How to build content clusters and pillar pages: A strategic guide

If your organic traffic is flat, it may be time to shift from focusing on individual keywords to building topical authority. This guide provides a strategic overview on how to build content clusters and pillar pages for SEO success.

The reality is, SEO isn't what it used to be. Simply targeting keywords in isolated posts is no longer sufficient. Search engines, including AI answer engines like Google's AI Overviews, are more sophisticated and prioritize content that demonstrates genuine expertise. To rank well in 2026, you need to establish your site as an authority on a subject. An effective way to achieve this is through the topic cluster model.

This approach helps organize your content and showcase your knowledge, which can improve search rankings. However, creating the necessary volume of high-quality content can be a significant time investment. Tools like the eesel AI blog writer can assist in this process by generating complete, ready-to-publish posts from a single keyword.

Understanding the Basics of Content Clusters and Pillar Pages

So, what exactly is this topic cluster model? Think of it as building a small, specialized library on your website for a specific subject. It makes it easy for both people and search engines to see that you know what you're talking about. It's built on three main parts. To help visualize this, here’s a breakdown of the structure.

The pillar page (the hub)

The pillar page is your centerpiece. It's a long, detailed piece of content that covers a broad topic from a high level. The team at Ahrefs calls this your "cornerstone" content. For instance, if your main topic is "SEO basics," your pillar page would be a guide that touches on everything from keyword research to link building, but without getting lost in the weeds on any one point. It's basically the table of contents for your topic.

Content clusters (the spokes)

The cluster articles are the spokes that connect back to your pillar page. These are a bunch of in-depth articles, each one diving deep into a specific subtopic you mentioned on your pillar page. Using our "SEO basics" example, you'd have separate cluster posts on things like "how to do keyword research," "a complete guide to on-page SEO," and "link-building strategies for beginners."

These articles target more specific, long-tail keywords and are designed to answer very detailed questions your audience might have.

The role of strategic internal linking

Internal linking is what ties it all together. Each cluster article (a spoke) links back to the main pillar page (the hub). The pillar page also links out to each of its cluster articles.

This creates a tight web of internal links that does a couple of important things. First, it tells search engines that all these pages are related and that you've covered the topic thoroughly. Second, it helps spread link authority (or PageRank) around the cluster, giving every piece of content a little boost and helping the whole group rank higher.

Why Content Clusters Are Critical for Modern SEO

Using the topic cluster model is more than an organizational tactic; it's a strategic response to how search engines and AI evaluate content today.

Building topical authority for Google and AI

Search engines love to see that you've covered a topic from all angles. A good cluster demonstrates deep knowledge, which is a huge plus for Google's E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) guidelines, a point that folks at Gravitate Design often highlight. When you're the go-to source, Google notices.

This also applies to Answer Engine Optimization (AEO). AI models like ChatGPT and Google's AI Overviews are built to pull together information from across the web. They are much more likely to feature sources they see as true authorities. Building clusters is how you become one of those sources.

Enhancing user experience and engagement

Have you ever found yourself clicking from one Wikipedia page to another for an hour? That's the kind of experience a good topic cluster provides. The structure makes it easy for visitors to find related info. If someone lands on your "on-page SEO" article, they can easily click over to the main "SEO basics" pillar and explore from there.

This keeps them on your site longer, which sends positive signals like increased dwell time to search engines. They'll reward you for giving users a good experience.

The same blog contains the same article, but this time as a part of a cluster. The same reader opens the article named 'Full list of Gutenberg Editor Blocks', and still doesn't know what this is about. However, as the article is part of a pillar topic, there are various anchor texts and sidebar article suggestions that revolve around the term Gutenberg. In this scenario, the reader can quickly find another article (within the same website), which explains what the Gutenberg Blocks are... This not only makes the reader's site browsing experience more rewarding but also helps with establishing trustworthiness with the said website.

Reddit

Avoiding keyword cannibalization

Keyword cannibalization is one of those annoying SEO issues where you have multiple pages on your site competing for the same search term. As the team at Semrush explains, this just confuses search engines and weakens your authority because they don't know which page to rank.

By planning your content in clusters, you sidestep this problem entirely. The pillar page goes after the broad, high-volume keyword, while each cluster article targets a specific, long-tail version. Everything is neat and organized.

A Practical Framework for Building Content Clusters

Building a topic cluster is a step-by-step process. We'll use an example inspired by a Reddit SEO discussion about building authority for "smartphone recommendations."

