogs gives you writing ideas. The same goes for infographics.

SlideShare—Some SlideShare content will be infographics, but SlideShare’s sweet spot is slide presentations. And the millions of concepts you’ll discover there are bound to make creative sparks fly. Infographics were the inspiration for some of the decks. Now flip that equation.

Dig up buried treasures

If you’ve been creating content for a while, you may be sitting on a treasure trove of winning infographics ideas.

Examine your most popular posts—Look at your page views and share numbers. Chances are some of your popular blog posts can be remade as infographics. List posts are particularly good candidates.

Mine your site—Does your site feature an FAQ? Perhaps you dedicate pages to detailing effective processes. Case studies could work. Have you published any research? How might you present content such as this in the ultra-friendly show and tell style of an infographics?

Open your outbox—The email you and your colleagues are sending in response to questions from customers may be a perfect source for infographics ideas.

Revisit presentations—There’s a very good chance the slide decks your sales team uses will make for strong infographics. If you haven’t considered the content from your webinars, it’s likely to work too.

Conduct brainstorm sessions

I want to also encourage you to try some brainstorming sessions. Try techniques such as the following:

Word storm—Choose a meaningful word in your niche then list words that come to mind. Various categories are likely to surface.

Mind mapping—Organize thoughts with a mind map by starting with one central idea, then attach related ideas to it. Allow the peripheral ideas to spawn new

Visual association—Start with a visual and do the exercises above based on it.

What if—Challenge your thinking with “what if” questions to invoke different points of view around a problem or creative challenge.

Ask questions—Get the questions you have about your topic down and list answers fast—without overthinking. Your answers are going to inspire new questions.

If you’re going to brainstorm as a group, apply some ground rules.

• Give participants a heads-up in advance. Lay out the objectives, in this case, to generate ideas for infographics. Let each individual try getting ideas together in advance of group session. Group brainstorms can inhibit some and the extroverts tend to take charge.
• When the group does come together, focus on quantity over quality. Encourage a free-flow of ideas and discourage immediate evaluation of them. Judgment is a brainstorm spoiler.
• Make it fun and positive. Beer might be useful.
• Record every idea.

Finally, synthesize the ideas you have

When you dig into this infographic for style ideas, then try some of the processes I suggested here. You should have a healthy assortment of potential concepts to play with. Mix and match. Explore visual styles. Play around with titles. Collect ideas from infographics that earned your attention.

You’ll want to strive for something that feels fresh and original, but I don’t recommend you get too hung up on it. Useful trumps original. Even if you decide to develop an infographic around an idea similar to something you’ve seen before, I believe you can give your infographic a fresh spin and realize the enormous benefits that can come from publishing valuable content in the form of a new infographic.

I want to recognize and thank my design partner for this infographic, Infobrandz.