The words old, classic, and vintage all describe the same thing but have vastly different meanings. Old tires belong in the junkyard, but vintage wine and classic cars become more valuable over time. In the same way, it’s important to recognize when you should delete old blog posts and when to leave them. With a new coat of paint, some provide value for years.
Is It Okay To Delete Old Blog Posts?
Deleting old blog posts can be a good thing. It all comes down to the effect removing the content has on your SEO goals. If old articles are weighing down your site or hurting search rankings, it’s time to trim.
On the other hand, some high-quality older articles actively support your search rankings and attract new leads. Many top-ranking pages have been around for at least two or three years.
We like the way John Mueller from Google explained this topic: “I think if that’s something that you think is good content that you want to publish with your website, with your name, then I would keep it. Just because it’s old doesn’t mean it’s bad.”
When Should You Delete Old Blog Posts?
When deciding whether or not to prune old blogs, look for five characteristics of weak content.
1. Violates Google’s Updated Guidelines
Anything that negatively affects your site’s domain authority or quality reputation needs to go. Black-hat techniques like keyword stuffing are an obvious no, but Google has also included “gray” policies on their list of practices to avoid. Private link network schemes (i.e., “link farms”), duplicate content from templates, buying backlinks, and other attempts to “game the system” can backfire and hurt your entire site.
2. Low Quality or Thin Content
Did your team use ChatGPT at the beginning of the AI craze to crank out hundreds or thousands of articles? If you didn’t check them for quality, they’re probably not worth saving. When you have blogs with low-quality writing, lots of errors, or repetitive content, it’s usually better to start from scratch and do things the right way.
3. No Longer Relevant
Sometimes, blogs just aren’t relevant for your company anymore. This can happen when articles:
- Were for a customer segment you don’t sell to anymore
- Revolved around products you no longer offer
- Focused on services that aren’t in demand
- Targeted keywords that don’t align with your current SEO strategy
During the pandemic, many businesses created blog articles about remote work, videoconferencing tools, telehealth, and HIPAA privacy rules. These topics may no longer be relevant as many businesses have shifted back to in-office work or no longer need extensive remote work solutions. If your customers no longer need or care about those topics, your old articles aren’t going to move the SEO needle anytime soon.
4. Extremely Dated
You wouldn’t use a medical encyclopedia from the 1980s to evaluate symptoms today. Similarly, information on finances, health, technology, and legal topics can become outdated quickly. The amount of effort required to bring them up to speed is better spent creating a current article. It shows that your business is an industry leader that visitors can trust.
5. Never Ranked
SEO takes time to work, but months, not years. If a blog has never ranked and barely had page visits, it’s OK to throw in the towel.
