With an increase in page views recently (thanks, Pinterest!) my thoughts have turned to how I can grow on this via Pinterest and other sources. My 6- month goal is to increase my monthly page views by a pretty huge 50,000 and right now I'm feeling confident about it!
Alongside A LOT of other stuff I'm currently doing to help my blog gain readers, I'm slowly updating old content that still gains traffic or posts I think I can jazz up and re-promote! Below I've detailed exactly what I've been doing to reignite my old content. Plus the great thing about it, is everyone with a blog older than a year can follow these steps and have success with them! P.S. Brace yourself... it's a long one (I promise updating old blog posts won't take this long!)
First of all... Why Update Old Content?
This is pretty obvious, but I still think it's worth going over!
More than likely you have a whole back catalogue of interesting posts that aren't being discovered anymore. So re-vamping them and then re-promoting, especially via Pinterest can really give content a new lease of life and bring more pageviews and new readers to your blog! Refreshing old content that may have been wrote when you weren't as savvy at blogging also helps with SEO, so there will be a better chance your old content will appear higher in search engine results - again resulting in more pageviews!
The aim really is to update as much of your old content as you can (I'm currently aiming to freshen up 4 blog posts per month). The reason for this is not all of your updated content will see an increase in pageviews, however there may be a golden few that get rediscovered on Pinterest and seriously increase your traffic! Trust me, a single viral pin can send tens of thousands of pageviews your way - monthly!
Find Your Most Read Blog Posts + Seasonal Posts
I personally like to start with finding 10 of my most read blog posts that are over a year old and are looking a little lack luster. To find these you can use your own blog dashboard analytics (statistics especially on Blogger aren't reliable however it's good enough for this purpose) or Google Analytics. To do this on Google Analytics you want to find the 'Behaviour' section in the sidebar menu, then 'Site Content' and 'All pages'. Then change the date range to when you first started your blog to around a year ago. This will bring up your most popular content and from that you can write a list of the blog posts you want to re-work.
I also like to write down a few seasonal posts while I'm at it, for example right now I would find popular autumn themed posts to rework so that I can link that content in newer content. Plus it's more likely to be popular on Pinterest right now rather than if I tried to re-promote it in spring! Are you still with me? Good! Hopefully this isn't too dull!
I also like to write down a few seasonal posts while I'm at it, for example right now I would find popular autumn themed posts to rework so that I can link that content in newer content. Plus it's more likely to be popular on Pinterest right now rather than if I tried to re-promote it in spring! Are you still with me? Good! Hopefully this isn't too dull!
Run the Title through Headline Analyzer
So you have you're first old blog post infront of you so it makes sense to start at the top and look at making the title more attention grabbing (for Pinterent) and SEO friendly (for Google). My favourite way to do this is first run the blog post title through a Blog Post Headline Analyzer to see how it scores and how it can be re-worded (I could go into detail here but you will see exactly what it does once you try it - it's such a fab free resource!). I also like to do a quick search on Pinterest for similar content to my blog post and look at the titles that have the most pins, generally they will have awesome attention grabbing and emotive titles. I also find headlines that start with 'How to' or numbers (so list style posts) to always do well!
Create a Pinterest-friendly Main Image
If you're a photography geek like me then this may be the funnest part. I love using what I know now and totally revamping old blog post images, because this is such an important factor if you are wanting your post to do well on Pinterest. Yes, I keep on bringing Pinterest up, but you can't underestimate the platform - it can seriously bring you a lot of monthly traffic if you get it right! Here you want to create good quality images with your blog post title overlayed over the image, as this will grab attention both on Pinterest and Google Image Search.To omtimize images for Pinterest then aim for it to vertical and long, Pinterest recommend 735px x adjusted to height (I generally go for 600 x 900-1200 px) so basically the longer the better as it takes up more real estate on Pinterest. So do this, unless you have the original pictures from your old blog post (kinda' unlike) I take all the relevant images from that post, cropping them if I need to, and save them to a new folder. I then open them up either in PicMonkey, Canva or Photoscape (all free to use!) and move them around until I create my new Pinterest-friendly image! If back in the day your images were fairly small then creating white space inbetween them and placing text there will create a bigger overall image - as you can see I've done this in the example above.
