Content Clusters

What are Topic Clusters (Hub and Spoke)?

A content cluster or topical cluster is a group of web pages that aim to establish topical authority on a particular subject.

Content clusters usually include a pillar page (also called hub) that covers the whole topic completely, but each subject is covered very broadly. 

Whenever a pillar page mentions related subtopics, it links to cluster pages (also called spokes) that cover each subtopic in more depth.

All cluster pages can also link back to the main pillar page and other relevant cluster pages.

What is a Topical Map?

A topical map is like your “plan for content cluster”.

Topical maps are used to determine which topics will be covered and how much content will be created for each topic.

Topical maps are like “ wireframes” or “sitemaps” of planned content that will define content cluster topics and subtopics, and the relationships between them.

In other words, topical maps are visualizations of content hierarchy structures that allow us to execute effective content strategies.

Content Clustering for SEO

To understand the immense value that content clusters bring to any website SEO strategy, we first need to understand Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness or in short E-E-A-T.

What is E-E-A-T?

E-E-A-T is Google's content rating guideline that checks for experience, expertise, authority, and trust.

Meaning search engines determine the quality of your content based on the following questions:

• Do you have experience with this subject?
• Was the content created by an industry expert? (or experienced enthusiast?)
• Do other websites agree that this content is valuable?
• Can users trust this content? Will it be helpful or could it harm visitors?

One of the ways content strategists and SEO professionals aim to use E-E-A-T guidelines to improve website rankings is by establishing topical authority. 

What is Topical Authority?

Topical authority refers to the level of expertise and credibility a website or content creator has in a specific subject area. It’s determined by the depth and quality of their content on that topic.

Topical authority is an SEO goal that aims to make your website the best source online for a specific topic.

Building topical authority is a practice that aims to:

• Help search engines understand the website’s topic and industry
• Help users with all their topic-specific problems
• Covering single or multiple topics in so much depth that users always think of your site as the main source of trusted information for this topic

Topical Authority Example

Example of Topical Authority:

Imagine you're looking for a company that specializes in Webflow. You find three different websites, each from a different agency.

• Agency 1 has just one page – their homepage.
• Agency 2 offers more, including pages for various services, team info, case studies, and tools like quote calculators.
• Agency 3 goes even further. They have all that Agency 2 offers, plus they've written hundreds of articles on web design and Webflow. They have a popular YouTube channel, their team members are known in the industry, speaking at events, and they offer Webflow courses and tools.

Which one seems like the real expert in Webflow? The one you'd trust with your project?

That's what search engines think too. They see which site is most helpful and knowledgeable, and that site gets the most visitors. It's not just about having lots of articles on a topic; it's also about offering services, products, courses, and other resources that show you know your stuff.

How to Build Content Clusters?

Here’s a quick overview of how topical cluster building works.

Step 1: Understand Your Topic

What sounds like the easiest task, might be a bit trickier than it sounds. To create a great content cluster you have to clearly define and understand your main topic.

Start by determining:

• Which topics are relevant or important for your brand image?
• Do you have expertise in these topics?
• Which content do you already have?
• Which topics have already been covered by your competitors?
• What is my audience interested in?
• Which topics performed well in the past?

Step 2: Determine Topic Cluster Size

Your chosen topic should always be big enough to need multiple content pieces. But not so big that it would become “unclear what the actual topic is”.

Example: 

• Webflow = too broad.
• Webflow development = a bit better.
• Custom code for Webflow websites = amazing!
• Custom JS code for TOC in Webflow = too narrow.

Step 3: Conduct Keyword Research

After identifying your main topic, the next step is to do keyword research. You can use SEO tools or just search engines for this.

Try typing your main topic into a search engine and look at the autocomplete suggestions that come up.

The aim is to find keywords that aren't too hard for your site to rank for in search results. 

Even if your site doesn't rank high for a particular keyword, using it can still help because it makes it easier for search engines to understand what your website is about.

If you know a lot about your topic, it should be easy to figure out the different parts that make up the topic.

Just ask yourself: What are the key subtopics you need to cover to explain it fully?

Make a list of these subtopics. You can use this list to plan out content that covers each part of your main topic.

