7: Why It’s Important to be Intentional with Your Pillar Content (The Systems & Workflow Magic Podcast)

Have you established pillar content for your business? In today’s episode, I’m sharing what pillar content is, why it’s important, and how to be intentional with it in your business and content strategy!

The Systems and Workflow Magic Podcast is brought to you by Dolly DeLong Education. This is a podcast for creative business owners who want to learn tangible steps to automate their business through workflows, systems, tools and strategy in order to go from scattered to streamlined with purpose. Because even muggles can become automated wizards.

The Systems and Workflow Magic Bundle

If you’re ready to streamline your business, make sure you’re on the waitlist for the Systems and Workflow Magic Bundle, where over 20 creatives and business owners have collaborated to create an exclusive collection of resources to help you start and implement workflows and systems in your business to go from scattered to streamlined! The Systems and Workflow Magic Bundle will be available January 24th-28th, so make sure you’re on the waitlist today!

Review the Show Notes:

What is Pillar Content? (1:10)

Evergreen Content (2:49)

Why Pillar Content Is Important (4:10)

Putting Your Pillar Content on Platforms You Own (5:35)

When IG & FB Went Down (6:24)

Examples of Pillar Content (9:27)

How to Plan Around Pillar Content (10:34)

Using Pillar Content for Establishing Yourself (11:23)

5 Tips to Being Intentional with Pillar Content (14:24)

1.  Access all of your offerings within your business (14:24)
2. Pick out one of your services (14:45)
3. Decide how you’ll present yourself as the expert (15:18)
4. Create a schedule that is doable (16:13)
5. Do some keyword research on pillar content (16:52)
6. Start promoting your pillar content (18:01)

Resources Mentioned in this Episode:

Content Creation & Batching Masterclass – Use PODCAST for 20% off

Connect with Dolly:

instagram.com/dollydelongeducation

facebook.com/DollyDeLongEducation

pinterest.com/dollydelong

Review the Transcript:

Welcome to the systems and workflow magic podcast where I help entrepreneurs go from scattered to streamlined in their creative businesses. I’m your host, Dolly DeLong, a wife, a mom and a photographer turned systems educator. Join me every week as we have conversations centered around creating tactical workflows, and automations in your business. Now, let’s make some strategic workflow magic. Oh my goodness, I am so excited because I get to talk about pillar content with you today.

And this is one of the many things I cover with my one on one clients and in several of my systems and workflow related mini courses. But on today’s podcast episode, I wanted to take a moment to peel back the curtain of what pillar content means. So I know this topic is oversaturated. But I wanted to share my take on this because I’m hoping it can help you be more intentional and strategic with your creative business. So let me first answer the question of what is pillar content. So pillar content is for me, it means content pillars are around three to five topics that your brand your business consistently discusses. And you want to not only talk about these different pillars, these topics, but you want to amplify them. And you want to draw attention and awareness of these different aspects of your business. So that more I guess either ideal clients can get to know you like you and trust you over time, you might hear pillar content be referred to as content buckets, or hero content or foundational pillars. And they all mean the same. But for my example of this podcast, I’ll be calling it pillar content. So consistent, again, three to five topics that you’re always talking about, as you are building more brand awareness for your business and the pillar content in my examples that I’m always talking about centres around videos, or like YouTube, or podcasting, audio format, and blogs. So content that is more evergreen, over content, which has a shorter shelf life like social media, for example. And let me peel back the curtain even more if you want to know what I mean by evergreen content. Here’s a quick explanation of what how I term evergreen.

So evergreen content to me is content that stays continually relevant and fresh to readers to listeners to viewers, no matter what time of year it is. So it works as an answer to what they are searching for. So if they are on YouTube, they’re searching for an answer that’s coming in video format. Or if they are listening to a podcast they are searching for a podcast that they are looking for an answer for or if they are they like reading, then they’re looking for an article a blog post that will help them answer a specific question. So going back to pillar content, you want your pillar content to be as evergreen as possible. Because hopefully as you continue to establish yourself as an authority in your creative field. Your goal is to have content rich articles, or content, which videos or audio files like podcast episodes, so that new viewers, new subscribers can consume it and get to know you over time. And to dig deeper as to why establishing the way you’re presenting your pillar content is important. It’s this for me it means consistently meeting your ideal audience where they are. So you want to meet them at the platform they where they are looking for those answers so that they can consume your content. I know I talk about filler content so much and you might be like What is Dali talking about? So I would encourage you to give this episode a listen at least two times because I might be sharing a lot of new terms with you that you may not have ever considered. But I truly want you to dig into why establishing the way you’re presenting your pillar content is important and consistency is important. and establishing your authority. It does take time. So I’m sorry, if you thought by listening to this episode, I was going to give you a magical formula for pillar content success, you may want to turn it off. Because this is not a magical formula, I want to give you a realistic view on how to set up a great system for yourself as you dive into pillar content. And as you get to know what type of pillar content you are needing to create for your specific business.

