The power behind cornerstone documents

And why you should have at least one for your brand

Let’s talk cornerstone documents for a moment here. You probably already know all about repurposing content and how to do it. You write big, then break it down into smaller parts to use on different platforms, then break it down into smaller to turn into graphics, and so on and so forth. (PS. this isn’t the only way of repurposing content). A cornerstone document plays on the same idea, though sometimes in reverse.

The original definition of a cornerstone is the first stone set in the construction of a masonry foundation. All other stones will be set in reference to this stone, thus determining the position of the entire structure. Construction, right? And it kind of makes sense, it’s used as a guideline to build something bigger and better. A cornerstone document is similar in the sense that is used to build your content. And yes, you can use this for any aspect, not only content, but I will be focusing on content creation in this article.

I want you to think of it as your base content and everything else you created around it. For example, your brand guidelines are the cornerstone document for your brand. Everything you create about your brand is based on those guidelines. Another example, I use ClickUp as my content management system now. That means I write almost all of my content on there. For me, ClickUp is my cornerstone document because everything I want to say is either already on there, or gets added on there.

Here are the top three benefits of using cornerstone documents…