Meta just upped their game with the launch of their Meta AI assistant. Open up Instagram, Facebook or WhatsApp and you'll see the colorful ring on your search bar.
When you search, Meta AI generates an answer in visuals and text, sometimes from Google and Bing. It also fetches the most relevant Reels and posts from social media.
Takes some getting used to.
With Meta AI, the way your social media posts get discovered will change. That means having a solid content pillar strategy for social media will matter even more now.
What Are Content Pillars for Social Media?
Content pillars are the key themes or topics that form the backbone of your social media presence. Think of them as the core subjects you want to be known for online—the areas of expertise that define your brand's voice and value.
Having 3-5 well-defined content pillars helps keep your social feeds focused, relevant and engaging for your target audience. They ensure consistency across all your channels, establishing you as an authority while helping you stand out from the noise.
Why Are Content Pillars Important for Ecommerce Brands?
Build a Consistent Brand Identity
In ecommerce, brand identity is crucial. Users buy from brands they like and follow, and they follow brands that share their values and talk about ideas they resonate with.
Content pillars helps you stay disciplined and keeps your tone, messaging and style consistent across all platforms.
So every time you post, your audience know it's you and may stop scrolling to read what you have to say.
Attract Your Target Audience
Social media is a platform where users get ideas and find ways to solve their problems.
To capture the attention of your target audience, you'll have to create content that cover their interests and pain points—these can be grouped under content pillars.
When your content consistently shows you understand what they're going through, more will follow and engage with you. That increases your brand's reach.
Boost SEO and Discoverability
While social media isn't a ranking factor, it helps drive traffic to your website.
When more people engage with your website content, it sends positive signals to Google which can benefit your search rankings.
Having clear content pillars for social media helps you create content that users want to read. If you create enough curiosity, you can get them to click into your website and move them further down the funnel.
Streamline Content Planning
Having clearly defined content pillars simplifies the content creation process for your social media team.
With a structured framework in place, you can efficiently plan your content calendar, brainstorm ideas, and consistently deliver high-quality posts that resonate with your audience.
Measure and Optimize Performance
Content pillars provide valuable insights into what type of content resonates best with your audience.
By tracking engagement metrics for each pillar, you can identify top-performing themes and adjust your strategy accordingly.
This data-driven approach ensures your ecommerce brand stays agile and continues to deliver content that drives conversions and sales.
How to Identify the Right Content Pillars for Your Ecommerce Brand
Understand Your Audience
The key to identifying effective content pillars is understanding your target audience inside out.
That means defining detailed marketing personas is crucial—their interests, pain points, and how your brand can help resolve them.
For example, a fashion ecommerce brand may have personas like trend-setting millennials, busy working moms, or eco-conscious shoppers. Their content pillars would revolve around the latest styles, work-wear inspiration, and sustainable materials respectively.
Analyze the Competition
Once you know your audience, research what competitors in the same ecommerce space are doing.
Note the popular content types, any gaps you can fill, and consumer engagement levels. This benchmarking exercise can help you identify unique opportunities without having to reinvent the wheel.
You may find that "how-to" guides or video reviews work well for your niche. Or maybe there's potential for behind-the-scenes content that humanizes your brand.
Stay On-Trend
Social media trends move rapidly, so stay updated on what's current and relevant to ecommerce.
Consider broader industry shifts that could influence your pillars. For instance, if sustainability is an emerging trend, having an "eco-friendly" content pillar with tips on sustainable living and product use could be timely.
The key is creating a mix of evergreen and topical content.
Audit Your Channels
Analyzing your brand's existing social channels is a goldmine for data-driven insights. Look at which posts drove the most engagement, comments, and shares to identify strengths.
Let's say unboxing videos or user-generated content saw high traction—you can set up a content pillar for each.
Speak to users
User questions or feedback can also shape future pillar topics. Spend time speaking to users, or simply go through customer support queries.
If there were recurring requests for size guides or alternative ways to use your product, you can cover those.
You could even start an AMA in story form, and turn questions into posts. The best ideas come from users—go find them!
Content Pillar Examples for Ecommerce Brands on Social Media
Content pillars serve as the foundation for your online content, helping you stay on-brand and appeal to your target audience. Here are some examples you can take inspiration from.
Behind-the-Scenes Peek
One content pillar that resonates with customers is providing a behind-the-scenes look into your brand's operations. Share photos and videos of what happens in your office, operations or even how you develop the product.
This creates a genuine connection with users, so they feel like they're part of process.
Juice brand innocent frequently shares what happens in the office. It's almost like we already know the entire crew and their quirks, including Abby and her purchases.
Product Showcase
Dedicate a content pillar to sharing high-quality visuals and videos that highlight your offerings from different angles.
This pillar is also meant to raise awareness and build desire of any new launches.
Instead of just featuring the product, Birdbuddy publishes videos of their smart bird feeders in action. Users can see exactly how the product works, its quality and how it could fit into their lives. They can then decide for themselves whether it's for them.
Educational content
Position your brand as a trusted source of information by creating an educational content pillar.
Share tutorials, tips, infographics, and how-to guides related to your products and their use cases. Not only does this establish expertise, but it also provides value to your audience.
Here's one example from health supplement brand Athletic Greens, where they share recipes using their product. It gives users ideas and refreshing new ways to experience them.
Social proof
Leverage the power of social proof through a content pillar dedicated to customer reviews, testimonials, and success stories.
