Content Pillars for Social Media – A Fool-Proof Strategy

According to the Content Marketing Institute, 71% of B2B marketers believe the importance of content has increased in the last year. Marketers are creating content pillars for social media that support the entire buyer’s journey to set their brand apart from competitors.

However, maintaining constant content production might seem like an uphill battle. Marketing departments often grapple with anxiety while managing leads, communication channels, and sales team satisfaction.

Fortunately, there is a more effective method to meet your content requirements than to engage in last-minute, impromptu initiatives. Content pillars can help you generate more website visitors by improving SEO, maintaining message consistency, and simplifying idea generation.

This blog will discuss factors to consider when creating content pillars.

What Are Content Pillars and How Do They Work?

Marketers select primary ideas, themes, or subjects as content pillars that form the basis of social media content during planning. It’s a broad topic, broken into several manageable chunks to provide relevant content for channels you’re trying to grow. You can attract different types of consumers through various channels by focusing on one content pillar. Moreover, you can break your content down into blog posts, infographics, videos, emails, and social media posts.

These themes or content buckets should have a tight connection to your brand and reach your brand’s goals. Unlike brand pillars, you can exclusively share social media content pillars on those platforms. 

The nature of your target audience will shift significantly depending on the channel you’re using to share your material. You can use a different set of core topics for your blog than your social media.

If you’re creating content without a content pillar strategy, it might fit within certain categories without your knowledge. Each content pillar should address a distinct set of customers, company goals, or even individual items. Your central themes will vary based on your company, social media platforms, and goals, making it hard to generalize.

Marketers often ask, “What Are Content Pillars?” There’s no certain answer. It might change based on the nature of your company and its goals. Some social media platforms prioritize certain content pillars over others, while others may have unique content pillars for each platform.

Each company has unique pillars specific to its niche and subject matter. Even platforms within the same brand may have different pillars. It would be a mistake to treat all social media accounts the same.

Importance of Content Pillars

A company’s content pillars are the backbone of its social media presence. They provide a systematized foundation that simplifies consistency, strengthens brand identification, boosts efficiency, keeps relevance high, and facilitates measurable content. 

Cultivating consistency in your social media message, tone, and style inspires audience confidence and lays firm content foundations. They’ll easily identify and interact with your brand, boosting your profile.

Furthermore, content pillars are essential to establish a consistent voice for your company. Communicate your brand’s identity to your target market by zeroing down on the fundamental ideas and principles it stands for. This unique selling proposition lets your company stand out and connect with your ideal customers.

Remember that content pillars simplify content creation by providing a framework to follow. This allows for increased productivity and efficiency. By producing better content quickly, you gain an advantage over competitors and can focus on other aspects of your Instagram marketing strategy.

The key to social media success is knowing your audience and posting content that interests them. With this strategy, you can be certain that your writing will consistently cater to your readers’ interests and demands. 

Measuring the results of social media efforts is crucial for informed decision-making. This procedure is less complicated when you have central themes to work with. You can learn what your audience finds most interesting by monitoring followers’ engagement and other data for each pillar. This information allows you to fine-tune your plan for the best possible results.

Types of Content Pillars for Social Media

Content pillars are the foundation of your social media strategy. Marketers must be thoroughly familiar with different types of content pillars for social media. Here are 4 of the most common ones. 

1. Promotional Content

You can use promotional material to remind your audience to buy from you. Maintaining enthusiasm and creativity in promoting your products is important. 

Create educational content like blogs and videos that target potential customers to increase chances of conversion. This helps establish your expertise and provide valuable information to your audience. Use this platform to promote your products and services, showcasing what sets you apart. This content pillar example is vital for drawing attention to sales, new products, and events. Your content strategy should describe when and how you will market your goods or services.

2. Entertainment Content

Write some blog entries on the ideas that sparked the development of your product or service. A brand story can be as simple as a flashback photo. Doing so will create a stronger connection with the audience. Instagram is also a platform for humor with dedicated content pillars for Instagram memes, fun challenges, and trending topics. Entertaining content is a great way to maintain people’s interest. 

3. Educational Content

To succeed in business, focus on expanding your customer base while retaining current clients. Make product videos, key feature summaries, how-to blogs, and carousel entries to expand on these ideas. This material includes articles, images, case studies, or even films. In addition, respond to the questions and Instagram comments your followers have posted across several channels. 

4. Conversational Content

A key performance indicator (KPI) or goal will center each content pillar’s attention. It is necessary to examine the buying process to reach this goal. Connecting with customers at every step of the purchasing cycle is possible with the help of content pillars. You can boost your chances of securing a sale by tailoring material to different points in the buyer’s journey.

