Update an Old Article or Publish a New One? An SEO Guide
You have an old guide on your site that still brings in visits from Google. You're thinking of deleting it and writing a new one with this year's date. That won't necessarily help.
An article doesn't get better or worse just because it's old. Readers care whether the information still holds, whether it answers their question and whether they can use it. Most of the time, a proper update of the existing article is a better move than a new article on the same topic.
Why an old article can still be the best answer
A good guide to choosing a mattress or caring for a wooden table stays useful for years, because the basics don't change. Over time, an article like that has usually also picked up links from other pages, on your site and elsewhere.
That doesn't mean Google “prefers” old articles. But a new date doesn't make content better on its own: readers want a correct, complete answer.
When an update is essential
If the guide mentions products you no longer sell, prices that have changed, rules or deadlines that no longer apply, or processes that now work differently, it needs a serious review. An accounting firm, for example, should check its articles on tax returns every year, because amounts and deadlines change.
A real update might mean new photos, corrected steps, better examples and removing sections that are out of date. Adding “(updated for 2026)” to the title isn't enough.
When you need a new article
Write a new article when you're answering a genuinely different question. For a bike shop, “How to Choose a City Bike” and “How to Maintain Your Bike's Brakes” are two different subjects and fit comfortably into two articles.
But if you already have “How to Choose a Bike” and you're preparing “The Complete Bike Buying Guide”, the two will compete for the same searches. Decide which one is the main article and improve that one.
Don't delete pages without a plan
Before you delete an article or change its address, check which pages link to it and how many visits it brings. If there's a new page with the same content, set up a permanent (301) redirect from the old address to the new one and update your internal links.
Don't redirect all your old articles to the homepage just to make the 404 errors go away. Visitors should land on the closest answer to what they were looking for, not on an unrelated page.
Which articles are worth updating
In Search Console, compare each article across two equivalent periods. Look for articles with a real drop in impressions and clicks, but first check whether the drop is explained by the season, a change of address or simply lower demand.
Also look at which searches the article appears for. People are often searching for something the article doesn't answer. Even an article that hasn't lost any traffic may need fixing if its information is no longer correct.
How to update an article properly
Check the facts one by one, repeat the steps the article describes, fix broken links and add whatever new information readers need. Keep what still holds. If the changes are substantial, show the date of the last update at the top of the article.
If your site is available in more than one language, update every version. The Greek version shouldn't say something different from the English one when they're meant to be the same article.
How often to write new articles
A realistic schedule might be one new article a month and, alongside it, improving two older ones that already bring in visits. The exact pace depends on your time and on the state of the content you already have.
Before you hit “Publish”, ask yourself: does this article answer something no other article on my site already answers? Is it correct? Would I hand it to one of my customers to read? If not, you may be better off improving something that already exists.
Has your site built up years of content that needs sorting out?
At Hot Web Design we can review your existing content using Google Search Console data: which pages are losing traffic, which compete with each other and which contain information that no longer holds.
We decide with you what should be updated, consolidated or retired, and carry out the changes with proper redirects, so you don't lose the visits and links your site has already earned.
See our SEO services or contact us so we can assess your site's content.