Content Auditing: The How and Why

We've gone over the benefits of repurposing content to make it work harder for you. But how do you know which ones are worth repurposing? And for that matter, what do you do with that older content that isn’t performing well? The answer: content auditing.

Unless your blog is brand new, you probably have a wealth of older content languishing in your archives. For example, HubSpot has said that a whopping 70% of its traffic comes from content published before that month.

We'll go over what content auditing is, why you should do it, and how to go about it.

In This Article:

What Is Content Auditing?

You might be familiar with SEO (search engine optimization) auditing. It's the process of reviewing and cataloging any issues holding your site back from performing well for search engines.

SEO audits aim to identify and fix the technical problems with your website. For example, site loading times or broken links. Content auditing is a similar process with some overlap but a different focus.

Content auditing is analyzing a website's content to identify its strengths and weaknesses and align it with your marketing goals. It is a critical step to improving the overall quality of the website.

A content audit can be performed on any website, but it is most commonly used for blogs. A blog's primary goal is to provide high-quality, engaging content to drive traffic and conversions.

Content auditing takes a holistic look at the content on a website:

• The quality of the content

• The relevance of the content

• The length of the posts

• The frequency at which posts are published

Why Content Auditing?

Optimizing older content is faster and easier than creating new content. But there are more specific benefits of content auditing.

A second chance at keyword optimization

You also benefit from hindsight (aka analytics) when dealing with older content. For example, the keywords you've been targeting may not be the ones you're ranking for. And often, you can see what you're ranking for and find a variation to sub in with minimal effort.

Here's a dramatic example of the effect keyword optimization can have. When we first published our blog on white label blog content, we weren't even close to ranking on the front page of Google. But the results of a successful audit speak for themselves.

Seize the day

Another reason to have a content audit is to take more advantage of the posts that are doing well. If a post consistently ranks highly, you should update your CTA to what you're currently pushing. If it's a data-heavy post, ensure the research is still accurate.

Interlinking

You've almost certainly expanded or written on previously referenced subjects in older blogs. Content auditing gives you the perfect opportunity to add links from your newer blog posts. Interlinking is an underrated SEO tactic--this is a fast and easy way to improve it.

Focus your efforts

Content auditing is also a great way to ensure you don't waste time updating or expanding content that's dead in the water. Repurposing content is great, but making a video, infographic, and podcast over something that's not performing well will be a waste of effort.

Mold your content to your goals

Marketing should always be done with intention, and content is the same. Your content is filling a purpose, but it may not be the one you want.

We've made a tool that tells your ideal word count based on your industry and goal. Because maybe your goal is getting shared on social media, but your content is more optimized for ranking. It's an easy fix, but only if you take the time to do it.

How To Start Content Auditing

Performing a content audit is a lengthy process. While the results are impressive, it can take a while actually to complete an audit. Therefore, at PFC, we approach content auditing as a one-time project and an ongoing process.

These are the basic steps that go into content auditing.

1. Decide what you want to achieve

As mentioned earlier, content can achieve different results depending on its structure, subject, medium, and length. So using your marketing strategy, decide your overall goals.

2. Choose the content you want to audit

While your blog is a great place to start, you likely have content elsewhere on your site. How is your gated content performing? Are your eBooks bringing in leads?

Just be sure to set reasonable goals for your content audit. Casting too wide a net may leave you overwhelmed. We recommend ignoring content published within the last couple of months. These posts likely are still up to date and haven't had enough time to reach their full ranking potential.

3. Choose your tools

There are quite a few tools out there to help you perform content audits, but two of the essential tools are free. Google Analytics and Google Search Console. Both will help you identify what's ranking and how visitors interact with your site.

4. Categorize

Using whatever analytics program you've landed on, put your content into different piles. These should align with your content goals.

For example, if you're looking to improve SERP ranking, divide your content into ranking in the top 10, ranking in the top 100, and not ranking.

This will help you prioritize the easy fixes.

5. Get into a routine

Content auditing isn't a one-and-done thing. While you can get a lot done in a big spring cleaning, your content will need refreshing and editing consistently.

While editing a singular blog post will be much faster than writing one from scratch, a backlog of hundreds of blog posts can quickly become overwhelming.

Content Audit Services

While the benefits of auditing content are undeniable, the process can be time-consuming and tricky. Auditing content isn't just about finding errors in the content. Instead, the goal is to figure out what needs to be done next to improve your content and make it more engaging for your target audience.

Which is why many companies outsource this task to an expert. An expert will do a thorough job, so you won't need to worry about wasting time on things like checking grammar or punctuation mistakes—they will take care of it all for you!

People First Content now offers content audit services! Get in touch with us below to get started.

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