Examples of Content Pillars for Social Media

Here are examples of content pillars for social media that influencers can incorporate into their social media content calendar:

• Behind-the-scenes: Share a video from behind the scenes to give your audience an inside look at your business landscape. Introduce your company to clients with an office tour, staff introductions, or a product sneak peek. It makes your company more approachable and helps you connect deeply with your audience.
• Community Service: Emphasize your company’s dedication to community service, charity work, and eco-friendly practices using the hashtag #CSR (for Corporate Social Responsibility). This kind of content highlights your company’s beliefs and commitment to doing good in the world.
• Product Showcase: Highlight your items or services regularly in an aesthetically engaging and instructive manner. This will keep your audience engaged and also boost sales.
• User-Generated Content (UGC): Inspire your consumers or followers to make material about your business with user-generated content. UGC fosters a sense of community for businesses by showcasing positive customer interactions. An easy way is to republish customer-submitted content like comments, images, and Instagram reviews.

Content Pillar Inspiration: What Industry Leaders Are Doing

Many companies have established content pillars that align with their target audience and mission statements. Studying techniques will help you create effective ones for an engaging social media following. Look at these real-life examples for inspiration to craft your strategy:

• Hubspot: The main elements of HubSpot’s social media content strategy include blog articles, e-books, webinars, and courses. They cover many topics, including inbound marketing, sales, and customer service. Their material is insightful, fact-based, and visually pleasing, making it easy to digest and shareable.

• Salesforce: Salesforce specializes in cloud-based CRM (customer relationship management) software. Their social media posts focus on digital transformation, client success stories, and future business technology thought leadership.
• Buzzfeed: Buzzfeed’s quizzes, listicles, and videos on current events, pop culture, and entertainment are the site’s backbone for social media. They are one of the most successful social media companies because their material is easily spread and enjoyed by many people.
• Disney: Disney’s social media focuses on captivating stories, all-ages enjoyment, and cherished memories of their brand. They promote forthcoming releases, provide exclusive footage from behind the scenes, and honor iconic moments from their back catalog.

How To Create Content Pillars for Social Media?

Creating content pillars requires in-depth familiarity with your brand’s ideals, objectives, and audience demographics. Follow these guidelines on creating content pillars for social media and creating an effective social media strategy’s content:

1. Choose Your Pillar Post Topic

Finding relevant subjects to use as content pillars is the most critical step. Finding the right search terms for your products/services requires thinking creatively. Center your content strategy around the core subject. Utilize different content formats like Guest Posts, LinkedIn Posts, videos, 

Email Campaigns, infographics, newsletters, Whitepapers, e-books, short snippets, etc.

2. Analyze, and Personify Audiences

Audience persona analysis aims to develop a thorough understanding of your target demographic. Your message is important, and understanding your customer’s preferences, reading habits, and demographic information is crucial. Use social media marketing tools like Xtensio or Mockplus to create effective customer personas instead of relying on online templates.

3. Examine Your Competitors

Check out other companies’ social media posts to see what connects with their audience. This may assist you in locating content cornerstones that can set your company apart from the competition.

4. Revamp Brand Pillar Content Strategy

After you’ve finished developing your consumer personas, start iterating the content pillars of your social media marketing strategy.

You can reach your target audience by publishing many posts using targeted hashtags. Keep your readers interested by adding a unique twist to the content. You can post links to interesting, educational videos and direct them to the content pillar blog.

5. Social Media Posting Schedule

Keep your content-sharing activities in sync to reach your intended audience effectively. Incorporating insights from social media analytics will help you build even stronger content pillars. Refine your content with the buyer persona in mind and see how well it performs.

How Many Content Pillars Should You Have?

There is no definitive answer to ‘How many content pillars should you have?’ You want to have a pillar for each content category to rank well. If your business has four products, make each a separate pillar. This applies to diverse customer bases, too.

There must be at least three sub-pillars and three supplementary blogs for every major pillar. This implies that at least 16 bits of shorter material are the foundation for each pillar. The number of sub-pillars and blogs will increase proportionally with the breadth of a subject. Sub-pillar pages focus on the most relevant and competitive keywords, generating the greatest website traffic.

After selecting your content themes, research sub-pillars and blog topics. Search your short-tail subject to identify related pillar topics and popular keywords. Use these as foundational terms for your sub-pillars and blog posts. The “related search terms” at the bottom of a search page are generally the most sought-after keywords and phrases. 

Internal links rely on how many sub-pillars and blog articles your content strategy plan has. Within this tactic, there are certain guidelines for connecting between articles. The true potential of the content pillar approach is in the connection between individual pieces of information. Linking articles properly shows search engines that a great deal of in-depth, high-quality information is available on a subject.

Enhance Your Social Media Presence With Path Social

Incorporate content pillars for social media into your brand strategy to take your content marketing to the next level. Ensure a systematic approach by researching competition, auditing the brand’s social media, and using marketing personas to drive social media content.

Start growing and gaining Instagram followers today with Path Social. We are an all-in-one social media platform with robust strategies and an advanced AI-targeted algorithm. Don’t stress over identifying the right content pillars and Instagram strategies to boost your visibility – let Path Social help you. 

So, get in touch today to watch your Instagram visibility soar!