I had moved to a new city and was struggling to find good coffee and burgers (two things that are very close to my heart). I figured that if I was having that problem, others were too. So I started to post write-ups and pics about every place I visited. One of my burger pics was really popular. So much so, that when the local burger joint changed their menu people would show him the pic from my write up and ask for it so he had to put it back on the menu.
I know this sounds silly, but I realised a few things from this. 1) people were really finding value in my tips and pics. and 2) businesses were able to get real feedback from their customers on what they wanted. To me this was huge.