Content pillars are an effective way to boost your content strategy and draw readers in. By focusing on specific topics that are central to your brand, you can create valuable and engaging information that will encourage readers to take action and lead to increased conversions.
You become the thought leader in those areas that matter to your potential clients, providing them with valuable content that will keep them coming back to your site and giving you more of a chance to close sales.
What are Content Pillars?
Content pillars are categories that encompass the main topics around which content is structured and organised. They are the elements used to create an engaging content strategy, providing the core of your message, and publicising it in a variety of ways.
Utilising content pillars allows you to provide a comprehensive body of knowledge to readers on an ongoing basis while keeping them engaged, increasing conversions, and building loyalty.
Those who do content pillars right tend to choose between three and five topics that really matter to them, their business, and their target audience.
Examples of Content Pillars
Here are some examples of how you might use content pillars. Each features an overarching niche, followed by the area of content to concentrate on (the pillar) and then subjects relevant to that pillar.
Health and Fitness Blog
- Nutrition
- Exercise
- Running
- Weights
- HIIT
- Low-impact exercise
- Lifestyle
- Meal planning
- Alcohol consumption
- Snacking
- Exercise
Travel Agency Blog
- Holidays
- Beach
- Portugal holidays
- Greek holidays
- Spanish holidays
- Adventure
- Mountain climbing
- White water rafting
- Trekking
- Luxury
- Dubai
- Seychelles
- Maldives
- Beach
By focusing on these core topics or themes, each of these businesses can create a variety of content that appeals to their target audience and aligns with their brand message and values. They can also create a content calendar around these content pillars to ensure that they are consistently creating valuable content that resonates with their audience.#
How to Use Pillars
To use content pillars effectively, you need to decide on your output, whether you will write blogs, create podcasts, or record videos for YouTube. You then want to create content that links back to the main pillar post. For example, we have a pillar post about creating content. Linked from that, we have articles about marketing challenges, creating content calendars, tools for content creation, and more.
As you can see we choose blogging as our pillar content, it is the longest piece of content that we create.
Develop Compelling Content Pillars
Developing compelling content pillars is key to creating an engaging content strategy. To determine the right topics for your content pillars, it’s important to consider what is relevant and valuable to your target audience. Researching industry trends is also a great way to identify which topics are likely to draw in readers and be beneficial for your brand. Additionally, creating multiple subtopics under each pillar can help keep readers coming back for more.
When you choose your pillars, you should ask yourself a few key questions:
- Who is my target audience for my product or service and who do I want to read the articles that I write?
- What do I want my brand to be famous for?
- How does the information I have to impart provide value to this ideal customer?
When you have answers to these questions, you can start to come up with topics that fit the bill and help the people that you want to buy from you.
Find Relevant Keywords
To increase the visibility of your content, it’s important to use relevant keywords in your content. This will help your content rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs) and drive more traffic to your website.
But it is not only important for pages and posts on your websites. People search YouTube for solutions in their millions every day. By using keywords in your video descriptions, you can gain more views and conversions in this manner.
Use a tool like Ubersuggest to find keywords relevant to your niche and then dig down to see the search volume and the competitiveness of the keywords too. You can then select a range of keywords for your content that will bring in traffic and which you can rank for most easily.
Structuring Content Pillars
To get the most out of your content pillars, it is important to put some thought into how you structure them. Start by creating a list of topics that represent the core of your message, then divide those topics into detailed categories for which you will produce content pieces.
Ensure to cover every component with each pillar and include details that readers can interact with, such as images, quotes from industry leaders or clients, and other interactive elements like audio or video recordings.
Once you have established the core topics that your content pillars should focus on, it’s time to think in more detail about the themes and topics for each pillar. Pick topics related to each pillar’s core concept but also engage with their specific reader or customer base. Break down each topic into categories of related components and use those categories to plan out what types of content should be created based on those subcategories.
This will help ensure that there is a good balance of informational, educational, and entertaining content throughout each pillar.
Supporting Content Pillars
Your content pillars will be most evident on your website, but you can support these pillars through other content creation. Maybe a theme each month of social posts around a different pillar. Connect your posts and add short-form content that adds extra value to the content within the pillar. You can also send out themed emails to your mailing list.
Create visuals on Canva to add to your marketing efforts, distilling the information within your pillar posts.
Any extra promotion helps to reinforce the message that you are the market leader for this information and the authority in your niche.
Diversify your formats
To keep your content fresh and engaging, it’s essential to diversify your content formats. This could include blog posts, videos, infographics, social media posts, podcasts, and more. The more varied your content, the more likely you are to find something that your potential customer can connect with and that will draw them in.
Some people love reading blogs, but others prefer to watch videos to learn about products and services. Others listen to podcasts as they travel around. By repurposing content for these different formats, you cast the net as far as possible.
Measure your results
Finally, it’s important to measure the success of your content pillars. You can use analytics tools to track your website traffic, engagement rates, and conversion rates. This will help you to identify which content pillars are resonating with your audience and adjust your strategy accordingly.
By delving into Google Analytics, you can see how you attract pageviews and where they go once they are on your site. If you spot a content pillar that successfully brings in traffic and then sends it on to the various pieces of content within that pillar, you can take a closer look to see why it might be working so well. Learn the lessons from that and apply them to your other pillars.
Ready to Create Content Pillars?
Now you are ready to create content pillars and boss your niche. If you feel like you don’t have the confidence or time to develop this essential element of your content marketing strategy, talk to us today about how a marketing virtual assistant can develop the pillars you need to become the authority.
