If you weren’t aware, I’ve recently started going through a process of updating all of my old blog posts… I’m currently 40% of the way through, having updated 285 posts! It’s taking A LOT of time, but I’m starting to feel a lot more confident about my old blog posts and it feels good to go through them all and see what needs updating, sorting and sparking a whole lot of new ideas for blog posts, newsletters and everything inbetween!
My blog is 6 years old, and so a lot of my initial blog posts needed a lot of updating….
Anyhow, I remember not knowing where to start, and after looking through other people’s versions of this post, things I discovered online and just personal experience, here is my checklist of things to do to update your old blog posts!
Proof Spelling & Grammar
I mean this is a key one. I’m a bad proof reader at the best of times, but my writing style has changed massively in 6 years. And while I never want to completely rewrite my old posts because I like the fact that they reflect who I was then, I also have learnt a lot about the English language since then. And so it’s always a good idea to check your writing reads well!
Update Formatting
I’ve learnt a lot about formatting, with Headers and short, snappy paragraphs… but also my earlier posts were pulled across from Blogger (where my blog was originally hosted) and obviously WordPress has brought in block editor in the last year or so, so my older posts could do with quite a bit of formatting fixes!
Update SEO
When I started my blog I didn’t even know what SEO was. And while I don’t claim to be an expert on the matter I have learnt a lot about it since then. So using what I know, I’ve gone through updating key words, alt tags and everything else you need for on page SEO to make sure my posts are as likely as they can be to rank in searches
Read More: SEO – The Basics | What Is It? How Do I Ace It?
Update Images
I personally haven’t done this. All my photography is taken myself and I don’t own some of the products any more in older posts, and also my older blog photography is nowhere near bad…. but I can totally appreciate why you may want to update old posts. However, what I am going is updating the Featured (or cover image) with plain images rather that images with text on (as I briefly did for about 2 years), so that my blog looks consistent over the 6 years.
Check Links & Add Links
It’s super important links going around and out of your website aren’t broken. Also, you may have written a follow up piece for an older article, and so why not link between the two of them? A general link check can never go amiss!
Make Sure The Tags and Categories are Right
This sort of depends how your blog is set up. But I know mine is split into categories which you can then search through on my blog. However, a few of the categories I was using are a little dated (such as a 30 day blog challenge I once did) and there are a few categories I felt like I needed to add (such as beauty subscription boxes). There are also tags, which I just went through and made sure they were all still relevant too.
Fact Check
As much as you may have had the best intention back then, you learn as you grow… and that’s super important. And when you grow you learn that things you once knew may not be true. So going back and making sure you’re recommending the right products and tips is always worth a check!
Do you go back through and update your old blog posts? Do you do something I haven’t recommended?
Katie x