Content audit: how to decide what to keep, update, merge, redirect or remove

A content audit is a page-by-page review of a site that ends in one decision per URL: keep, update, merge, redirect or remove. For SEO, base each decision on four numbers you can pull for every page: clicks and impressions from Google Search Console, the backlinks pointing at it, and the conversions it starts. A page with demand but slipping rankings gets updated, two pages chasing the same queries get merged, a page about something that no longer exists gets redirected, and a page with no demand, no links and no business purpose gets removed.

When a content audit is worth the time#

• Before a redesign or migration, so you do not move pages you should have removed.
• After a broad traffic loss you have already diagnosed with the organic traffic drop checks, when the cause points at content quality rather than a technical problem.
• Once a year on a site that publishes every week. Large blogs collect overlapping and outdated posts faster than anyone notices.
• When you inherit a site, as a new in-house lead or a new agency, to learn what exists and what earns.

The spreadsheet columns#

One row per URL. These columns are enough to make every decision in the table further down; anything else is optional.

How to do a content audit, step by step#

1. 1

   Build the URL inventory

   Combine your XML sitemap, a crawl of the site and the Search Console Pages export. De-duplicate, and drop URLs that redirect or return errors into a separate technical list.

2. 2

   Add 12 months of Search Console data

   Clicks, impressions and average position per page. Twelve months smooths out seasonality; add a second column comparing the last three months with the same three months a year earlier to catch decay.

3. 3

   Add each page's top query

   For pages that matter, filter Performance by the page and note the query with the most clicks. When two URLs share a top query, mark both: that is a merge candidate.

4. 4

   Add backlinks and conversions

   Referring domains per URL and conversions per landing page. These two columns protect pages with little search traffic but real value.

5. 5

   Review quality by hand where it counts

   You do not need to read every page. Read the ones heading for update or merge, and spot-check the remove list. Note what is outdated, thin or off-intent.

6. 6

   Apply the decision rules

   Use the decision table below for a first pass, then override where your notes disagree. Write a target URL for every merge and redirect.

7. 7

   Ship in batches and annotate

   Work through the decisions in batches of 10 to 30 pages and record the date of each batch, so you can tell which change moved which number.

8. 8

   Measure after four to eight weeks

   Compare clicks to the affected pages and their merge targets over the same number of days before and after, against the rest of the site.

The decision table#

The click threshold for removal depends on the site. On a small local business site, a page with 10 clicks a year may still be the only page about a service you sell. Look at the business purpose column before you look at the traffic column.

Delete, noindex or redirect?#

Content audit template#

Paste this header row into a spreadsheet. The sample rows show how filled-in rows look.

url,content_type,clicks_12m,impressions_12m,avg_position,clicks_change_pct,top_query,referring_domains,conversions_12m,last_updated,quality_notes,decision,target_url
/blog/invoice-template,blog,8420,212000,4.1,-3,invoice template,31,96,2025-02,Accurate,keep,
/blog/late-payment-tips,blog,1960,88000,9.8,-38,late payment,4,12,2023-06,Old law references,update,
/blog/how-to-chase-invoices,blog,640,41000,14.2,-12,late payment,1,2,2022-11,Overlaps late-payment-tips,merge,/blog/late-payment-tips
/features/legacy-export,feature,120,9000,11.5,-70,csv export,6,0,2021-04,Feature retired,redirect,/features/integrations
/blog/company-picnic-2021,blog,3,400,38.0,-50,,0,0,2021-08,No purpose,remove,

Worked example#

Worked example (hypothetical numbers), using the rows above. The invoice template page is the site's strongest page, so it stays and gains links from newer posts. The late-payment post still has demand (88,000 impressions) but lost 38% of its clicks while its position slid toward 10: an update. The “how to chase invoices” post shares its top query and ranks lower, so it is merged into the late-payment post and redirected, which also removes a cannibalization problem. The retired feature page still has six referring domains, so it is redirected rather than deleted. The picnic post goes.

Across a real audit of a few hundred URLs, the typical outcome is a short update list that carries most of the upside, a handful of merges, and a remove list that mostly tidies the crawl rather than adding traffic by itself.

After the audit: turn decisions into work#

An audit is only useful if the decisions get shipped. Put the update and merge rows into your SEO roadmap, sized in clicks like any other item, and treat the quick title rewrites as quick wins. For each updated page, check its title and description against the queries it gets impressions for today using high impressions, low CTR.

AnotherSEOGuru App runs the decay and cannibalization detectors on your Search Console data continuously, so after the audit you hear about the next page that starts slipping instead of waiting a year. The live demo shows them on sample data.

Common content audit mistakes#

• Deleting by age. Old pages that still earn clicks or links are assets. Decide by data.
• Ignoring links when removing. A deleted page with referring domains throws away authority a redirect would keep.
• Merging without redirecting. The merged-away URL must 301 to the target, and internal links should be updated to point at the target directly.
• Auditing only the blog. Product, category and service pages decay and overlap too.
• Shipping everything on one day. You will not know which change caused which result.

Related guides#