After publishing blog posts consistently over the past few months, you’re expecting your website to start climbing in search engine results.
But without any pillar pages to organize your content and demonstrate your expertise on key topics, you’re likely to stay stuck where you are.
Pillar pages give your site the structure it needs to compete. More importantly, they tell search engines that you’re a credible source on these topics and worth showing to users.
(Anastasia Tili/pexels)
What Are Pillar Pages?
A pillar page is a long-form piece of content that covers a broad topic at a high level. It gives readers an in-depth overview of a subject and links out to more focused pages that explore specific subtopics in detail.
Let’s say your business is in health supplements. A pillar page might be titled “The Complete Guide to Gut Health,” and it would link to subtopics like “Best Probiotics for Women,” “Signs of Poor Digestion,” or “How to Improve Gut Flora Naturally.”
Each subtopic links back to the pillar. This creates a connected web of content that signals topical depth and expertise to Google.
Why Pillar Pages Are Essential to SEO
You already know Google wants to serve the best, most relevant content for every search. Pillar pages help you prove your authority by organizing your site in a way that’s easy for both users and search engines to understand.
Typically, sites have a bunch of blog posts with no clear connection between them. You write about topic A for one week and topic B the next. There’s no thread tying it all together.
With pillar pages, you build around core topics. Each piece of content connects to a central hub, which shows Google you have depth on subjects that matter to your audience.
Topical Authority = Better Rankings
One of the biggest SEO trends in recent years is topical authority. In short, Google rewards sites that thoroughly cover a subject rather than those that merely target a specific keyword.
When you publish a pillar page with well-organized subtopics, you’re showing Google that you understand the landscape. And when those pages link to each other naturally, you reinforce that you’re a reliable source across multiple angles of a topic.
Sites that Google considers authoritative naturally tend to rank better in search engines.
It Enhances the User Experience (Which Google Tracks)
Beyond SEO benefits, pillar pages offer a much better experience for your visitors. Instead of bouncing from page to page or Googling a dozen different variations of a topic, they find one comprehensive resource that answers multiple questions.
For example, if someone is looking into “how to start an online business,” they’ll appreciate a single, detailed page that links to articles about choosing a niche, building a website, marketing strategies, and common startup mistakes. By creating a pillar page that covers these things, you give them a reason to stay on your site.
The longer visitors stick around and explore your site, the more positive engagement signals you send to Google.
Pillar Pages Are a Long-Term Asset
Unlike news-driven blog posts or short-form updates, pillar pages are meant to be evergreen. That means you build them once and then update them as needed to keep them current. This stability gives them a huge advantage in SEO.
With time, pillar pages often attract the most backlinks because they serve as comprehensive resources. And the more quality links a page earns, the stronger its domain authority becomes, boosting all the supporting content connected to it.
It’s a compounding effect. Your pillar page lifts your subtopics, and those subtopics in turn reinforce the pillar.
How to Build a Successful Pillar Page Strategy
Start by identifying the core topics you want your site to be known for. These should align with your audience’s most common questions and pain points. If you’re a Utah-based home services company, your pillars might include topics like “Complete Guide to Seasonal Home Maintenance” or “How to Choose a Roofing Contractor in Utah.”
Once you’ve locked in your core topics, create a pillar page for each and map out supporting content that dives deeper into each element. Every blog post, FAQ, or landing page should connect to the appropriate pillar (and vice versa).
Here’s what a basic structure might look like:
- Pillar Page: “Everything You Need to Know About Email Deliverability”
- Subtopic: “How SPF, DKIM, and DMARC Affect Inbox Placement”
- Subtopic: “5 Tools to Test Email Spam Scores”
- Subtopic: “Why Bounce Rate Matters for Email Marketing Success”
Each of those supporting articles links back to the pillar page and ideally uses consistent anchor text to reinforce the topic.
Getting Pillar Pages Right (And Why It’s Tricky on Your Own)
Although pillar pages might sound like something you can tackle on your own, they have a learning curve that catches most business owners off guard.
For example:
- You need to figure out which topics are actually worth building a pillar around
- Your cluster content has to connect back to the pillar in a way that makes sense to readers and search engines
- Internal linking needs to be set up correctly, or the whole structure falls apart
- Every piece of content should answer the questions your audience is asking
A professional SEO company can map out your topics and work with you to build content authority around your area of expertise. Experienced agencies handle the research, internal linking, and content structure so everything connects the way it should.
So instead of spending months figuring it out yourself, you can get a pillar page strategy in place and start seeing results sooner.
The Bottom Line
You can keep publishing content piece by piece and hope it connects. Or you can start building pillar pages with an online SEO agency that knows how to structure your site for rankings and authority.
If you’re ready to get started, identify two or three core topics your business should own. Those are your pillars. From there, an SEO agency can help you map out the supporting content and build a strategy that works.
Pillar pages give your website the structure it needs to rank higher and establish real authority. The sooner you build that foundation, the sooner you’ll see results.