If the post you are refreshing went viral at some stage and still gets traffic but the images just aren't upto scratch then re-taking them is a good idea! I wouldn't recommend spending that amount of time on all old content as it would take forever but on content that you hope to really reignite it's time well spent!
Freshen up that Copy
This is pretty self-explanatory! You want to check over your grammar and spelling and tighten up that copy. You may want to add sub headers, create shorter paragraphs and make it all round more reader friendly.Add More Content
Did you know that Google actually likes longer content? So if it's a post that's providing information, such as a guide/tutorial or even a review then you may want to add to it. Even consider adding an update, first stating the month and year and then the relevant information that readers might find helpful to know. Even if it's just to say you are still using X product or method and anything further advise you have.Correct & Add Valuable Links
Often old posts will contain dead links and that's pretty rubbish for the person that reads your old post and clicks the link. So make sure to check all links and correct them. Also adding links to outside sources that are relevant helps with SEO and affiliate links (if you use them) is a good idea... I mean what if it went viral!
Link to Related Blog Posts
If your updated post were to become popular through Pinterest then you want to keep readers on your blog for as long as possible (that's what 'bounce rate' is!). Ideally this is through linking to relevant posts in your main body of text in a natural way. But if you can't make links fit naturally then a simple 'Related' or 'Here are a few posts you might like' at the bottom of the blog post with 2-4 links will do.Do a Final Tidy
Once you are done, have a quick read over the post to double check you haven't missed anything. You may also want to add tags/labels to your post and alt-tag images.Re-Pin it/Tweet/Facebook it!
Yes! It's finally time to re-promote the post! Tweeting it and adding it to Facebook and maybe stating you've updated it is a easy and quick step. As for Pinterest, pin your main image to your most relevant board and any suitable group boards you may be a part of.Link to said post in your New/Upcoming Content
Over the coming weeks and months be aware of the content you've newly updated and where you can, link to them posts is new content. This will be a sure fire way to guide readers to your amazing updated content and you never know they may even pin it! Side note - That really should have been a section on it's own... but make sure all blog posts can be socially shared and images can be pinned when you hover over them - so important!Re-Pin a few Weeks Later
You know when Pinterest goes "Psst! You've already saved this pin to..."? when you try to pin an image twice. Ignore it! Re-pinning your own images to a different board (even the same board if you have enough content) is totally fine and actually makes sense. New followers won't have seen it and it increases the chance of it being pinned. You can also re-pin it to more group boards, just makes sure you're aware of the rules and it's a relevant subject. Even pin more images from renewed content as long as the images are 'Pinterest worthy'!
Things To Avoid
Never Duplicate Content
Duplicating content and re-posting it isn't good for SEO and should be avoided! Yes, do an update post or write an entirely new post on the same subject but never take from an old blog post to create 'new' content'. The same thing goes for deleting old posts - update, yes, but never delete!Don't Over Market Old Posts
Ever clicked on a link from a blogger on Twitter or Facebook only to find out it's 4 years old and the offer or 'news' is irrelevant? It's annoying! So don't be that person. Avoid promoting time-sensitive content and don't over promote your updated content like it's a new post.
Free Blog Content Refresh Checklist (download link)
As this is a lot of information and there are a lot of steps to take when updating an old post (it should only take around an hour, mind) I thought I'd come up with a free printable checklist! The printable also acts as a tracker as you can note down the date and current pageviews when you update the content, then check against it in 6-12 months time to work out how many new page views you've recieved since the update!
Really hope you have found this more in-depth post helpful. Let me know how you get on updating your old blog posts!
Fee xo.
