How to Update Old Blog Posts and Boost Its Traffic

by ​Helen Stark, Guest Contributor

Back in 2003, Google has filed a patent that set a new bar for content marketers and blog owners. It stated that a search engine could take content freshness as one of the characteristics that impact its rankings.

In other words, fresh content may rank higher on Google. Bloggers often start chasing this freshness creating tons of new articles. But there is another way of getting Google’s attention and driving more traffic to your website: update your old content.
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A number of tricks that will make your old content loved by users and Google.

What is your benefit?
Some bloggers consider updating old posts a waste of time. They believe that only new content helps rank higher and get traffic. But the old content can be a source of constant traffic through the years if properly updated.

Updating old article is usually a lot easier and faster than creating a new one from scratch. In most cases, you should take care of a few sections, add some fresh data and polish the headline.

An old article can bring you a high amount of traffic after the update. Especially the so-called ‘evergreen content.’ Those articles can bring you stable traffic through the years (like on the screenshot below). Just make sure they include the fresh data and latest tips.
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Finally, by updating your article info, you send a signal to Google that your content is ‘fresh’ and invite bots to crawl your link. It may impact article’s rankings.

What articles to update
You should choose the right articles for the update and know the right time for doing it. Here are the main factors you should check to select a proper article for the update:

• Traffic. Check out your Google search console to find out what posts bring you the highest and the most stable amount of traffic. E.g., set the last year as the timeframe and check your Top 10 posts there.
• Backlinks. The more backlinks the post attracts - the more promising it is for updating. Content that gets a lot of backlinks already has more trust from users and ranks higher.
• Social shares. The posts with a good number of social references may also be considered a good base for the update.

Not only your evergreen posts may be updated. In Google Trends, you may notice that some searches have regular spikes in traffic. Those are searches for seasonal events, holidays, sports, etc. If you have such posts - e.g., “Super Bowl recipes” or “Summer vacation tips” - you can also update them closer to the respective dates.
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What not to change
There are a few elements you should not touch when updating your article. Of course, you should not change the best parts of the post. You should not change the general topic as well. The users who visit your page should see the information they expect from the headline. So only minor updates can be done here.

And you should never touch the URL! This URL already has some authority, backlinks, and inbound links. If you change it - you lose all its ranking potential and have a bunch of broken links pointing to your website which is bad for SEO.

Start with keyword research
So, you have an article to update. How do you think users find it in searches? Do your keywords answer the ‘searcher’s intent’? Do you actually rank for the keywords you set as your target ones? You may need to update your article with more relevant keywords that will take it higher in SERP.

• Check out the article in your Google search console for the keywords it already ranks for.
• Inspect those keywords in your favorite keyword tool. Take a closer look at the keywords with ‘good’ metrics, like high search volume, traffic potential, lower difficulty.
• Check out what pages also rank for those keywords and what content they offer to users. Try to piggyback on your competitors and ‘steal’ some keyword ideas from them.
• Focus on long-tail keywords since they give you an opportunity to rank for thousands of keywords with one piece of content.

Update the article's Meta-data
Title and description are the first things that users see when they find your post in the search. Think of how the title and description can be improved:

• Create a new title that includes your new target keyword (don’t change the URL). You can come up with a few versions of the title and choose the best one with the help of Optimizely plugin for WordPress.
• Rewrite your description/snippet to make it more attractive for users. Sometimes Google chooses the first phrase from your article for a snippet, so pay attention to your first paragraph, too.

Update the article contents
Take a closer look at the article’s structure and content. Check out those parts that should be revised or rewritten. You might also need to change the order of the article’s sections, add more specific info to attract various groups of readers.

You may also wish to add new examples or take new screenshots. If you used various data and surveys in your post to prove your thoughts, it might be that right time to find more recent researches. Don’t forget to proofread your article to remove mistakes and make it more readable. You can use HemingwayApp to improve your writing style.

Improve your links
Interlinking is one of the ways to tell Google that the page is important. Inbound links increase trust from search engines and readers as well. Proper interlinking helps boost the time a user spends on a website.

Check out your article for the links it has, and remove/fix all broken links. Broken links on your website (no matter - inbound or outbound) lead to the poor user experience. Of course, you can’t control the links on other websites. But you definitely can fix broken links on your own website: either replace them with live links or set 301 redirect to the relevant links.

It's time to share!
Updated article is not a new one, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need promotion. You should make people learn about the article as if it were new:

• Post the link to the article on the social media channels you use. Add brief info about what’s updated;
• Put the link to the article into the emails to your subscribers. Mention what data was added;
• Do some outreach to people who may be interested in the content you provide. Tell them why do you reach out and what are the benefits of your article for them.

Don’t reach out to bloggers if you did just a ‘face-lift’ to your article like changed its title and description or added/fixed a few links. Do promote the article with major updates like improved parts, new data, and fresh tips. It will improve trust to your content and attract the relevant audience.
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Author bio:
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Helen Stark is a content marketer at Ahrefs. She explores new things every day to impress her readers with catchy stories. Apart from all that marketing stuff, Helen loves listening to rock music, reading and traveling. A lot! Feel free to follow Helen on Twitter and Facebook.