Try to come up with ideas for stories that can be told better on the Web than in other mediums.

Practice lateral thinking, as opposed to vertical thinking. Vertical thinking is sequential – you follow the most likely paths, going from one logical step to the next. In lateral thinking, you make jumps, exploring the least likely paths and unorthodox ideas.

Don’t restrict yourself by forcing your mind to only think of things that “work” or “make sense” – think of “crazy” ideas. They’ll open your mind to new ideas.

Having trouble? Brainstorm on paper using freewriting techniques.

Ask: What is this story really about? What am I trying to convey to the reader? And how can I best convey it?

Dissect your stories into the main elements: overall theme; supporting and underlying concepts; characters; background info; visuals; sound; key statistics; etc. Then figure out what the best tools are to express those themes to the readers.

Collaboration is key to producing top-quality work because there are so many different elements involved in online journalism. Collaborate with interactive producers, graphic artists, photo editors, audio/video specialists, etc. They are trained to think about stories in different ways and may think of new approaches to the story.

Learn from the experts in your newsroom. Pick their brains. Make your newsroom into an ongoing seminar. Learn from the way they approach stories, so that you too can think about stories in new ways.

After the story is finished, think about what worked and what didn't. How would you do things differently if you could do them all over again? How could you have made the story better? Think about how you can apply those lessons to future stories. Then apply them.

Learn by example. Seek out good work online -- and bad work. Dissect it. Figure out how others wrote or built something. Decide what you like and what you don't – and why. Borrow good ideas; meld them to your own needs.