[et_pb_section admin_label=”Top skinny IC Logo Section” global_module=”26126″ fullwidth=”off” specialty=”off” transparent_background=”off” background_color=”#cc4315″ allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” padding_mobile=”on” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off” custom_css_main_element=”@media only screen and (min-width: 1350px)||.page-id-25059 .et_pb_section_0, .page-id-25059 .et_pb_section_0 .et_pb_row_0 {||padding: 0 !important;||}” custom_padding=”0px||0px|”][et_pb_row global_parent=”26126″ admin_label=”Row” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”off” padding_mobile=”on” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”on” parallax_method=”off” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_method_1=”off” padding_top_1=”0px” padding_right_1=”0px” padding_bottom_1=”0px” padding_left_1=”0px” column_padding_mobile=”on” custom_padding=”0px|0px|0px|0px” custom_margin=”0px||0px|” custom_css_main_element=”@media only screen and (min-width: 1350px)||.page-id-25059 .et_pb_section_0, .page-id-25059 .et_pb_section_0 .et_pb_row_0 {||padding: 0 !important;||}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_image global_parent=”26126″ admin_label=”IC logo Image” src=”https://iriscontent.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/IC-logo-horizontal-framed-e1468862028685.jpg” alt=”Iris Content logo” show_in_lightbox=”off” url_new_window=”off” use_overlay=”off” animation=”off” sticky=”off” align=”center” force_fullwidth=”off” always_center_on_mobile=”on” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin=”0px|0px|0px|0px” custom_css_main_element=”@media only screen and (min-width: 1350px)||.page-id-25059 .et_pb_section_0, .page-id-25059 .et_pb_section_0 .et_pb_row_0 {||padding: 0 !important;||}” url=”https://iriscontent.com”] [/et_pb_image][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section admin_label=”section” background_image=”https://iriscontent.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/sage-bells.jpg” transparent_background=”off” background_color=”#ffffff” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” padding_mobile=”off” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row”][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_3″][et_pb_divider admin_label=”Divider” color=”#ffffff” show_divider=”off” height=”200″ divider_style=”solid” divider_position=”top” hide_on_mobile=”on”] [/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text admin_label=”Blog Post Title Text” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”left” max_width=”620px” text_font=”Cantata One||||” text_font_size=”72″ text_text_color=”#ffffff” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin=”0px||0px|” text_line_height=”1.1em” text_font_size_last_edited=”on|tablet” text_font_size_tablet=”52″]
Revisiting the Past: Not a Bad Thing In Generating New Leads After All
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NOVEMBER 2016
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There’s nothing wrong with a little nostalgia. It’s a good coping mechanism. Our history professors reminded us to revisit the past and learn from it. Therefore, some nostalgia is good! But what has that got to do with leads generation and optimization?
We all know that optimization is the foundation of a successful website. You do want people to find you, or else, what’s the content creation for? And if your blog has been around for a while now, maybe now’s the time to do a little site revisiting or ask the help from a content marketing company for a strategy known as “historical optimization.” It simply means optimizing old published content in blogs or eBooks and gain back its visibility. It’s like meeting up with an old friend you haven’t seen in 5 years and telling the same stories but with new updates. Suddenly, your friend is relevant again.
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Why historical optimization matters
In any marketing or sales strategy, we all want basically the same things – we want something that’s not too expensive (read: cheap), something that doesn’t take a lot of effort (read: lazy) and something that will gives great potential (read: profit, income, leads, traffic, etc.). The same applies to historical optimization – it’s easy, it costs nothing and it gives awesome results.
More and more businesses do content marketing strategies and create more content – each content piece clamoring for attention from their target audiences. With today’s content overload, there are not a lot of people willing to consume it. The supply of content is increasing, but alas, the demand from the audience is not.
The result is that most of the content is completely unseen. And if you add more “unseenable” content, well, it will be a waste of resources since everybody else is doing it. The more practical solution is to do historical optimization.
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How does it work?