So you may be listening to this and you may want to argue with me. And you may say, well, Dolly, my clients are on Tik Tok, or on Instagram, or on Facebook. So I want to create content for that platform in that platform alone, and not worry about creating pillar content for a blog or YouTube or video format or audio format in the form of a podcast, I just want to stay on that social media platform. Okay, so I hear you, but you need to put your main pillar content on platforms you own. And then use those secondary social media platforms again, like tick tock or Instagram or Facebook, to drive the traffic back to the pillar content platform you own. We can let me remind you to remember a date, the most recent date of October 4 2021. And that’s the day Facebook and Instagram and WhatsApp. It’s the shutdown in many people flipped out, especially the business owners who do the majority of their marketing and business and their pillar content pieces on those platforms. Yes, okay. I will admit, if you follow me on social media, you’ll see that I’m working my business on social media platforms. So I’m not dogging social media platforms at all. I love Instagram. But my pillar content lives on the platforms I own. So my website and blog format. And now this podcast, and my social media derives the traffic to that pillar content. So going back to the thought of if you are only marketing your content on platforms you don’t own, consider the risk you’re putting your business in, it’s just not worth it, you might lose everything in a day. And I’m not trying to scare you. But I’m just trying to help you think of a new way of looking at pillar content.

Plus, another risk to consider is this. Someone can report your account, hack into your account, or again, those accounts may disappear. So please be intentional with where you are putting your main pillar content. And again, I’m not trying to scare you into thinking oh, I can’t post my pillar content on social media, it’s going to be lost. I’m encouraging you to take your pillar content and put it on platforms that you own. And then and then talk about your pillar content, again on the social media platforms. And if you were to lose everything, hopefully you won’t, but if you something would happen. If someone were to report your account or you hacked into your account or again, the accounts disappear. To some unforeseen circumstance, you at least have your pillar content on the account platforms you own is the time to sprinkle a little magic through the systems and workflows in your business.

Along with over 20 different creative business owners and experts. I’ve created the systems and workflow magic mental it collection of exclusive and free resources designed to help creative business owners actually start and implement workflows and systems in their business so that they can go from scattered to streamline this year and beyond the systems and workflow magic bundle is coming January 24 through 28th of 2022. So make sure you join the waitlist today to be the first to get access to this free bundle head on over now to www dot systems and workflow magic.com to join the waitlist so that you can create some workflow magic in your business. Let me share some examples with you. So if you’re wondering, okay, Dolly, I’m slowly wrapping my mind around pillar content. Can you give me some more exact concrete examples? So I’ll use myself as an example. So as you may or may not know, I am a creative business owner. I am a family and branding photographer. In addition to that, you know that I also love teaching on systems and workflow education. So my pillar content pieces are family photography, branding photography. fee systems and workflow education. And then a huge why of my business is my family, like they are the driving forces of my business, I want to be successful, so that it has a positive ripple effect on them. So my pillar content pieces sometimes revolve around my son, my husband, my faith, because those are really important to me. So I have four different types of pillar content that I’m constantly talking about.

And I’m very intentional with my pillar content. So at the top of every quarter, I like to assess what content pieces I’m going to publish in blog in podcast format, I have a posting schedule, because I want to be consistent and professional in I want my audience to have anticipation of when to expect new content. I do not want to present myself in such a scattered way. I want to be very consistent with my schedule in it that might not be appealing to many listeners right now, you might be thinking, I can’t even have a schedule for myself, how am I going to establish a consistent schedule for my pillar content Dolly. So I’m going to encourage you to listen on because I’m going to give him some just like some tangible tips for you to take action today. Before we go there, I have my pillar content, I just want to also share I have my pillar content pieces in place. Because I also want to be known for these specific topics. So an example of what I mean by that is, I used to be known as the Pinterest gal, to the creative industry for many different creative business owners would reach out to me and I would help them out with Pinterest optimization, and teach them how to drive traffic from Pinterest, to their website to their, like whatever platforms they own. And I love that I love I still use Pinterest to this day. But I do not teach on Pinterest anymore. And so in order when I was making that pivot from I teach Pinterest to more of systems and workflow education, centered around funnels and centered around dubsado, I started creating more pillar content pieces that pertain to funnels and systems and to dubsado education. Why? Because I again, I wanted to start establishing myself as a go to expert in those topics. And I wanted to just not post about Pinterest all the time. So I had to be very intentional about the new pillar content pieces I wanted to present. And I didn’t want to be so scattered again.

