Sites with any level of content production quickly build up pages that are outdated and left unmanaged, crawl budget can be wasted on low quality pages, penalties may be incurred and organic search visibility can be lost for the pages that matter most on a site.
Sam will be sharing a new framework for conducting regular content audits that make use of many data sources but that are time efficient to implement and put you in the best position to make decisions on how to deal with the content on the sites you manage.
Sam will examine the different data sources that you can bring together from commonly used tools and how to anchor this with crawl data in unique and original ways to assess onsite engagement and performance in search.
7. A website redesign is a long process
2Source: http://ezsitecms.com/services/website-redesign/
A site redesign is a long process
7
8. A website redesign is a long process
2Source: https://juliandontcheff.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/migration.png
...and we needed to move
to a new CMS
8
9. A website redesign is a long process
9
...because we were suffering from plugin bloat
38. Use custom extractions to pull out:
● Authors bylines
● Published & last modified date
● Structured and meta data
● Wording and phrasing
● Image alt tags
● Tagging & tracking
Extracting out onpage data
37@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
44. 2@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
You should be left with:
Page descriptors – URLs and page titles
Page attributes - word count, published &
last modified date, links, duplicates, categories, author
Performance metrics - backlinks, social shares,
traffic, SERPs, impressions, engagement metrics
45. With your inventory in place,
auditing can be streamlined and efficient.
2@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
46. @sam_marsden BrightonSEO
What are we going to cover?
Four questions you can answer with your
content inventory
Four examples of insights to inform your
content strategy
Introduce ways to automate content auditing process
49. Defining a set of criteria to judge content performance
46@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Performance depends on nature of the site.
A news site that generates revenue through ad
impressions will define successful content
differently from a B2B site that provides a
niche service.
May also have different expectations of content
performance dependent on the content type.
Mass appeal vs. targeted content.
50. Inclusion relies on correct goal implementation*
In the DeepCrawl content audit…
47@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Content performance assessed based on:
Unique
pageviews
Share
count
Backlink
count
Page
value*
52. Adding an ‘Action’ column
49@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
In your spreadsheet you’ll want to create an ‘Action’ column and
add in four options
Keep Cut Combine Convert
53. In DeepCrawl’s case...
50@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
We knew there was a lot of outdated content no longer providing value.
We could afford to be cut-throat and only keep content that:
● Had a publish date within the last year.
● Or had a specified volume of traffic from
Analytics or impressions from GSC Search Analytics.
54. For pages where
you aren’t sure
about what
action to take...
@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
55. Is the page being seen in
search and receiving traffic?
@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
56. Is the page actually bringing
value to the site?
£££ $$$ €€€
@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
60. ...and examine ways you can maximise
the value of your top performing content...
@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
61. @sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Optimising titles & meta
descriptions
Keyword cannibalisation
Duplication issues
Internal & external linking
Page speed
Structured data
Tag pages
Start using a fuller breadth of the data you’ve pulled in.
Key areas to focus on for content optimisation:
62. 4. How can you use this data inform your content strategy?
2@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Question 4:
How can you
inform your
content strategy?
69. 1. Performance by channel/category/content type
68@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Do some types of content perform better than others?
Group content into categories and look in terms of
performance (views, shares, backlinks) and volume of
production (no. articles published).
Are you allocating content efforts efficiently?
Is time, money and effort being spent on the right
types of content?
71. 2. Content length and engagement
70@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Is content length positively correlated with engagement?
72. Content length and engagement
71@sam_marsden
If engagement doesn’t increase linearly with content length
then can resources for content production be used more
efficiently.
Create guidelines for content length based on insights.
Select topics based on impact rather than length.
Greater awareness of time taken to create content and the
likely impact that can be expected.
BrightonSEO
73. Is page speed harming bounce rate and conversions?
72@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Do some pages load more
slowly than others?
Are some resource heavy?
Images optimisation
required?
Important, especially for
eCommerce as load time
and bounce rate closely tied
to conversion rate. https://www.branded3.com/blog/mobile-speed-experience-googles-2-4-second-sweet-spot/
74. Performance and engagement by author
73@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
How does content performance vary by author?
● Useful for sites with high turnover of content, like news sites.
● Define ranges by which to rate content performance
○ E.g. Poor, average, good, excellent based on pageviews
● Can be replicated on a weekly, monthly, quarterly basis for ongoing monitoring.
Name Poor Average Good Excellent
Barton Haberkorn 26 64 11 60
Jacquelynn Kline 19 79 4 49
Claudette Etheredge 87 79 77 11
Sharell Phinney 73 31 8 20
75. 5. Performance fluctuations by publish date and time
74@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Is content better
received on
specific days of
the week, time of
the day or months
of the year?
76. But this is just the beginning...
76@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
77. From here
you want to
automate the
auditing process
77@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
83. To wrap up...
83@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Number 3:
How can you get the most out of
content that is performing well?
Question 2:
How can you deal with content that
isn’t performing well?
4. How can you use
this data inform your
content strategy?
Question 4:
How can you inform
your content strategy?
Question No. 1:
What is and isn’t performing well?
84. To wrap up...
84@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
The content auditing process should be centred around a cloud
based web crawling solution and be:
Data driven Automated Frequent
86. Useful resources:
75@sam_marsden BrightonSEO
Crawl-Centred Guide to content auditing – Me!
How to do a Content Audit – Everett Sizemore
Automate or Die – David Iwanow
Branded3 Mobile Speed Experience – Mathew McCorry
Kevin Indig Experts on the Wire Podcast – Dan Shure
Webmaster Hangout Notes - DeepCrawl