Step 4: Create Content 

Now that you have your main topic and all the subtopics, it’s time to create content!

There are two main ways you can create your content cluster: from top to bottom or from bottom to top.

It all depends on the research needed, expertise, and personal preference. 

You can either start with the most important content piece and then cover subtopics, or you can do it the other way around. Start with subtopics, and then make the pillar piece by covering everything in less detail.

Make sure that for each subtopic or pillar, you read all your competitor content that is already ranking. 

Then try to make your content better than theirs. Be it videos, more images, or even headings they missed.

Make the best content out there. Every time!

Step 5: Internal Linking

After you create your amazing content, it’s time to make sure you create proper internal linking structures.

This means contextually linking to subtopics every time you mention them in your main post. Just like we did two sentences ago.👆

But don’t stop there! 

Link to the main topic from each subtopic page.

And of course, interlink your subtopics.

Whenever you mention another subtopic in your content, make sure to link to it. 

Internal linking should be done during content creation, publishing, and even while doing content updates or optimization.

Pro tip: While working on a series about Webflow SEO, this article is the 57th I've written in the series. Interestingly, none of the previous articles have been published yet. However, I make sure to link to these unpublished articles whenever I refer to a related subtopic. It's a good idea to get your metadata ready before you start writing!

Step 6: Publishing Your Cluster

A common question is: Should you publish your content cluster as soon as the first page is ready, or wait until all pages are complete?

There's no strict rule for this.

However, it's generally a good idea to publish sooner rather than later. 

Keep in mind that the top content in Google searches for well-known topics is often 2-3 years old. This suggests that giving your content time to gain traction is beneficial.

Publishing your pages as they are ready is a bit better because you get the ball rolling earlier. Especially if the content is high-quality and the best on the topic. 

This is because the sooner your page is indexed by search engines, the better.

Concerned about broken internal links if you publish cluster pages one by one? 

Don't worry too much.

Search engines understand that broken links can occur. They expect you to fix them in a reasonable time, so if a link is broken for a week or two after publishing, it's not a major issue.

Just make sure to fix them within a couple of weeks.

While publishing the entire content cluster at once is ideal, it's rare in practice. Holding back content that's ready to be published for several months is generally not advisable.

Building Clusters with CMS Collections

A common misconception is that this clustering strategy works only for blogs. But this can't be further from the truth.

That’s because any content type can benefit from following clustering rules.

Videos? Yes.

Ecommerce? Yes!

Service or feature pages? Absolutely!

None of these examples are blogs, yet the same clustering strategy is effective in each content category!

CMS Collections Come in Pairs

CMS collections should almost always come in pairs:

• Blog and Blog Categories
• Product, and Product Categories
• Service, and Service Categories
• Feature and Feature Category

The best thing is that Webflow even does this for you.

Webflow creates a content cluster system for you as soon as you turn on an e-commerce website plan; Category and Product collections.

Each category is a pillar. A pillar that has multiple products in it.

SaaS or Business Pages

You already read about agency examples earlier in this article. Now let’s take software.

Most software products have different “feature groups” or “tool types” in them. Let’s call them main functions.

For example, ClickUp has Docs, Collaboration, Task Management, Time Reporting, and many others.

These are their product pillars. These are their feature categories.

If we look at a single pillar, such as “task management software” we get a list of sub-features:

• Priorities
• Custom Statuses
• Checklists
• Time Tracking
• Chats
• Etc.

Do you see how this is a topical cluster once again?

This would mean that in Webflow, we would need two different CMS Collections to make this happen. Main features (groups) and sub-features.

Pro tip: Don’t make slugs like /feature-category/ and /feature/. Use /features/ and /feature/ instead. For more info, check out our slug guide for SEO.

The Best Content Comes in Clusters!

Once you understand how content clusters work, you will start seeing them in every successful content strategy on the interwebs. 

That’s because sites convey trust in the quantity of high-quality content. 

It’s easier to trust someone who did something amazing a hundred times, rather than someone who did it once, right?

Or to put this in Alex Hermozi’s words:

Quality beats quantity. But quality quantity beats quality.

Now it's your turn!

Plan your content clusters, and become an authority in your niche!