With Google’s new Search Console Tool, you have the opportunity to improve the quality of your existing and future content. How? By keeping track of any content that the general public flags as outdated, and by reacting with a strong, well-informed content strategy.

The Search Console tool allows the users to flag content as outdated, giving the website owners the chance to temporarily remove that page while you update the content. The feature is relatively new, so you’ll have to wait and see how the general public starts to use it. But the good news is that starting now, you can use the public’s reactions to your content as an opportunity to detect what content needs a rewrite and how you can improve your content strategy moving forward.

So what exactly is outdated content? Here are some examples:

Blogs or pages that cover content that doesn’t add value to your ideal audience.

Blogs that cover topics that are no longer representative of the kind of work your firm focuses on.

Content regarding an event that already happened.

Legal news that hasn’t been updated.

Attorney bios of partners who no longer work with your firm.

Pages that don’t reflect your recent achievements or accolades.

 
You should always prioritize your content, as it is Google’s number 1 factor in determining a site’s authority. Quality, not quantity, is the key to getting higher rankings. Since that is the case, outdated content might be hurting your rankings. See if there are any patterns in the topics or type of content that keeps getting flagged. If people keep flagging blogs about a certain topic, maybe it’s time to rethink your overall content strategy and the type of content you post.

Here are some tips:
1. Don’t create a new page for rewrites

If a page is already acquiring clicks, you won’t want to remove that page. Instead, update the page, and see an uptick in traffic.

2. Don’t permanently remove a page unless it has zero clicks

It’s not necessary to remove content that’s deemed outdated, unless it’s content about services you no longer offer, old events, posts about employees that no longer work at your firm, or topics that lack any relevance to what you currently practice. But before you hit “delete,” make sure that the page has zero clicks anyway. You wouldn’t want to delete a page if it’s bringing you traffic. Set up a redirect so that visitors who find the URL will be redirected to a current page.

3. Keep updating content in the future.

Pages with a more recent publishing date tend to have a higher click-through rate. Information that was accurate even just a few months ago might lose relevance. For that reason, people tend to trust articles that have a more recent publishing date than say, something from 2015. Keep updating your content in the future to get your pages to continue staying relevant, and bringing you more traffic.

At Custom Legal Marketing, we monitor your Google Search Console and make positive changes whenever a page is flagged. Your content is our priority, which gives you more time to be a lawyer than a content editor.

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Cristina Fríes is a MA in English/Creative Writing from UC Davis (2019), and is a legal marketing strategist and content developer for CLM. Her interests include creating compelling marketing content, writing books, and traveling the world.