So how does one take advantage of a little nostalgia and make it work? Here are some tips:
Start with your page views
From your old posts, have a quick Google Analytics check to see which ones are the most popular so far. Which ones have had the highest visibility? Pick out a few (3 for starters) of the ones that went viral with views that went through the roof.
Do some updating
Sometimes, the data on your content will be outdated and stale – like old news. But since it is still generating some organic search traffic, we need to keep this content fresh and updated. This post has some search page authority already and will not rely on zero results. Edit it and see if you can provide a more detailed explanation. Update your examples, if you used them, for more recent and real life ones. Add images and videos. For sure, there are more media available now. In short, take your content a level higher. Your updated old posts will now be more accurate and fresh. Remember that Google rewards freshness.
Do some new linking Try adding internal links to these refurbished blogs directed to your new posts. Historical optimization doesn’t mean you stop making new content so you can add links to the new ones to your old ones. These new linking could still generate a lot of traffic.
Optimize the right items
We all know that ranking is everything and the best ways to rank is to have your page optimized by using the best keywords. But it’s not the same as the days when stuffing a page with keywords would do the trick. If your old blog post followed that rule, redo content optimization and narrow down the number of keywords so as not to get penalized. Content stuffed with keywords oftentimes do not make sense.
Other items to optimize are your images. There are probably new social media platforms nowadays than when your blog post first came out. So have the correct sizes and alt text for your images. Plus, get a better and more updated image to match your content.
Republish your old post
Lastly, after all the sprucing up you’ve done to your updated post, it’s now time to publish it as fresh and new by changing the publish date. Then just like all the rest of new content, email it to your subscribers, promote it in social media and do everything you did that made it go viral.
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But don’t stop there
Historical optimization shouldn’t be your only blogging strategy. You should still be creating new content. Even though not all new posts will be a guaranteed success story, remember that the high traffic post you are now updating was once fresh and new.
In conclusion, when you find that old blog that was an SEO hit, revise it, optimize it and modernize it for today’s readers. If you’re not confident in doing it yourself, have a content marketing company do it for you. And lastly, be patient. Not all the results you envisioned will come out right away. As you keep updating and republishing, you will see more improvements having given those old blog posts their much needed second wind.
[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”on” gutter_width=”2″ padding_mobile=”on” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_method_1=”off” parallax_2=”off” parallax_method_2=”off” column_padding_mobile=”on” custom_padding=”50px|||” custom_padding_tablet=”30px|||” custom_padding_last_edited=”on|tablet”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”row” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”off” custom_padding=”17px|||” padding_mobile=”on” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_method_1=”off” parallax_2=”off” parallax_method_2=”off” column_padding_mobile=”on”][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_3″][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_divider admin_label=”Divider” color=”#cc4315″ show_divider=”on” divider_style=”groove” divider_position=”top” hide_on_mobile=”on”] [/et_pb_divider][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section admin_label=”Blog post main Section” fullwidth=”off” specialty=”off” transparent_background=”off” background_color=”FDF3E7″ allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” padding_mobile=”off” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off”][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”off” padding_mobile=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”off” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_method_1=”off” parallax_2=”off” parallax_method_2=”off” column_padding_mobile=”on”][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”https://iriscontent.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/author-image-annie.jpg” show_in_lightbox=”off” url_new_window=”off” use_overlay=”off” animation=”left” sticky=”off” align=”right” force_fullwidth=”off” always_center_on_mobile=”on” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”] [/et_pb_image][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_3″][et_pb_team_member admin_label=”Person” name=”Annie Ianko” position=”Content Happiness Advisor” animation=”off” background_layout=”light” facebook_url=”https://www.facebook.com/IrisWebContent/” twitter_url=”https://twitter.com/Iris_Content” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_css_main_element=”box-shadow: 0 0 20px rgba(0,0,0,.1);||”]
Annie has 18 years’ experience as an editor and content creator and manager. With work in television and written media, she has dedicated her past 10 years to learning the ropes of online content creation, from writing to editing, from SEO to content management.
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