Content Strategy

---
name: Content Strategy
description: Use when the user wants to plan a content strategy, decide what content to create, build topic clusters, or figure out what to write about next.
category: SEO & Content
version: 2.0.0
tools: []
---

# Content Strategy

Plan content that drives traffic, builds authority, and generates leads by being searchable, shareable, or both.

## Before Planning
Search the Knowledge Base for existing product-marketing context first, and only ask about what isn't already covered. Otherwise gather:

1. **Business context** — what the company does, the ideal customer, the primary content goal (traffic, leads, brand awareness, thought leadership), problems the product solves.
2. **Customer research** — pre-purchase questions, sales objections, recurring support-ticket topics, the language customers use for their problems.
3. **Current state** — existing content and what's working, available resources (writers, budget, time), producible formats.
4. **Competitive landscape** — main competitors and content gaps in the market.

## Searchable vs. Shareable
Every piece of content should be searchable, shareable, or both — prioritize searchable first, since search traffic is the foundation. **Searchable content** captures existing demand: target a specific keyword/question, match search intent exactly, use titles and headings that mirror how people search, place keywords in title/headings/first paragraph/URL, cover the topic comprehensively, and back claims with data and authoritative links. **Shareable content** creates demand: lead with a novel insight or counterintuitive take, challenge conventional wisdom with evidence, tell stories that make people feel something, and share honest, vulnerable experiences others can learn from.

## Content Types

**Searchable:**
- *Use-case content* — [persona] + [use-case] formula targeting long-tail keywords ("project management for designers").
- *Hub and spoke* — a comprehensive hub page with linked subtopic spokes. Most content works fine directly under `/blog`; reserve dedicated hub/spoke URL structures for major topics with real layered depth.
- *Template libraries* — high-intent keyword targets ("marketing plan template") that deliver standalone value while showing how the product enhances the template.

**Shareable:**
- *Thought leadership* — name concepts people feel but haven't articulated; challenge conventional wisdom with evidence.
- *Data-driven content* — anonymized product-data analysis, public-data analysis, or original research with published results.
- *Expert roundups* — 15-30 experts answering one specific question, with built-in distribution from participants.
- *Case studies* — Challenge → Solution → Results → Key learnings.
- *Meta content* — behind-the-scenes transparency (e.g. "How We Got Our First $5k MRR").

For programmatic content at scale, hand off to the programmatic-seo skill.

## Content Pillars and Topic Clusters
Pillars are the 3-5 core topics a brand will own; each spawns a cluster of related articles. Most content can live under `/blog` with strong internal linking — dedicated pillar URL structures (`/guides/topic`) are only needed for comprehensive, multi-layered resources. Identify pillars via four lenses: product-led (problems the product solves), audience-led (what the ICP needs to learn), search-led (topics with real volume), and competitor-led (what competitors already rank for). Good pillars align with the product, match audience interest, have search or social demand, and are broad enough to support many subtopics.

## Keyword Research by Buyer Stage
Map topics to the buyer journey using proven modifiers: **Awareness** — "what is," "how to," "guide to" ("What Is Agile Project Management"). **Consideration** — "best," "top," "vs," "alternatives" ("Asana vs Trello vs Monday"). **Decision** — "pricing," "reviews," "demo," "trial" ("[Product] Reviews"). **Implementation** — "templates," "examples," "tutorial," "setup" ("Step-by-Step Setup Tutorial").

## Content Ideation Sources
1. **Keyword data** (Ahrefs/SEMrush/GSC exports) — cluster into topics, tag buyer stage and search intent, flag quick wins (low competition + decent volume + high relevance) and content gaps versus competitors. Output as a table: Keyword | Volume | Difficulty | Buyer Stage | Content Type | Priority.
2. **Call transcripts** (sales/support) — extract questions asked → FAQ/blog ideas; pain points in their own words; objections → proactive content; exact phrasing (voice of customer); competitor mentions.
3. **Survey responses** — mine open-ended answers for topics and language; flag themes mentioned by 30%+ as high priority; note requested resources and preferred formats.
4. **Forum research** via web_search — Reddit (`site:reddit.com [topic]`) for top posts and comment frustrations; Quora (`site:quora.com [topic]`) for most-followed questions; also Indie Hackers, Hacker News, Product Hunt, industry Slack/Discord. Extract FAQs, misconceptions, debates, and the terminology used.
5. **Competitor analysis** via web_search — find their content (`site:competitor.com/blog`), note top-performing and repeatedly-covered topics, gaps they haven't addressed, and their case-study structure; identify angles the user can cover better.
6. **Sales and support input** — objections, repeated questions, ticket patterns, success stories, feature requests and the problems underneath them.

## Prioritizing Content Ideas
Score each idea on four weighted factors: **customer impact (40%)** — frequency in research, share of customers affected, emotional intensity, potential LTV; **content-market fit (30%)** — alignment with what the product solves, unique insight available, supporting customer stories, likely product-interest lift; **search potential (20%)** — monthly volume, competitiveness, long-tail opportunities, trend direction; **resource requirements (10%)** — available expertise, research needed, assets required. Score as a weighted table (Idea | Customer Impact 40% | Content-Market Fit 30% | Search Potential 20% | Resources 10% | Total).

## Output Format
1. **Content pillars** — 3-5 with rationale and subtopic clusters, tied to the product.
2. **Priority topics** — per piece: topic/title, searchable/shareable/both, content type, target keyword and buyer stage, and the research backing it.
3. **Topic cluster map** — how content interconnects.

## Task-Specific Questions
1. Patterns from the last 10 customer conversations?
2. Recurring questions in sales calls?
3. Where do competitors' content efforts fall short?
4. Unique research insights not shared elsewhere?
5. Which existing content converts best, and why?

## Related Skills
copywriting (writing individual pieces), seo-audit (technical/on-page SEO), ai-seo (getting cited by LLMs), programmatic-seo (scaled generation), site-architecture (hierarchy/navigation/URLs), emails (email content), social (social content).