Another reason why I like have my pillar content in place is because I want to optimize my keywords for SEO purposes. So that stands for search engine optimization. So when I optimize my blog posts, my pillar content, and my podcasts my other pillar content, my site ranks on Google over time, which means more traffic and more customers are finding me organically. And don’t worry, I am planning on inviting more industry guests and experts who can expound more on this topic. But I just wanted to share, you can optimize your pillar content to be more SEO friendly. And as a reminder, I go into more of my content creation strategies and batching strategies in my batching masterclass. Now, if you are overwhelmed with this topic, then I have some homework for you. Let’s set up a system and create some pillar content magic. So I told you earlier in this episode that I would share some tangible steps for you to take. So here they are. If you like taking notes, then I would encourage you to get your notes app out on your phone or to get a pen and paper out. And let’s let’s dive into some tangible steps. Okay, so step one, I want you to assess all of your offerings within your business. So your services or if you have digital offerings, or if you do a hybrid of both. I want you to literally list out everything that how you make money within your business. Okay, step two, once you have them all written out, I want you to pick out one, okay, just just one money making service that you offer. It could be again, it could be a digital offering. It could be a service but just pick out one because I want to start off small here and I don’t want you to To be overwhelmed, and also like, why not pick out the one that you want to be known for? So let’s say you’re a photographer, who does all the photography things, but you want to be known for wedding photography. So so let’s start there. So that leads into step three. Once you have that nailed down, then I want you to decide how you’re going to present yourself as the expert in wedding photography. So are you going to present it in an evergreen way through a podcast or through videos or through a blog, I would recommend starting out with blogging because if you get into the shoes of your, your ideal client, I hate using the term ideal client. But here I am using that term. Your ideal client is a future bride who is researching, like how to plan out their wedding. All right. And so most likely, they’re looking at visuals on Pinterest or visuals on Google and normally leads back to some sort of blog posts. So that’s why I would recommend setting your eyes on blogging. Now, step four, create a schedule that’s doable and workable for for yourself and your business. So like maybe post a new blog once a month. Now, if you just go out the gates and you’re like, I’m going to blog every single day, you might burn out really easily or you may not. So that’s why I want you to start out really, really small with creating a schedule that’s doable and workable for you. So creating a blog post once a month, that’s really doable. And make sure this blog post is rich in content and has keywords you want to be known for. Okay.

So step five back, I’m kind of tying it in with the keywords and SEO for content. So here it is. So once you have your schedule, do some keyword research on your pillar content. So let’s say you are a wedding photographer who lives in San Diego, I, I love San Diego, so I’m just gonna use san diego wedding photographer. So one of your keywords is going to be San Diego wedding photographer. And then I want you to do some more research and find some keywords that your ideal client, you know, those future bride and groom’s would search for on Google or on Pinterest, and start writing out content in a blog post format, which has those keywords naturally infused in that pillar content. And again, if you’re like, Okay, say what Dolly, I will have a an industry expert who, who specializes in setting up systems for optimizing blog posts on the podcast, but I want to start helping you see the value in optimizing your pillar content. Okay. Okay, so step six, this is the very last step of your homework, I want you to start promoting your pillar content, which is we discussed in this example, as a blog post to drive traffic to your content. So this is where social media comes in handy. So if you love Instagram, or tick tock or Facebook or Pinterest. So this is where you’ll use those platforms to drive traffic to your pillar content. And so once you’ve developed a system and strategy with pillar content for one offering, and you feel like you haven’t nailed down, you have your head wrapped around that, then I want you to look at your other offerings and services you have within your business and apply these same six steps, okay? And these same concepts. Remember, this takes time, okay? This takes patience. And yes, this takes a system you need to set up for yourself.

Even if you feel like Oh, you’re such a free spirit and you don’t need a workflow or system. Well at least write it down and put it somewhere for yourself. So you can remember this these processes. Okay, I promise you, developing a system for your pillar content will serve you handy. Now, you may not have a team working for you. So don’t compare yourself to the big names in your industry. Cut yourself a lot of slack and give yourself grace and just start small, but still be intentional with your pillar content. I share that because I I don’t have a big team working for me. I have two contractors within my business and I am wearing all the hats within my business at the moment. So I find myself constantly I wouldn’t say constantly but like at least once or two times a month, just like falling in that rabbit hole of comparing myself to big names within my industry who have a team who have that giant team.

And of course, like, every, like they are crushing it in content, and then that could crush me. But if I remember to stay in my lane and to be patient and be intentional, I have developed a system for myself, and I am still optimizing my pillar content. So I have to remind myself of this lesson all the time. So I’m trying to encourage you right now to be patient with yourself. Because you can take baby steps with setting up Strategic Systems with your pillar content, you can. And remember, I am all about creating a system and strategy for your content. And I’m all about being intentional with your content. So it drives traffic to your brand and your business over time. And if you want to see my strategies and how I do this within my own creative business, please check out my content creation. Batching masterclass. Okay, I will link it in the show notes. And don’t forget, if you use the code podcast, you’ll get 20% off the masterclass. And this is exclusive only for listeners of the systems and workflow magic podcast.

So please take advantage of this. Okay, I know I give you a lot of homework to work on, and your head is probably spinning. So again, like I said earlier, listen to this episode two or three times to soak it in. But I hope you’ll truly take a step back and assess how you can be more intentional with your pillar content. And if you can, please screenshot this episode and shoot me a DM on Instagram to let me know what pillar content you’ll be working on for your creative business or what aha moments you had within this episode. Until next time, I hope you always find the magic in systems and workflows. And I will chat with you later. Bye. Thank you so much for listening to the systems and workflow magic podcast. You can find full show notes from today’s episode at dolly DeLong photography.com forward slash podcast. If you’re loving the podcast, I’d be so honored if you’d subscribe and leave a review on your favorite podcast player. Be sure to screenshot this episode, share it to your stories and tag me at dolly DeLong education over on Instagram. Until next time, go make some strategic workflow magic.