Step 1: Identify core topics based on your audience and offerings

First, you need to pick your main pillar topics. These should be broad subjects that are directly tied to what your product or service does. A good pillar topic is big enough to have at least 10-20 more detailed subtopics branching off it.

• Example: For a tech review site, a perfect core topic is "smartphone recommendations." It's broad, relevant to their audience, and has endless potential for subtopics.

You can use tools like Semrush's Topic Research tool or Ahrefs' Keywords Explorer to validate your ideas. These tools can help you see the search volume around a topic and discover related sub-themes to ensure there's enough meat on the bone.

Step 2: Brainstorm subtopics and map your clusters

With your core topic chosen, it's time to break it down into smaller "buckets." These buckets will become your content clusters. Just think about all the different questions, angles, and comparisons your audience might have about the main topic.

• Example for "smartphone recommendations":

1. Bucket #1 - By Type: You could create content clusters around different operating systems or brands. Think articles like "best Android phones" or "Samsung vs. Apple in 2026."
2. Bucket #2 - By Comparison: This bucket would house all your head-to-head comparisons, like "iPhone 15 vs. Pixel 9" or "best camera phones under $500."
3. Bucket #3 - By User Need: This is where you get super specific. You'd create listicles for niche audiences, such as "best smartphones for gamers," "top phones for photographers," or "most durable phones for construction workers."

To find these subtopics, you don't have to reinvent the wheel. As Ahrefs suggests, look at sources like Wikipedia for a structured overview of a topic, and pay close attention to Google's "People Also Ask" section for the questions real users are asking.

Step 3: Conduct a content audit to find gaps and opportunities

Chances are, you already have some content on your site. Don't let it sit there collecting dust! Go through your existing articles and see what you can reuse.

Start by sorting your current content into your new cluster buckets. You might find you already have a perfect article on "best camera phones" that can be a cluster post. Or maybe an older, more general post can be beefed up to become your main pillar page.

This audit helps you see what you have, what needs an update, and most importantly, where the content gaps are. Those gaps are your new to-do list.

Step 4: Create your pillar and cluster content

This is where you'll spend most of your time.

• Pillar Page: Your pillar needs to be an authoritative overview. It should be well-structured, have a clear table of contents, give short summaries for each subtopic, and link out to all your detailed cluster pages. It’s the roadmap for your entire topic.
• Cluster Content: Each article needs to be a deep dive into one specific subtopic. It should give clear, actionable answers and link back to the main pillar page with descriptive anchor text (like, "for a full overview, check out our complete guide to smartphone recommendations").

This step can be the most time-consuming for content teams, as creating dozens of well-researched articles requires a significant amount of work.

Scaling Content Cluster Creation With AI

The primary challenge in this strategy is content creation. Developing dozens of well-researched cluster articles at scale can be slow, expensive, and resource-intensive for content teams.

The eesel AI blog writer is a content generation platform designed to address this challenge. We used it at eesel to grow our blog's traffic from 70k to over 750k impressions in just three months by publishing over 1,000 optimized posts.

By entering a keyword, the platform generates a complete, publish-ready blog post with features suited for building content clusters:

• Deep Research and Citations: The AI researches the topic and incorporates relevant information with internal and external links, which helps in creating a well-connected cluster.
• Automatic Asset Generation: Each post includes AI-generated images, tables, and infographics to make cluster articles more engaging and comprehensive.
• Social Proof Integration: The tool can automatically find and embed relevant Reddit quotes and YouTube videos, adding real-world context and credibility to the content.

This approach allows your team to focus on high-level strategy, such as refining pillar pages, while the AI assists with the creation of supporting cluster content.

For a more visual walkthrough of this strategy, the following video from HubSpot provides an excellent overview of how to create effective topic clusters and pillar pages, reinforcing the concepts we've discussed.

A YouTube video from HubSpot explaining how to build content clusters and pillar pages for a successful SEO strategy.

Final Thoughts

A key takeaway is that SEO success in 2026 relies heavily on topical authority, not just targeting individual keywords. The content cluster model is an effective way to demonstrate expertise to both users and search engines.

By identifying core topics, mapping out clusters, and implementing a strategic content creation plan, you can build a robust library of content that establishes your authority. This is a powerful approach that can deliver significant results.

To build topic clusters efficiently, you can use tools like the eesel AI blog writer to create expert-level content at scale.