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Reduce, Reuse
Recycle Your Way to
Content Success
Natalie Arney
Freelance Consultant
@__nca
Speakerdeck.com/nataliearney
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Hi, I’m Nat
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I’m a Freelance SEO Consultant.
I’ve worked agency side and in-house, for big
brands and small brands.
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I love nothing better than helping businesses - and
people - meet & exceed their potential.
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Have you ever been in the position where no
matter how much content you create, your
Organic Traffic still continues to decline?
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It’s often the fault of content decay.
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Image source: Wikimedia Commons
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OK, so what is content decay?
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Isn’t it just another SEO buzzword?!
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Content decay is a decline in Organic Ranking
and Traffic over a period of time
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This downward spiral happens in the
background
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And it can not only impact one piece of
content
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So what causes it?
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Content Aging
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Shifts in Search Intent
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Decline in Interest in the Topic
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Cannibalization
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Algorithm Updates
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Competition (Internal and External)
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OK, so we know how it can happen, but how does it
affect us?
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Decline in rankings
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Decline in Organic Traffic
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Decline in CTR
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Link acquisition fails to help
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People don’t get what they need!
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The Importance of the Content Audit
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The Importance of the Content Audit
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The Importance of A GOOD Content Audit
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A good content audit helps you to identify
problem content (including decay)
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A good content audit helps you to understand
what works well
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What Does A GOOD Content Audit Include?
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Evaluate metrics like search and social stats,
indexing status, traffic, keywords, shares,
and backlinks.
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Make sure to incorporate E-E-A-T and
ensuring content meets quality standards.
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Make sure to include a way to assess if the
content meets its intended purpose and
aligns with user intent.
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Is it just the SEOs role to decide on content
quality?
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No.
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When auditing content, we should never just
look at SEO.
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(even if it’s just a couple of metrics)
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Caveat: Don’t let non-SEOs remove content they
don’t see as helpful - without your guidance.
Speak up!
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What ranks well doesn’t always show/mean
quality
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Especially in the world of rank and tank
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So what should we look for alongside
Organic Traffic Metrics, Keywords and
Backlinks?
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● All channel traffic
● Conversions
● User journeys
● Social shares
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Speak to other teams/consultants
(Including copywriters and editors, but also Customer
Service & Customer Success)
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Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
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Reduce
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Don’t churn out unhelpful and lower quality
content at scale…
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… especially in the age of the stochastic
parrot
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(Emily M. Bender)
Professor of
Computational
Linguistics
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… you need to stand out in an ever-growing
sea of beige
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… and try to survive the ‘enshittification’ of the
internet
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Remove old, unhelpful content that can’t be saved
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Consider removing or splitting long content to
align with intent and improve user experience
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Consider E-E-A-T
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Consider content design (users)
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Consider information gain
(Search engines and LLMs)
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Reuse
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Reuse content across channels
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Stuck for content ideas?
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Look at what performs well elsewhere
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Trends on other platforms often deserve a landing
page
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These trends are more likely to be featured in the
press
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Not only will you then have a presence for said
trend, the page can also be used for link
acquisition & brand authority building
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Keyword tools only tell part of a story, and landing
pages/articles provide a place to embed useful
other content (video, images etc) aside from the
original channel it’s placed on
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Recycle
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Improve content that already exists
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Using the findings from a good content audit to
help improve this content
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Existing content does not need to be good or
helpful to benefit from an upgrade
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Existing content does not need to be good or
helpful to benefit from an upgrade
This should be considered before removing that
content
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Let Me Show You a Quick Example
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I found a piece of content that wasn’t doing that
well… it had potential
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After a quick refresh…
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Providing Value
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This won’t always be SEO value
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This won’t always be SEO value - try to see if it can
provide this but don’t force it
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Quality is key.
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Intent is key.
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It needs to be insightful.
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It needs to be human-centric.
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Review Frequency
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Content needs to be reviewed regularly… but how
regularly?!
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At least annually, considering trends, search
queries, and user demands to refresh and update
content accordingly.
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Evergreen Content
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Even evergreen content requires periodic updates
to stay relevant and competitive
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We have very little time and budget; is it worth it
and how do we cope?
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Prioritize quality over quantity to maximize impact
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Stop producing rushed, poor-quality content and
focus on creating fewer, high-quality pieces that
provide substantial value across channels.
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Thank you.
Where You Can Find Me:
X (Twitter):@__nca
LinkedIn: Natalie Arney
nataliearney.com