Creating a blog post takes a lot of time and effort. After years of publishing it, there is a need for an update. Updating your old blog posts reaps many useful benefits for your business and no one would want to miss out on such opportunities. But, there may be some questions popping up in your head like: How to optimize a blog post? Why update old blogs for SEO? Do these optimizations help in marketing? Well, let’s find all the answers to your questions here.
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Why Update Old Blogs for SEO?
When you perform a Google search, you will notice that results from past and recent years get displayed. But the data that is displayed on the top of the searches is more fresh and updated. You can keep writing about new topics and keep producing more content. However, it takes a lot of effort and time to do so. Wondering what strategy will take less time to do the work and deliver faster results? To skyrocket your rankings on the search engines without a lot of extra effort and work, update your old blog posts. Yes, you read that right!
Your old content gradually becomes less and less fresh and this factor affects your rankings. The reason is, new posts have updated information that old posts do not have. Any topic needs an update after a while, as with time, there are some changes in every field. When you tell Google that you have some new content, you will start getting a spike in traffic. So why not take advantage of such an opportunity where a tiny amount of work would lead to huge benefit.
Now that you know why one needs to keep updating the old blog posts, let’s discover the best practices to optimize a blog.
How to Optimize a Blog?
The first step to updating old blog posts is to review them based on which topics fit your business and which don’t. Optimizing blogs for SEO plays a crucial role in consistently attracting more traffic to your site. You get an opportunity where you get many visitors from the search engines by taking some extra effort.
Now, let’s share some tips that will guide you about how to optimize a blog and help you in creating a blog post again.
Find the Underperforming Pages
The page you want to republish must come under the low ranking category. Also, a blog post with many backlinks will not be beneficial if republished. So it becomes essential to find pages that need updates and improvements. The pages that have fewer backlinks, traffic, and are ranked low because of the keywords are the one’s that need more attention. Make sure to not change the URL because this action will publish a new blog and not republish the old one.
Target New Keywords
Search engine results change very quickly. Hence, the key phrases that people use to search automatically varies. This is the main reason why you should target new keywords while republishing. A better keyword ranking will eventually improve your SEO rankings too. It’s a win-win situation for you here!
You can use Google Keyword Planner to find a variety of definite keywords. There are some other tools available online, you can use them too as per your preference.
Add Internal Links to the New Content
Your old post contains the interlinks of those posts that were published before it. Now, when you are republishing it, add new internal links that relate to the topic. Interlinking your blogs to each other will help the reader stay on your page for a longer time. It improves user experience and your search engine rankings as well.
Link to New and Better Resources
While you update and improve your old content, link to new and fresh resources. Search engine ratings also depend on the external links you add to your content. While adding links, do check for the broken links, and if there are any, remove them first. Incorrect sites ruin the user experience and degrade your page.
Add New Video or Images
The best way to make your old blogs look fresh is by adding new images and videos. Images and videos are more interesting and engaging compared to plain-text. It also makes the reading experience better as this visual content entices the readers and keeps them hooked for a longer time.
Some images have copyrights and if you use them without permission, you may land into legal trouble. So to avoid the hassle, make sure that you take care of minute details. You can optimize your images for SEO. How? It’s simple, add your targeted keywords using ‘Alt Tag’ and you’re good to go. You can also create your own video that is related to the topic and add it to the blog.
Use Categories and Tags to Organize Your Content
Categorizing the content and taking care of the tags will not only help you but also the search engines and the readers. This tactic divides your content into major topics that are discussed in the blog and makes the topic more understandable. It also helps improve the reading flow and keeps the readers engaged.
Uncategorized and unorganized content will give your readers a bad experience and can harm your reputation as well. People wouldn’t want to read a piece that is all over the place and does not provide the details that they are looking for.
Always add a Meta Description to Your Blog
The meta description refers to an HTML meta tag that can be added to any page. Its primary purpose is to provide your article with a short description for search engines and other crawlers. It gives an instant idea about your topic to the readers and helps them understand what to expect inside the article.
Also, a well-written meta description helps you explain a lot more about your blog post. Even social media giants like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter display it while your articles are being shared on those platforms. So why should you fall behind in the race? There is no harm in trying anything that can help you attract more audience to read your blog posts.
People nowadays are more likely to visit a site that has recently been published and provides fresh, updated content. Content with a higher click-through rate is likely to rank higher on the search engine result page. So, update the content of blogs for SEO to enjoy the maximum benefits and be on the top always.
Time to play Smart and not Hard!
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To know the best benefits of republishing blogs for SEO, do check Neil Patel’s articles.
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