At the time of writing this article, I have 1018 blog posts published on this site.
WHAT? 1018? Now that’s a lot of writing, taking photos, editing, proof reading and promoting.
During my blog journey, my site has evolved in many ways. I’ve changed my writing style, how I lay my content out, the font colour, the colour scheme many times.
I have posts that I thought would do well and get a lot of shares, but they just didn’t get the attention I thought they deserved.
There’s also the flip side, posts that I thought were pretty average ended up doing really well.
Some of those posts still do well today. Some of them posts, I’ve forgotten about and they’re hidden deep in my archives.
But sometimes, rather than writing a brand new post, it’s much quicker and easier to edit your old content so when people visit that page, it’s consistent with the rest of your site. Or maybe it’s one of those failed posts that you want to give a bit of an upgrade to – then promote it again on social media, now it’s a couple months or years later and you have more followers – it just might get the views it deserves, right?
Well, I do this every so often when I’m looking at blog posts to schedule in Buffer. My buffer queue isn’t just a list of my most recent posts, but a list of new and old posts. Every so often, I get board so trawl through my archives, edit an old post and put it in my buffer queue to see how it does.
It’s a really quick way of bringing old content to live, as well as refreshing your Twitter feed or giving you new things to pin on Pinterest.
So here’s the checklist I go through to edit old posts.
1. Are the images consistent with rest of my site?
I might want to consider deleting the photo if it’s old, poor quality or doesn’t match my recent photos and replace it with a new one. This also goes for the main header image – I often update them with one of my new style graphics.
2. Is there a pinnable graphic?
Because I’ve been working on my Pinterest traffic and following lately, I’ve been keen to get a pinnable graphic into all posts that I think would do well on Pinterest. I didn’t start doing this until the last few months, so I almost always have to add this in when I refresh old blog posts.
3. Spell check.
I’m a terrible speller. Mistakes always seem to slip through even if I proof read 10 times. Going back to old content is a great chance to have a read and make sure there are no errors before you promote the post again!
4. New ideas to add.
Thought of something new to add to the post? Or is it a bit out of date and there’s more to add? Now’s the time.
5. Link relevant content.
Linking to relevant content is a great way to increase your bounce rate. If you’ve any new posts that will fit in, nows the time to link up.
6. Reset related posts.
If you have a related post Plugin, like the one below my post – it might be time to edit it and put in new posts that are more relevant.
7. Check your SEO.
Now’s a good time to check in with SEO. Have you put alt tags in your images? Have you used headings and other SEO techniques?
Do you ever do anything with your old content?
If you like what you see, please sign up to my newsletter below and follow me on Twitter and Bloglovin so you don’t miss out on updates!
Well there’s a task for me today then. Thanks a lot a always x
I just dumped a lot of my old content because I was moving platforms and URLs, but then I have been blogging for 9 years and there was a lot of stuff that’s simply too out of date. With evergreen posts, I tweet out links to them from time to time if they’re still relevant. As long as people still get value from them then it doesn’t matter how old they are. The other thing of course is to keep checking for broken links, especially in comments, as these can happen so quickly.
I have made a list of old content which I will update so these tips are very useful!
I know I should spend a little more time with the old content, but I’m so focused on the new things that I neglect it and it’s bad.
Great tips for anyone who has at least a year of archives. I think I’m still a bit too new to have to worry about this, but definitely handy for when I finally have enough content to go back to!
Psst! I think on #5 you meant decrease your bounce rate, right? 😀
Great outline of tips is very help and true to keep a consistency of topics but interesting followers enjoy that.
I’ve published 902 posts on my blog so far and have never gone back to some of my old posts…but definitely will after reading this post! 🙂 Obviously now I know how I’m gonna spend this rainy afternoon!
Yes I actually do the same! I recently edited one of my posts that got few reads via Pintrest! I published it earlier when I started blogging, it didn’t get the love it deserves. It’s also getting noticed by search engines! I find few reads every now and then, so I decided to enhance it.
I will do more Posts editing after exams. I will redesign my blog as well! I am glade your post comes in match with my motivation for my old posts. Thank you 🙂
I love these ideas! Especially updating the lead image and linking to newer posts.
Liz x
Distract Me Now Please
These are really handy tips !
I have recently started working through my old post trying to sort them out but I feel like it may take me a life time lol 😀
Alex ox
I’ve re-purposed a few old posts, but I want to update some more of my early posts because a lot has changed 🙂
I do want to go through my old posts and update them with alt tags but gosh, so much to do and so little time…I lie, I’m just a lazy arse.
Thanks for all the tips! I’ve only recently started to optimize my social media accounts and all that jazz so every bit helps 🙂 I never really shared any of my old posts before, even when I initially posted them so thanks for the tips!
Mili | Sharmtoaster
These blogging tips are absolutely great! Thanks for sharing!
http://fashion-soup.com/
I have actually been wondering about doing this for a while now, but didn’t think of taking new pictures for it and sorting it out… there is a few posts I love, but I cannot bare to share thanks to the ugly layout… away to redo them now haha
Erin || MakeErinOver
Apparently I am up to 1639 posts (who knew!) , but there are a lot of old ones. I quite like the nostalgia of my old posts- even if they are a bit cack, they are me! But these are great tips though!
I link to some of my old stuff as I love some of the posts I wrote in the past, but I never thought to spruce it up before doing so – great idea!
I’m currently going back through my blog & repurposing. I started on Blogger & had no clue about SEO. I switched to WordPress.org less than a year ago & have discovered the wonders of SEO! I’ve been working through my ‘Blogger’ posts to bring them up to scratch with my more recent content in this area. I’ve also been re-doing photos where I’m not completely happy with them. I need to go through my site & add a pinnable image to each post, I’ve only recently got to grips with Pinterest & am eager to make it ork in my favour in terms of blog traffic. Xx
Tania | When Tania Talks
Nah I don’t have enough content to begin with lol. But I do particularly like the idea of adding in relevant links especially if you’re doing a series or writing about a particular topic that you’ve done loads of more since.
x
I start doing that recently!In the past i thought that this wasn’t so true to do it,because i will change the post but now i see that i learned more and i can do those old posts better and readable to be honest haha ^_^
xx Aphrodite ~ BubblyBeauty
I now know what to do this weekend. Thanks a lot. ❤
Really like this post. I’ve been meaning to go back and repurpose a few of my posts for a while now. My style has changed so much since I started. This post is going to help so much. Thanks!