Original and interesting website content is a hugely valuable commodity these days. Some digital publishers make thousands of dollars each month out of leveraging the right content, making sure it caters to their intended base of clients, customers, or visitors. The problem though, is when certain content has stayed up for a long time and stopped attracting as many visitors, prompting publishers to see it as “old” and needing replacement.
Deleting your Old Content is Not the Best Idea
When you have old articles lying around which were created some time back for targeted readers to enjoy, chances are you would give thought to deleting them. However, this alone would not suffice to boost search rankings. Even the most middling SEO services company India has to offer, would tell you that this needs to be complemented with relevant search engine optimization practices.
Come to think of it, deleting content can sometimes be bad for a website, and there are plenty of examples in that direction to watch and learn from. Neither outcome is assured, but look at it this way: the old content is still something you once worked on. Wouldn’t it be better to put it to more use instead of scrapping it, especially if there is the chance of that noticeably boosting revenue?
What to Do with it Then?
There are a few things, which you could do with your seemingly outdated content, apart from deleting it.
Augment it
Every publisher seeks that one article, which can land them the number one spot in search rankings. However, it often takes a while for it to play out this way, even after said article has been posted. Meanwhile, your old articles are festering, making it a good idea to augment them.
Start with the low hanging fruit, and go to work making it more relevant to your current visitor crowd. With what your SEO research has shown you about current topics of interest and how they are constantly shifting, find ways to draw association between the old articles and the new, with the latter mentioning the former where gracefully possible.
Plenty of blog posts serve up older website posts as a source of relevant information, and that often ends up bringing more traffic to the latter. Find out what you can do in this direction without letting new content creation get sidelined.
Repurpose it
You probably remember that one awesome article which got you rave responses and countless shares on social media, as well as tons of organic Google traffic. Take that information and convert it into another format, specifically one that can grab similar audiences on a whole different platform.
For instance, an old skateboarding post could be used as the source for a new video on much the same topic, which you could then host on YouTube, your website, and other places. The core audiences would swarm back in, dragging new followers in their wake.
Consider self-publishing a video with your own video player instead of posting it on YouTube, to earn a lot more revenue out of it. If not, at least make a slideshow with subtitles and pleasant background music, and publish that.
Content never really loses value, which means if it was good once, you should be able to juice it for a really long time. All you need to do is pick the right medium to convert it to, without shedding too much of its appeal. Old articles can be turned into infographics, slideshows, offline downloads, e-Books, podcasts, etc. Each of these formats has platforms dedicated to its publishing, such as SlideShare, for instance, which is the main go-to for helpful slideshows.
Syndicate it Elsewhere Online
Syndicating is simply the act of letting another party publish your content, while crediting you with its creation. This could be a Facebook page, a medium account, or even another website so long as they do not forget to mention it’s yours.
Here is an example: you have an article, which you wrote a while back about surfing in Miami, which was popular once, but has since stopped drawing nearly as much traffic. You could take this content and give it to a well liked Facebook page or website, even if the latter happens to be a competitor with regard to audience. If they are willing to put up the post and credit your site, then you have successfully syndicated that content. In this way, you get to promote your website free of cost, while deriving use out of heretofore defunct content.
The first time is the hardest, but once you get the hang of it, you will have new avenues open up whereby you can regularly syndicate content with other publishers and platforms.
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