The Secret to Website Success? Content Refreshing

Keeping your website content up-to-date is essential for user engagement and search success. But that doesn’t mean you have to write new content all the time. In fact, refreshing old web content – especially high-performing content – is one of the best ways to enhance your site. Let’s dig into the top four reasons refreshing is an effective strategy for getting the most out of your existing content.

Top Reasons Refreshing Web Content Pays Off

Have you ever searched for a topic and noticed all of the results are dated more than a year or two ago? You likely kept scrolling. Consumers today expect search engines to deliver relevant, up-to-date content to their queries. Investing in content refreshing will help you:

• Improve Search Engine Optimization (SEO): There is no question Google has numerous ranking factors with quality, page experience, and linking usually topping the list. Fresh content is a confirmed ranking factor for many queries, too. At the end of the day, Google wants you to deliver valuable content to searchers — and most searchers don’t want to read outdated content.
• Improve User Experience (UX): When you refresh old content, you inevitably find things to fix. Broken links, missing alt text, or a long paragraph that needs to be broken into bullet points. The list goes on. Fixing issues and enhancing readability improves the overall user experience, which in turn can improve SEO.
• Increase Organic Traffic: Better SEO and UX should lead to more organic traffic. And more traffic is always the end goal.
• Enhance Content Operations: Creating new content all the time can be a strain on small teams. Adding continuous content refreshing to your strategy can be a lighter lift for the team and still provide incredible results.

Refreshing Web Content: What Content Do You Choose?

Your website is filled with content — services, products, about, case studies, blogs — the list goes on. If you want to implement a content refreshing strategy, where do you start? We’ve outlined the process for you.

Perform a Content Audit

Review the performance data of all content across your site to prioritize your refresh. Two of the most common approaches include starting with high-traffic content older than 12+ months and/or low-traffic content that is focused on priority keywords.

(Re)Evaluate Keywords

You likely identified primary and secondary keywords when you originally wrote the content. Are those keywords still your targets?

AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries that appear at the top of search results. They pull from multiple sources to give a quick, single answer. For contractors, this could mean users might search for “Best roofing contractor near me” and see a summarized answer featuring your company. All without ever visiting your website.

Refresh On-page SEO

Review the meta description, SEO title, headings, and other elements that make up on-page SEO. The best practices around character counts may have changed since the page was created.

Update the Content

Jump into your content management system (CMS) and update the content. See the list below for a starter guide on what elements to update.

Publish and Track Performance

Publish the updated content with the new date. Then, be sure to track how it performs.

Refreshing Web Content: What Should You Update?

Unsure where to start? We have you covered. Here are a few ways to add more value to outdated web content.

• Update Facts and Figures: One of the easiest ways to update content, especially blog content, is to update facts, figures, and statistics. The world moves fast, and regardless of what industry you are in, if you are citing statistics that are more than 12 months old, there is likely newer, more relevant data available.
• Share New Examples: If your content links to examples, or has screenshots of examples, replace them with new ones. While you’re at it, double-check that you’ve optimized the image to reduce the file size so it’s not hurting site performance.
• Add Multi-media: Videos and graphics engage readers, leading to longer time on the page and lower bounce rates. When you review your content, consider if adding a video, infographic or other visual element could help the reader better understand the content. Visual content, especially video, is known to help search rankings and it makes it more engaging for readers. Learn more about ways to boost engagement with video.
• Rewrite for Keywords, if needed: If you selected more relevant keywords for the content, you’ll need to refocus the content on the updated keywords.
• Improve Readability: Review the content and look for any opportunities to apply web writing best practices. For example, make sure the content has headings, subheadings, and bulleted lists to aid scannability. Also, check to ensure each page has a well-written call-to-action, so that the reader can take the next step.

After you’ve chosen your content and made the updates, it’s time to republish the post with the new date. The date helps readers to determine if the content is still relevant. Many content creators will add an editor’s note at the top or bottom of the page indicating that the post was updated.

Need a Hand Refreshing Web Content?

Refreshing website content is an effective way to ensure your website remains valuable to your site visitors and ranks well in search. Best of all, it helps you get the most out of the content you already have. If you need an SEO-savvy partner to help you implement and execute a content refreshing strategy, contact inConcert Web Solutions.