When should I remove Old Pages from my Website?

The worst part about the search engines is that it takes forever for all of your content to get listed, when it does you really don't want to get rid of it.

People will find your pages for years, in fact the older the pages are the better because the search engines know they have been up for a long time and know that they are reliable and will likely be there when they send visitors your way.

Of course, what if the content is not relevant anymore? What if you have an article talks about products that are out of production? Or a club that closed, or a website that went out of business?

Before you remove a page consider these issues:

• Does the page have useful content?

• Does the page show dates or deprecated?

• Does the page contribute value to your visitors?

• Does the page negatively impact your site SEO?

• Do you get any traffic from search engines to the page?

Does the page have useful content?

If someone reads the page, is there any value to the reader? Even if the information is about an old model of a product people are still look for that information, even 10 years after they go out of production. They want to know repair info, where to get parts or what the new models are that can replace it.

So having old data is not a bad thing at all. In fact when all the big sites remove it, you are left with the only pages and now you get all the traffic.

We see this continually on affiliate sites. People search for the exact model, product and set up and since the product is no longer available they find our dated old page that has not been removed yet because we are the only company with the item still listed. If we can offer them an alternative or the newest model we can get a sale.

In almost all cases it is better to have traffic to your website than not to have traffic.

Does the page contribute value to your visitors?

If a page has any useful information at all it should be preserved. Even something as simple as a photo of a product and the serial number can be useful when someone is trying to identify something. If you have the only example, it may be extremely useful for someone.

You know as well as anyone how frustrating it is to search for something and not be able to find it. So maintaining information is great for everyone.

Does the page show dates or deprecated?

If the product is out of date or no longer available, then you should have a date on the page showing when the information as posted and if the product, service or website is no longer available.

In blogs, like wordpress articles have dates ad are archived by month and year. This gives users an understanding of when the information was relevant. If the pages was written in 2005, then the user knows the information is old, not updated and may be out of date.

If you have time to go back and update pages that is helpful. Add a note that the item discussed was discontinues, deprecated or just does not exist anymore as of the date that occurred.

This lets you keep valuable information for users without misleading them about what might be available.

Lets look at for example all the pages about production of old classic cars. It would be a shame if those pages were removed just because the cars are out of production. People want to look up information. serial numbers and details about these classic cars.

I was just recently searching for a part of an air conditioning system and searched for an hour before finding that the part was replaced with a new part number. When I did find information because an old article had been updated I was able to order that part from that website.

So don't be so quick to remove those old pages.

But sometimes pages should be removed.

Does the page negatively impact your site SEO?

It is rare that any one page will negatively impact your website SEO because no website is judged for any single page. Each page has its own relevancy and should not impact the overall website. I said it should not, but that does not mean it will not.

If you site becomes a graveyard for discontinued products it could begin to have a reputation for old stuff and if you are selling new stuff that could be problematic.

It is highly unlikely that that will happen but if everyone links over to your articles about something then the searches can start categorizing you in a place you don't want to be. So you need to balance content.

Make sure if you save old pages that you keep adding new ones so the search engines don't think you website is stuck in a time warp.

That should go with out saying. You always need to add update and work the website to stay relevant and never opt for leaving old pages in rather than adding new ones.

Do you get any traffic from search engines to the page?

If you are seeing traffic, no matter how small, even 1, 2 or more a year then you should consider keeping the page. If people are fining the page it has value to you in the searches. If you have 1000 old pages that all bring in 2 people a year then that is 2000 visitors to your website and 2000 potential customers because you did not remove the old pages.

It really is a balancing act.

If you see too much traffic for content that is not related to your actual product or service, then it might be time to remove some of those pages and replace them with new ones. But if you have not tried adding new ones without removing the old ones, that should be the first step.

The biggest problem with websites is not the sites or the content but the owners. They lose interest, don't update and don't add new stuff.

Websites are just like teeth, if you ignore them, they will go away.

Just because you have traffic today does not mean you will have it tomorrow, so keep up the pages, make the right choices about what to keep and add new. As long as you don't completely ignore the website it should serve you well for many years.