The blinking cursor. Side hustle content ideas
You know the one. It mocks you from the empty social media scheduler. It’s the silent, pulsing reminder that you should be posting, you should be building your brand, but you have absolutely no idea what to say.
For me, that blinking cursor was a nightly ritual of failure.
I was working a full-time job, trying to build my own thing on the side. Every single piece of advice said the same thing: “Be consistent! Post every day! Provide value!”
So every night, after my real job, after dinner, after life… I’d sit down with a lukewarm cup of coffee and try to be a “thought leader.” The result was always the same. An hour of scrolling through other people’s successful posts, a wave of impostor syndrome, and maybe—maybe—one painfully generic post that would get three likes from my mom and my two best friends.
I was exhausted, invisible, and ready to quit. I figured I just wasn’t cut out for this.
The Shift: ChatGPT Isn’t a Magic Wand, It’s an Intern
Like everyone else, I had tried using AI. I’d type in “Write a tweet about marketing,” and get back something so painfully robotic and soulless I’d be too embarrassed to use it. It felt like cheating, and the results weren’t even good.
The breakthrough came when I stopped treating ChatGPT like a magic wand and started treating it like a brand-new, slightly clueless, but very eager intern.
You would never tell an intern, “Do some marketing.” You’d give them specific instructions. You’d give them context. You’d tell them the goal, the target audience, and the desired tone of voice.
So I started creating “briefs” for my new AI intern. We call them prompts. And suddenly, everything changed. The blinking cursor wasn’t a threat anymore. It was an opportunity.
Steal My System: 5 Prompts You Can Use Today
I’ve since developed a whole system, but I want to give you the exact starting point I used. Here are five of my go-to prompts. Don’t just read them—go open ChatGPT and try one right now.
1. The “Impostor Syndrome Killer” Prompt
This is for when you feel like you have nothing valuable to say.
The Prompt: “Act as a brand strategist. I’m an expert in [Your Skill, e.g., helping people with email marketing], but I feel like an impostor because I’m not the most famous person in my field. Write a short, authentic social media post that starts with the line, ‘I’m not the #1 expert, and that’s my biggest strength.’ The post should explain that being just a few steps ahead of my audience makes me the perfect person to help them right now.”
Why it works: It turns your biggest insecurity into your most relatable strength.
2. The “Endless Ideas” Prompt
This is for when your brain feels completely empty.
The Prompt: “My core topic is [Your Niche, e.g., sustainable gardening]. Give me 5 ‘content pillars’ (big topics) I can talk about every week. For each pillar, give me 3 specific post ideas in the form of a question.”
Why it works: It turns one vague idea into 15 specific questions you can answer for your audience, creating a content plan in seconds.
3. The “Expert Story” Prompt
This is for when you want to share value without sounding like a boring textbook.
The Prompt: “Write a short, personal story about a time I made a common mistake in [Your Niche, e.g., running Facebook ads]. The story should detail the mistake ([Describe the mistake, e.g., I used the wrong audience targeting]), the lesson I learned ([Describe the lesson, e.g., the power of specific targeting]), and a simple takeaway for my audience. Make the tone conversational and humble.”
Why it works: Stories sell. Lessons stick. This prompt combines both.
4. The “Myth Buster” Prompt
This is for creating engaging, slightly controversial content.
The Prompt: “What is a common myth people in [Your Niche] believe? Frame it as a ‘Myth vs. Fact’ social media post. The myth is: [State the common myth]. The fact is: [State your counter-intuitive truth].”
Why it works: It positions you as a thought leader and immediately grabs attention.
5. The “Recycle Your Brain” Prompt
This is for when you’ve already created something and want to get more mileage out of it.
The Prompt: “I wrote a blog post about [Topic of your post]. Read the text below and extract 3 surprising tweet ideas, one engaging question for a LinkedIn poll, and a script for a 15-second TikTok or Instagram Reel from it. [Paste your blog post text here]”
Why it works: It’s the secret to being “everywhere” without working 24/7.
The “Aha!” Moment in a Box
These five prompts were a game-changer for me. But the real magic happened when I built a complete system—a toolkit I could open every single day to know exactly what to do.
It saved me so much time and stress that I cleaned it up, added 20 more of my best prompts for everything from finding your voice to promoting your products, and packaged it all into a simple PDF.
It’s called The Side-Hustler’s Content Starter Kit.
It’s not for social media experts. It’s for people like me—and you. The builders, the dreamers, the side-hustlers who are tired of letting a blinking cursor dictate their success.
If you’re ready to stop staring at a blank page and start building your brand with confidence, this is your next step.
You can grab the complete toolkit of 25+ prompts here: Side Hustle Tool Kit
Stop letting good ideas die in your drafts. Go and execute.
