Why content pillars are key to content success | The Giles Agency

We recently discussed the importance of the bigger picture in content strategy, and mentioned an important element called content pillars.

As Jen said in her Talk from the Top post last month, we usually help clients to develop a handful or so of these bespoke content pillars depending on their brand strategy and how frequently they intend to post. These come with clear guidance on the topic, the type of content that falls within in it, how often it should be spoken about, and the main action we want to achieve.

But what exactly are content pillars—and why do you need them?

The bedrock of successful content

As defined by hellosocial, content pillars are “topics or themes that create the foundation for your overall content strategy”. In simple terms, a pillar is a core theme that steers your content marketing strategy. It’s usually broad enough to give rise to a great deal of subsequent content on the theme – articles, videos, infographics, blog posts, ebooks – while being specific enough to connect strongly to your brand values and business goals.

Content pillars help to keep your entire content strategy consistent, and ensure that you maintain a wealth of potential topics to cover. Nowadays, companies must create endless amounts of content to populate websites,blogs and social media channels, support services, promote products, and more. In fact, according to the Content Marketing Institute, producing enough content is the biggest challenge facing b2b marketers.

Defining your content pillars can help you overcome both this hurdle and others. “If you have clear content pillars, you aren’t so engrossed in the need to create content that you’re making things that are either off-brand or won’t resonate with your audience,” adds our Managing Director Jen Campbell. Pillars ensure that all new content ties back into and builds upon existing content, helping you scale up your offerings and provide your stakeholders with real value. These come together over time to form ‘clusters’ of relevant, useful, high-quality content that is of real interest to your customers. One way of picturing a pillar is as the trunk of a tree, with subsequent content forming branches.

Defining your pillars

Where to start? The first step to building a killer content pillar is to refine your perception of your target audience and customer. Now’s a great time to revisit your buyer personas and ideal customer profiles; what kind of content does your ideal buyer want to read, and what pain points are they trying to address? What keywords are they using?

For example, say you’re a Singapore-based ‘green’ energy provider aiming to increase your consumer base among 30-somethings that are environmentally conscious. One of your pillars may be ‘energy efficiency’, and subsequent content may discuss overarching tips and tricks to improve your energy efficiency at home.

From this comes all kinds of related content: social ‘listicles’ on how to save energy when you work from home, blog posts on the most energy-efficient ways to heat your home, video explainers about various types of eco-friendly energy production, articles on which appliances guzzle the most energy, visual content on impressive wind farms across the UK, a breakdown of a typical home bill and what it all means… the list goes on.

Now that you understand content pillars, it’s time to get started. We regularly work with clients to help define these and revamp their content strategies. If you’d like to discuss how we can work together to engage your audience, improve your web ranking, drive revenue, and produce copious, consistent, high-quality content, contact us now.