These posts typically don't gain as much engagement but they build credibility and trust in your brand.
Casper frequently posts testimonials that highlight their USPs—it's always more trustworthy when someone else says you're good.
User-generated content
Share user-generated content showcasing unique ways customers style or incorporate your products into their lives.
This approach not only entertains but also sparks new ideas for potential buyers. It also prompts more users to post about your products. You could even feature them on your online store as part of your ecommerce merchandising strategy to leverage social proof for better conversions.
Electronics brand newegg encourages their users to share their final product by introducing a hashtag #neweggbuilds.
Relatable content
People want to feel understood. You can show that through videos and posts of situations relevant to your product.
The goal of such content is to get your followers to respond with—yes, that's me.
Outdoor gear and clothing brand REI does a great job of showing they understand their target audience. In this video, they share what goes on in the minds of hikers during the hike. Probably only hikers would relate to this, and that's what makes it powerful.
With a diverse range of content pillars, you'll have a lively feed that users engage with. And more engagement gives you more visibility.
Consistently delivering value through your chosen themes will keep your audience hooked and drive ecommerce success!
How to Create and Execute a Content Pillar Strategy for Ecommerce in 2024
To crush it with content pillars in 2024, you'll want to take a holistic approach. Start by assessing your current ecommerce efforts across different product categories or topics. Identify gaps and opportunities where additional content could beef up your expertise.
Decide your social media goals
Before we even start thinking of types of content, we have to decide what do we want to achieve from social media. Some questions to help you get started:
- Are you looking to raise brand awareness?
- Do you hope to drive traffic into your website or your blog?
- Who are your target audience and what are they interested in?
Being clear with your goals will help stay focused and pick the right content pillars. Your goals may change overtime, so it's important to review this periodically.
Understand your target audience
Find out which social media channels they use, what do they believe in, and what content will they find useful. This is the most important step in creating content pillars that resonate.
The best way to do this is to speak with your customers, conduct interviews and browse forums for discussions around your industry. That will give you some ideas.
Study your competitors
Visit your competitors' social media pages and analyze what types of content gets the most engagement, which ones get the least. You could take inspiration from there, and also find content gaps that you could fill.
For example, your brand serves supplements—you have expertise in nutrition but your competitor doesn't. Here, you can double down on this "scientific expert" angle by sharing tips and nutritional knowledge that will benefit your target audience.
Keep yourself updated
There're new trends every week and things happening around the world that are top of mind. You'd want to be talking about similar topics and stay relevant so that people can come to you for fresh insights.
Follow industry leaders, read up on international news, and participate in forums to find out what are people concerned about or what's top of mind.
You could also look at other brands—not necessarily within your industry—to keep track of any trends that you might want to jump on.
Plan and create social media content
Once you have your content pillars, you can start creating content. Brainstorm and list down ideas under each pillar, then put them on your content calendar.
Try to alternate among your different pillars so you don't get something like three product posts back to back.
Write your social media captions with the right hook, keeping in your mind your brand voice as well. You can try Hypotenuse AI to generate quality social media captions in your brand voice—they come with hashtags as well.
Review and optimize
Regularly review your social media channels to understand the types of content that resonate best. Adjust your content pillars using engagement metrics such as likes, comments and shares.
Within each content pillar, you could also analyze the elements that help bring the most engagement so you can optimize your content as well.
Tie it in with your overall content strategy
Social media can be a good way to understand which topics your audience enjoy. Review your best-performing posts and talk about them in-depth with full-length articles.
Instead of spending hours writing blog posts that may not resonate with your audience, you can create articles that you know—from social media data—that your audience wants to read.
To speed up your cross-channel content workflow, you can use Hypotenuse AI's article writer. It helps you create SEO-optimized articles by taking in your primary keywords, analyzing top SERPs and PAAs, as well as automate internal and external linking.
The key is using an integrated approach across channels, formats and stages of the buying journey, especially now with the Meta AI assistant improving social search.
With consistent nurturing, your content pillars will become a powerful asset for education, engagement and sales.
FAQs on Content Pillars for Ecommerce Social Media Marketing
Why are content pillars important for ecommerce?
Having defined content pillars helps ecommerce businesses stay organized and streamline the content creation process. It allows you to plan a steady stream of posts aligned with your business goals like driving engagement, traffic or sales. Pillars also help build topical authority on subjects related to your products or services.
How do I choose the right pillars?
Start by understanding your target audience's interests and needs. What kind of content would they find valuable, entertaining or engaging? You can use keyword research tools, analyze your top-performing posts, and gather customer feedback to identify promising themes.
How many pillars should I have?
While there's no magic number, most experts recommend 3-5 pillars. Having too many pillars can make your social presence feel scattered and unfocused. Stick to a handful of core topics you can create high-quality, consistent content for.
How often should I post for each pillar?
There's no one-size-fits-all answer, as the ideal cadence depends on your resources and audience preferences. However, it's best to maintain a schedule and content calendar so that followers learn what to expect. Regularly review your analytics to optimize the mix over time.
Conclusion
Having solid content pillars is crucial for any ecommerce business. By developing engaging, valuable content across multiple platforms, you can attract and retain customers while positioning your brand as an authority.
Don't be afraid to experiment to find what resonates with your audience—there's no correct answer since every market and product is different.
With a smart content strategy and consistency, your social presence will become a true driver of business success.
