should i delete old blog posts
Update, Rewrite or Delete? How to Decide What to Do With Old Blog Posts
Old posts can help or hurt your site. This simple test tells you whether each one needs a quick update, a full rewrite, merging with another post, or deleting.
Content StrategyUpdated 2 min readBy Kanchana Delgoda, Search and AI visibility
Short answer: for each old post, ask two questions: does it get traffic or links, and is it still useful and accurate? If yes and yes, give it a quick update. If it gets traffic but is weak, rewrite it. If two posts cover the same thing, merge them. If it gets nothing and helps nobody, delete it and redirect the address.
Many business blogs have dozens of old posts: thin news items, outdated tips, three posts on the same subject. They do not just sit there. They make your site look weaker to Google and confuse AI tools about what you really know.
How do you run the audit?
Export your posts from Search Console with clicks and impressions for the last 12 months. Add a column for links if you have a tool for it. Then sort each post into one of four groups.
When should you update?
The post gets traffic, the information is mostly right, and it answers the search reasonably well. Refresh the facts, add a direct answer at the top, add missing questions, and link it to a service page. This takes an hour or two.
When should you rewrite?
The post gets impressions or has links, but it is thin, outdated or does not really answer the question. Keep the URL, keep the topic, and write a new, better answer.
When should you merge?
You have several posts on the same subject, each getting a little traffic. Combine the best parts into one strong post, keep the URL of the strongest, and redirect the others to it.
When should you delete?
The post gets no traffic, has no links, is not useful to customers, and is not worth fixing: old event notices, empty announcements, posts unrelated to your business. Delete it and redirect the URL to the most relevant page, or let it return a "gone" status if nothing fits.
What should you never do?
Delete posts that have links from other sites without a redirect, change URLs that already rank, or delete large numbers of pages at once without checking their traffic first.
How often should you do this?
Once a year for the whole blog, and whenever you notice several posts competing for the same search.
This audit is part of our SEO service. Want us to sort your posts for you? Request a free growth audit.
- Content Strategy
- Topic Clusters
- Editorial Planning
