A common mistake that we see is that businesses let their freshly designed websites become static – thinking that the new design is the end of website work. However, your website should be constantly evolving, with every update playing a part in the interaction with users, customers and search engines. If you fail to update your website’s content regularly, Google may see it as a ‘dead entity’ with nothing new to offer, which can negatively impact your search rankings.
Frequently updating your website offers search engines fresh content and sources of new information to show to users, helping you to appear higher in the search results.
What is Website Content?
Website content is the text, visual or audio content that is available on your site for users to browse and read. In this article, we refer to updating content as blog posts, service and product pages, and about pages.
Why Updating Website Content Helps SEO
Frequent Indexing
Search engines use web crawlers to scan the Internet for websites, which then crawl the websites and rank them based on many factors – such as high-quality content, security, website speed, mobile friendliness and keywords. Everytime you update your website, the search engines recrawl your site and rearrange your site rankings – giving you a chance to appear higher.
Updating your website with valuable and relevant content gives you a better chance of ranking higher, however it is important to note that the key here is quality over quantity – all content added should be of a high standard.
More Keywords
When you publish new content, there are more opportunities for your site to contain more keywords. Keywords are high on Google’s ranking factor list. You should aim to include keywords in your content, but be sure to add them naturally – otherwise your website may be penalised for ‘keyword stuffing’. A great way to add keywords is by focusing each blog post on a new keyword.
Increased Authority
You want to be seen as an industry authority in Google’s eyes, showing users that you are knowledgeable and market leaders. The more informative and valuable content that you publish, the greater authority potential you have. A great way to do this is by posting in-depth articles and industry news, which will help to build your reputation and gain authority within your industry.
Ways to Update Website Content
Below are some ideas on ways that you can update content on your website, to help with SEO.
Fix Grammar
This might sound a very obvious one, but can be often overlooked. Nobody wants to read content that has incorrect grammar or spelling, so take some time and correct any errors across your website. Not only will this lead to better user experience (users will also trust you more), but it will signal to Google that you’re updating your website.
Add Product Images
Updating and adding new images to your products will again signal to Google that you’re updating your website. You could update images to be better quality, or simply add images that show your product from different angles and in different scenarios.
Add Testimonials
Not only does adding testimonials count towards adding content, but the more reviews that you show on your website, the more users will trust you. With 92% of customers reading online reviews before purchasing, testimonials are not something that you want to miss out on.
Improve Content Accuracy
Not only can you add new blog posts and content, you can also update old articles too. Updates on key articles can demonstrate to Google that your entire site is valid. Search through your website and update any statistics that are out of date, or even offer an ‘expert note’ on anything that is no longer relevant.
Write Frequent Blog Articles
Adding new blog posts and news articles is a great way to add helpful content to your website. Some examples of blogs include how-to articles, answering questions, and industry news. When writing content, remember to write compelling headlines and descriptions so that if you do rank higher, it will further encourage users to click on your website.
Remove Broken Links
One of the most frustrating parts of old content is finding broken links, especially if a user wants to navigate to another page and they are unable to do so. Be sure to regularly review old articles, as there may be resources that you have linked to that aren’t available anymore. Update these links or remove them altogether.
Share Your Content
Once you’ve created new content, don’t forget to share it on social media platforms and with your email list too. You can also share older content that is still relevant, to bring traffic to your website. Adding share buttons to the pages themselves is also a great way to allow users to share the content straight to their social media accounts. Sharing articles to social media and in your newsletter will help to create backlinks, which Google sees as a significant ranking signal.
Optimise Images
Accessibility is a huge factor in Google deciding where to rank you. Adding alt tags and text to all of your images will not only help user experience, but it will also signal to Google that your website is accessible and anyone can use it, further helping with your rankings.
Website Design
Whilst bringing traffic to your website is key, if your website is poorly designed then users will likely bounce straight back off – meaning that all of your hard SEO work was for nothing. Ensure that your website is easy to use and navigate, and is designed with your target audience in mind. If you’re interested in a website redesign or a modern website update, contact us to plan your website project and see how we can update your website. You can also see an example of our website refresh work here.
