As consumers continue to crave more and more original, valuable and quality content the phrase “Content is king” should be at the forefront of any successful marketing strategy for the foreseeable future. If you are not investing in a solid content marketing strategy, start now. The best place to start is where you likely host most of your content – your website. And what should be the first step?
An audit of your current website content. An audit of your website content is an involved process but it’s worth doing to keep your content updated with the latest information, generate ideas for future content and enhance the SEO value of content that already exists.
Updating content
As you go through your audit you’re going to find areas that need to be updated. This could simply involve updating statistics or references to people or events that are no longer relevant to readers. Another way of updating is finding content that can be combined into one longer piece that will more effectively address a topic.
New Ideas
An audit can also lead to ideas for new articles. Looking at massive amounts of old content can generate a host of ideas that can keep your editorial calendar full for months to come. It also clues you in on gaps in your content where issues around your product or services are not being addressed.
SEO Elements
An audit ensures that all the technical details of SEO have been addressed on individual pieces. This means titles, keywords, metadata and image tags must all be checked to ensure they have been done properly. This ensures even old content can still provide SEO value once optimized correctly.
To get started, you’ll want to choose a timeframe for review, use data to find what works and evaluate the “meat” of your content pieces.
Limit the Scope
Your first step should be to designate a period in time to audit. Ten years should be the absolute maximum you go back, five years is likely far enough. This keeps you from biting off more than you can chew, in terms of the amount of content you evaluate.
See What’s Working
This is the quantitative side of the audit equation. By looking at data from website analytics, you can determine what content has drawn the most readers into the site, from what source, and if people are taking the desired action on the page. This helps determine what is, and isn’t, working in terms of your strategic goals.
Evaluate the Content
Parts of this are more qualitative in nature. When evaluating content, ask yourself:
• Is the content clear on what it is about?
• Is the content presented logically?
• Is there a consistent voice on content across the site?
• Does the content serve both the needs of the reader, as well as the site owner?
Answering these questions will help direct you to additional steps. But if the content is professional, up-to-date and is still drawing traffic – leave it alone! There’s no reason to update content just for the sake of updating.
That’s an overview of what a website content audit should cover. Hiring professionals like Bayshore Solutions can be the best move, given the scope of a content audit. Whether you hire outside help or do it yourself, make sure to audit content routinely. It will not only show you what worked in the past, but guide you toward what type of content to create in the future.
Kevin Hourigan is the President and CEO of Bayshore Solutions and for over 23 years, his company has provided clients with digital solutions that grow their businesses. To contact Kevin, please email [email protected].
