Corporate blogs serve multiple purposes for recruiting and staffing companies. Creating well thought out and industry-specific articles can help recruiters make more organic connections with clients and regularly adding content to your website is a way to help boost your SEO. But what should you do when those blog posts get old? 

Do you delete it? 

Update it maybe? 

There are a few factors to consider before any steps are taken. First, let’s look at this a little differently. With time, all things change. Whether that be your clothing, your slang, your communication style, or even your taste in decor—with time, it all changes; and the same is true for your content. 

And, just like everything else adapts with time, so should your blog content.

Why is it important? 

Adding content to your website on a regular basis not only allows you to offer up-to-date information to your readers, but it satisfies the desire for new and refreshed pages that the search engines are looking for. Google wants to offer the most up-to-date experience for internet users and, when it comes to organic search engine rankings, not having updated content could hurt your search ranking. 

If your website has been untouched for years, chances are your business, industry and Google has changed. Which means you need to adapt too. 

Look at your current content

Updates won’t happen overnight. Set aside some time to review all the content on your website. After all, we know it doesn’t take long for a business or industry to change enough to see age or buzzwords in our content. 

To get a look quickly, use your WordPress administrator Dashboard. Go through the pages and blog posts and make notes. Perhaps you no longer provide a particular service or maybe you have expanded into new industries; these types of updates will need to be made quickly. Are some of your blogs dated a few years back, but the content still relevant?

Updating statistics, wording and images can go a long way in refreshing the blog posts. While you’re doing that, be sure that your posts include proper SEO keywords, titles and descriptions to help your pages be found.

If you’re looking for a tool to help export your content, we recommend WP All Export. 

No matter the situation, if a page on your website is no longer relevant, it is time to revise it.

But is it worth the time?

In short, getting clients to your website is ALWAYS worth your time, but that doesn’t mean updating every old blog post is. This is where some research has to be done to determine if you want to waste precious minutes updating. 

Before deleting or changing a page on your site, you will want to determine:

To see those rankings and measure search volume, we recommend looking at Google Search Console or SEMRush, as well as keeping track of your Google Analytics. 

If you see high search volume for specific posts or pages, you will want to update that content so it stays at the top of the search rankings and continues to pull in key potential clients. 

**Please note, some numbers may be naturally low depending on the size of the niche industry you are serving in. Take the size of your market into account and look at the numbers historically to get a better perspective of what is “high volume” in these cases.**

Updating older content

Once you are ready to dive in and start updating your online content, remember to keep these few items in mind. 

Update Terminology

Terminology changes frequently in every industry. It wasn’t so long ago that emojis were called “emoticons..” Sweep through your site and make sure any outdated words are changed to current ones.

Replace Old Statistics with New Ones

Nothing makes your content look more outdated than old numbers. Take the time to find the latest statistics or study dates to prove your point and include them in your site changes.

Notify Readers as Needed 

In the tech and software industries especially, older blog content is often needed to reference for problem-solving. Notify readers with an announcement of the newer information on the top of the blog and point them to the updated solution.

Optimize for Ranking Keywords

You might find that your page has started to rank on search engines for valuable keywords. Make sure to update the post with these keywords in mind.

Revise Metadata

If a blog needs to be updated, most likely the meta description needs to be too.  Make sure you change any outdated terms and include target keywords in your meta tags and meta descriptions.

Fix Broken Links

There is nothing more frustrating than broken links on a website.  As you make changes to your site, there could be broken links that need to be fixed. WordPress has a nice Broken Link Checker for you to use to help. 

Update Graphics and Alt Tags

Visuals are so important for your website and brand. Make sure to refresh any images that might be out of date. This is also a good time to check each image’s alt tags to make sure they have the right SEO terms as well.

Update and Republish, then Share

After all of your hard work is done, republish your new and improved blog. You can post it right away or schedule it according to your digital marketing calendar. 

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Keeping your content current can be time-consuming and overwhelming. At Recruiters Websites, our team understands your need for quick and effective solutions.  If you are prepared to kick up your digital efforts and grow your business, reach out today.