Do you struggle to think of social media posts for your business page? We’ve definitely been there. When you feel uninspired or a little unmotivated, having content pillars to reference can help you regularly execute your social media strategy. Once you understand content pillars and begin implementing them, you’ll feel more organised, consistent, and essentially drive business growth. So grab your notepad and pen because this one is important!
Let’s begin with what is a content pillar?
Think of content pillars as the structural skeleton of your social media content strategy. A content pillar is a theme or topic that your business can use to create social media content. These pillars are specific to your brand and should reflect the content that is most relatable to your audience. Some example content pillars for your business might be promotional, educational, community, entertainment, and engagement. Once you have laid a foundation of what your content pillars are, creating content is effortless. Instead of posting obscure or random information to your social media platforms, you can create content that aligns with the content pillars and therefore your overall strategy. Not making sense yet? Here is an example…
Hannah owns an independent book store and regularly posts to Facebook and Instagram where she has an engaged following. Instead of solely posting about the new best-selling books that arrive in store (promotional), she also posts about authors (educational), cosy reading cafes (community), beautiful library’s across the globe (entertainment), and joining her book club (engagement). Each of these “pillars” has a different theme, however still encompasses her “book shop” branding. When you adhere to different content pillars in your social media strategy, it is much easier to engage your audience through meaningful content and therefore enhance your brand.
As we mentioned, the content pillars that work best for your social media strategy will vary depending on your industry. However, here are some ways to begin thinking about your approach;
Firstly begin by asking yourself these questions:
- What topics are my audience interested in?
- What values do my audience hold?
- What topics are valuable and educational to my target audience?
- What sort of content will my audience find entertaining and interesting?
- If your audience was a person, who would they be (likes, hobbies, interests, etc)?
The answers to these questions will help you understand what type of content your audience would like to see and therefore help you divide topics into content pillars.
The next thing to do is perform some competitor research. What are other businesses in your industry posting to their social media channels? Make note of the types of posts that performed well (high engagement and likes), and look at what types of topics they are posting about. Remember not to get caught up in comparison, you are researching for ideas and not to copy. It is also a helpful idea to look at your own social media profiles, what posts performed well and which ones didn’t? Where did your audience show interest? Your analytics can guide your social media strategy.
Finally, once you have decided on roughly five different content pillars, it’s time to come up with a content calendar. A content calendar outlines weekly what you are going to post, what audience you are targeting, and what social channels you are hitting. This ensures that your content and frequency are both optimised and aligned with your strategy.
If you want to ensure your content is focused to your audience and aligns with a strategy, defining your content pillars is a must-do! It may take some time and effort to work out now, but will save you later! Good Luck!
