How to Choose the Perfect Topic for Your Pillar Page
A pillar page is a broad topic that serves as an exhaustive resource on that topic, thereby forming the content strategy backbone of your website. choosing a pillar page topic is a very important task. With the topic selection coming first on the list, it sets the direction for authority building, SEO, and user engagement on your site. With so many options at your disposal, the choice of the topic could feel extremely overwhelming. This blog has a step-by-step process for choosing a pillar page topic that will attract visitors, work toward your business goals, and assist your content strategy in accomplishing its goals.
Understand What Makes a Good Pillar Page Topic
Broad Yet Specific
The topic of your pillar page is broad, accommodating several subtopics. For example, while Digital Marketing is generic, Email Marketing for Small Businesses is specific enough to be treated comprehensively. The topic should keep the fine line between being broad enough to support several related articles yet focused enough that it is not too generic.
Relevant to Your Audience
The topic of your pillar page must be something your target audience wishes to learn about, should know about, or is solving an issue for. What is your ideal visitor searching for? What are some challenges they face that require solutions? Selecting a topic that should interest your audience will guarantee the right traffic to your pillar page and keep them interested.
Aligned with Your Business Goals
The best wide-reaching topics, however, are those supporting your actual business goals. If you sell environmentally friendly cleaning products, for instance, a pillar page about green cleaning tips can demonstrate your authority in the field and attract visitors toward your products. Ensure that your topic will take you one step closer to meeting your marketing, sales, or brand-building goals.
Keyword and Competitor Research
Identify High-Volume Keywords
Tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ubersuggest should help you to check keywords related to your industry. Search for keywords with high search volume but moderate competition. High-volume keywords mean that there is an interest and will be good candidates for your pillar pages, drawing more visitors to your site.
Analyze Competitor Content
Check what topics your competitors have been designing pillar pages for. Find where their coverage goes thin, or perhaps you can just offer more value. Competitor content analysis is going to reveal where you can differ and give visitors better opportunities.
Assess Search Intent
Try to think of the reasons why the particular keyword is being searched. Are people in the information-seeking stage, or are they looking for solutions or products? Choose a topic related to the intent of your audience because it is going to allow you to create content that is very helpful and comprehensive for their needs.
Map Out Potential Subtopics
List Related Questions and Themes
Come up with questions that your audience could ask relating to your main topic. For example, from “Home Gardening,” subtopics may be “Best Plants for Beginners,” “Organic Fertilizers,” and “Pest Control Tips.” Each of these can be a blog post that gets linked back to your pillar page, therefore forming a tight topic cluster.
Check for Content Gaps
Review your existing content to see what you have covered and what gaps exist. By filling these gaps through new cluster articles, you would bolster your pillar page and render the site less lonely, allowing it to become the reference in the niche.
Rank the Subtopics by Relevance
All subtopics are no more or less important. Concentrate on the ones most relevant to your audience and business goals. This priority ranking ensures the pillar page truly offers value, keeps visitors tempted to explore more of the site, and supports your strategic positioning. Check out our latest blog post on Pillar Pages vs. Landing Pages: Key Differences and When to Use Each
Prove Topics by Data
Search Trend Check
Convert any interest in a topic into a trend, with either increasing, steady, or declining. Having a rising or steady interest would mean one has long-term benefits of traffic and future relevance of the pillar page.
Existing Traffic Check
If you already run a website, see whether the topics and keywords already bring in visitors. You can build your pillar page around proven interests to increase chances of success and create content that really connects with your audience.
Test With Your Audience
Interview the audience directly through surveys or interaction in social media and e-mails, learning what kind of subjects interest them and what they hope to learn more about. Getting direct feedback helps to ensure that you really have created content that fulfills a need, thus increasing engagements for your pillar page.
Plan an Outline for Pillar Content
Create a Logical Flow
Arrange the content so that it naturally flows from one section to another. Begin with an introduction, move into the key points, and finish with either a concluding note or a call to action. An organized layout is conducive to easy navigation and reading of the pillar page, so this tends to keep them afloat a bit longer.
Link to Cluster Content
Determine from within the main pillar page the linking process towards the related articles. Internal links help visitors in searching for more detailed information while also promoting your site’s SEO by informing the search engine as regards the relatedness of your content. Also, this keeps readers engrossed with the site and flowing around it.
Use Clear Headings and Visuals in the Content
Apply relevant headings, bullet points, and images to break up the content. Doing so makes the pillar page less boring for the user and enables readers to locate what they want very quickly, which improves user experience and search rankings.
Conclusion
A perfect pillar page topic, chosen right, becomes the pillar to build its content strategy upon. A grasp of the audience, keyword research, and subtopic mapping, followed by data validation, evolves into pillar pages that manage to bring in traffic and support business goals. Are you ready to set up your name and pull in a number of visitors? Get in touch with us for expert advice on constructing high-impact pillar pages for your website!
