Regular content audits are key for ensuring your SEO strategy stays on track. However, it can be easy to conclude your content audit, summarise your findings and then only make vague plans to address the fixes before being pulled back into other areas of your work.
Don’t let your hard work go to waste – ensure that you action your fixes in priority order post-content audit, recording your progress and setting benchmarks for success which will translate into improved SEO performance.
Here are our top 8 priorities to focus on once your content audit is complete.
1. Translate your findings into KPIs
To keep your work from going to waste, ensure your findings are translated into actionable and measurable KPIs which have deadlines for completion and regular review dates.
Every content audit has different results, so your specific fixes will vary, but there are a number of metrics which are applicable to every case. These include traffic or page views, backlinks, conversion rate, bounce rate, dwell time and organic keyword position.
Assess where you currently stand for these metrics and set goals to be achieved in a specific timeframe. Some people like to review monthly, while others do so every quarter.
Whichever timeframe you choose to achieve your goals in – and regardless of the specific KPIs you set – you are responsible for keeping the ball rolling so that your content audit assists with consistent and proactive improvement.
Consider setting up specific goal tracking on Google Analytics so that reports can be exported and analysed ahead of reviews.
2. Sort your technical problems first
In your audit, you may have identified technical issues which are impacting your content performance. It should be your priority to get these fixed, whether you do it yourself or delegate tasks to your technical specialists.
Technical issues can include indexing, page speed and crawling issues. Some examples include:
- Index bloat leading to wasted crawl budget
- Soft 404s where no content or thin content is present
- Misconfigured trailing slashes where multiple indexable versions of one URL are served
- Discovered pages which are not indexed after large amounts of content are published
- Dozens of plugins installed which reduce page speed
- Large videos and images resulting in poor LCP scores
Ensure these fixes are tracked on a project management tool and that progress is reviewed to ensure none of them slip through the cracks.
3. Go for the quick and easy fixes
Once you have set up your technical fixes, it’s time to examine your content audit in more detail and identify areas where you can implement quick and easy wins.
Your audit should have categorised your content into various sections, each of which requires a specific fix.
For example, you may have content which is thin, in which case a decision needs to be made about whether you expand the content or retire and redirect the URL.
Writing additional content in situations like these can take time, but other fixes can be quicker and easier to implement.
You may have identified several pages which need slight tweaks to update them, in which case you can blitz through them and indicate when they are next due for review so that you avoid content decay.
There may also be several pages which don’t have keywords in the subheadings, missing or poor-quality meta descriptions or a lack of internal links. These can be tackled in batches and completed quickly.
4. Get your redirects sorted
Your content audit should hopefully have unearthed old and underperforming pages which drive no traffic, but have some innate, inherent or accumulated link equity. Key landing pages could benefit from that link equity, by redirecting these old URLs.
Several of your URLs may have been flagged by a tool such as Screaming Frog as containing duplicate content. During your manual review, you will likely also have uncovered content which is no longer relevant or is so outdated it is no longer worth having on the site.
To boost your link equity in your focus pages, you should begin retiring that old content, and putting into place 301 redirects to those pages. Consider sharing your redirect plan with your developer to ensure that you will not be creating new technical problems further down the line.
5. Fix your content issues
Now it’s time to dig deeper into your content and work on the fixes which will take more time.
You will need to allocate blocks of time over the coming months to address these fixes, or delegate batches of content to your team of writers.
For example, there may be batches of content which need to be revamped so that they adhere better to E-E-A-T guidelines. You may wish to rewrite sections, add information, include original insight and create original imagery.
You may also need to optimise a page of content for a specific keyword if it was not written with SEO in mind before. Perhaps you need to carry out keyword research and cross-reference the keywords you prioritise with other pages to avoid the risk of keyword cannibalisation.
There could also be content which is text-heavy and so it may be worth liaising with your design team to create infographics that support the content, helping with E-E-A-T and assisting visual readers who visit your site.
6. Update your internal linking strategy
Once all of your content has been revamped, you will be in a position to apply optimised internal linking strategy. As your URLs will have been redirected where relevant and technical issues such as index bloat will have been tackled, it will be time to analyse pertinent places to include internal linking.
You may have identified that some content is outperforming others, in which case you can update your internal linking to promote this page and capitalise on the opportunity to bring in more traffic and conversions.
Other pages may have external links, but you could have identified opportunities to link to freshly updated pages that would benefit from increased visibility once you submit your sitemap to Search Console.
Ensure you make a note of your internal linking strategy on your content plan, as you will need to remove broken links in the future and it will be important to keep a record so no issues like these are missed.
7. Fill in the gaps
Your content audit has nearly been fully actioned, but now it’s time to fill in the gaps and ensure that you have done all you possibly can to get your SEO strategy realigned and refreshed ahead of the next progress review.
Check back through your content and make tweaks such as writing keyword rich captions for your images and ensuring your alt text is filled out and optimised.
Now is also a good time to check for search intent mismatch. Taking steps such as using modifiers to convert primary keywords into long-tail queries can help to overcome such issues.
8. Review your audit
The final step is submitting your updated sitemap to Search Console for review, and then you can sit back and relax.
Unfortunately, your relaxation can’t last for long. You cannot rest on your laurels and consider that your job is done. You need to review your progress regularly in between your formal progress reviews.
Work proactively to adjust and improve your strategy whenever you don’t consider progress towards KPIs is moving in the direction or at the speed you would expect.
Need help with your content audit?
If you need help with organising your actions after your content review, or you would like to ensure your audit template is optimised for effectiveness and efficiency, we are here to help. Get in touch with us to find out how we can help to take your SEO content strategy to the next level.
We are also offering a limited number of Free Acquisition Workshops to help you gain understanding of how your site is currently performing and receive actionable insights on how to improve.
