Using Data To Refresh Old Blog Content
We have many tactics and tools in our ever-expanding marketing locker but the most consistent trick at our disposal is content. In the ever-changing landscape of digital marketing, blogs and articles remain a critical tool for engaging audiences and driving organic traffic to websites and this is true across almost all industries. From sports brands to funeral directors, we’ve seen the impact of an effective blog campaign on the overall health and performance of organic traffic.
However, maintaining a successful blog isn’t just about creating new content; it also involves making the most of your existing articles. In fact, reviewing old blog content can often be a more effective use of time and resources than spending time researching, writing and then publishing a new written piece. Old blog content, if strategically utilised, can breathe new life into your website and significantly impact your overall content marketing strategy. End of the day, it’s already there so it might as well perform as well as it can for you or it’s just wasted hours. We recently ran through the below steps for a sports nutrition brand with over 50 blog posts and we wanted to share our process as well as what we had learned by combining our top 2 marketing tools, content and data analysis.
We’ll explore the art of using data to revive old blog content, turning it into a powerful asset that drives traffic, boosts SEO rankings, and rekindles audience interest without making major changes to the actual content of the posts. While it sounds complicated, this straightforward process can help you assess how your content is actually performing and where the opportunities for improvement are.
1. Analysing Traffic Metrics
The first step in reviving old blog content is to analyse traffic metrics using various website analytics tools. Identify articles that once generated substantial traffic but may have lost visibility over time or where any recent uplifts have come from. Focus on high-performing posts that have the potential to regain traction and attract new audiences. The key to this is having a large enough dataset (at least 6 months but preferably a year or more to get enough clear data).
Start by evaluating metrics like page views, time on page, bounce rate, and organic search traffic for each blog post. This data will help you prioritise which articles to revive, as well as provide valuable insights into the preferences of your target audience. It’s also important to look at exit pages as well as user journeys. If a user clicked on a blog post, where did they go afterwards? Where did you eventually lose them?
2. Identifying Evergreen Topics & Understanding Topical Content
The key to any blog creation is understanding what content is actually on your blog. For the most part, this will fall under two categories : topical or evergreen. Not all blog posts age equally. Evergreen content, which remains relevant and valuable regardless of the publishing date, holds great potential for revival. Identify evergreen topics that are still relevant to your niche and target audience. By updating and republishing these articles, you can tap into ongoing search interest and engage new readers with timeless content.
This doesn’t mean that topical content is necessarily a lost cause. While one-time only events may not showcase continual value to users, there is often an opportunity to revamp the content without drastically changing it. Things like yearly bucket lists or seasonal challenges can be worked around to provide topical content that is still providing more evergreen value.
3. Keyword and Competitor Research for Optimisation
Keyword research is a crucial aspect of any content strategy, and the same applies to revitalising old blog posts. Utilise keyword research tools to identify relevant and trending keywords related to your blog’s focus. Incorporate these keywords strategically into your old posts to improve their visibility in search engine rankings. By optimising content for popular search terms, you increase the chances of driving organic traffic to your revamped articles. This is a process that can be easily chipped away at but knowing where to make the changes and why is important.
It is also important to look at what your competitors are doing. If you have a competitor that is performing well for your key terms and potentially stealing your base, you need to be prepared to steal it back. Look at their key terms with tools like Ahrefs or SERanking and see where their traffic is coming from and where you can make changes to cut them off at the pass. This can also be useful for identifying their content areas of focus and seeing what makes you different as well as considering what areas you are currently missing. While not necessarily revamping your old blog content, you can still sometimes find ways that similar content is framed differently for bigger results. For example, targeting ‘fitness challenges’ over ‘sport challenges’ or ‘sporting bucket list’. If your competitor is outperforming you, there is likely a reason for it and if you have similar content, have a look to see what they are doing well.
4. Refreshing and Enhancing Content
Once you’ve identified the blog posts to revive and the relevant keywords to target, it’s time to refresh and enhance the content. Now the most obvious area to expand is in the content and you can do this by updating statistical data, outdated information, and broken links to improve the overall accuracy and credibility of the posts. Additionally, adding new insights, examples, or case studies to make the content more valuable to readers.
However, this is time consuming and there are other ways to refresh your content without actually making any real changes to the copy or data. Refer back to your data. What did it tell you? If you have a high bounce rate, this would suggest users aren’t being compelled to stay for whatever reason. You can look to address this by improving CTAs across the blog post and ensuring a clear next step.
If users are continually looking at blog content but not really moving to the next step in terms of sales or enquiries, maybe look at ways to nurture them and pull them towards that next step. That’s not to say you should treat blog content as a sales method. Blog content is primarily a way of improving brand visibility and awareness while also building your reputation but if someone is staying for 10+ minutes and only reading content, that’s a good sign you’ve got an engaged base who maybe need a little push in the right direction.
5. Create Content Clusters
Another example of how data can help you address old blog content is by looking at similar categories. It is often the case that blog content comes in clusters. This is a solid SEO strategy that we have used to great effect over the years. This can be effective for many reasons but it can also significantly help with showcasing your priorities. For example, if you have 10 pieces of content on dog beds and only your ‘dog beds for small dogs’ article seems to be performing well then it might be necessary to review what you did differently in that post as well as using that post to divert traffic to your other articles with internal links. With cluster-type content, it is quite common for one or two pieces of content to outperform the rest as these will act as central hubs but if a piece of content you don’t expect is outperforming the rest, it is a good sign that you need to review your approach and make a change.
Recap
A blog audit that involves reviving old blog content using data-driven strategies can yield remarkable results for your content marketing efforts. By analysing traffic metrics, identifying evergreen topics, reviewing competitor research and refreshing content based on those findings, you can transform outdated articles into valuable assets that continue to attract audiences and boost SEO rankings.
Reviving old blog posts not only saves time but also ensures that your content library remains evergreen, offering timeless value to both new and returning readers. Embrace the power of data in your blog audit and witness your content’s revival spark new interest and drive consistent traffic to your website.
