How to do a content audit (with a template)

What a content audit is, and when to do one

A content audit is a page-by-page review of everything on your website, to decide what to keep, improve, combine or remove. Where a website audit asks "is the site working?", a content audit asks "is each page worth having?"

Most business websites build up content without a plan: blog posts from a burst of activity three years ago, service pages that overlap, news items nobody reads, and pages written for services you no longer offer. Over time that dilutes the site. Visitors find outdated information, several pages compete for the same search, and your best pages get less attention from you and from search engines.

Good times to run a content audit:

• before a redesign or move to a new CMS, so you only migrate what's worth keeping
• when search traffic has flattened or fallen despite regular publishing
• when you take over a site and need to understand what's on it
• once a year, as routine maintenance

Step 1: List every page

Start with a complete inventory. You need every URL, not just the ones in your menu.

• Your XML sitemap (usually yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml) lists the pages your CMS knows about.
• A crawler finds pages linked from the site, including ones missing from the sitemap.
• Search Console's Performance report (Pages tab, last 12 months) shows pages getting search impressions, including old URLs you'd forgotten.
• GA4's Landing page report shows pages that receive visits from any source.

Combine them in one spreadsheet and remove duplicates. For a small business site this is often 50 to 300 URLs. Leave out things that aren't content, such as tag archives, author pages and system URLs, but note them, because they may need a noindex or a redirect.

Step 2: Add the data

For each page, add the numbers that tell you whether it's earning its place. Use the last 12 months, so seasonal pages aren't judged on a quiet month.

Don't skip the referral and AI traffic in GA4. A page with no Google clicks can still be cited by AI assistants and send visits that way.

Step 3: Review each page's quality

Numbers tell you what's happening; reading the page tells you why. For each page, answer:

• Is it accurate and current? Prices, services, team members, screenshots and facts.
• Is it useful? Does it fully answer what someone came for, or is it thin?
• Is it for your audience? Content written to chase traffic that will never become customers costs effort and adds nothing.
• Does it overlap another page? Two pages targeting the same search split your signals. Search Console shows this when both pages appear for the same query.
• Does it lead somewhere? A clear next step to a service page or enquiry.

Google's guidance on helpful content is a good test: content should be written for people, show real expertise, and leave the reader feeling they found what they needed.

Step 4: Decide: keep, update, merge or remove

Give every page one decision. Keep the rules simple, so the decisions are consistent.

A few rules of thumb:

• Traffic alone doesn't decide. A page with good traffic from people who will never buy from you is a candidate for removal. A page with little traffic that answers a question every buyer asks is worth updating.
• Merging is usually the biggest win. Three thin posts on the same topic become one thorough guide that has a real chance of ranking.
• Pages with backlinks need care. If other sites link to a page you're removing, redirect it to the closest page so that value isn't lost.

Step 5: Redirect everything you merge or remove

This step protects what you already have.

• Set up a 301 redirect from every merged or removed URL to its new home.
• Redirect to the closest equivalent, not the homepage.
• One hop: if a page was already redirected, point the original straight at the final URL.
• Update internal links so your own pages point to the new URLs directly.
• Update the sitemap so it lists only live pages.

Our technical SEO audit checklist covers redirects in more detail.

Step 6: Plan the updates and gaps

The audit usually leaves you with two lists: pages to update, and topics you don't cover at all.

Prioritise updates by how close each page sits to an enquiry. Service pages and the guides that lead to them come first; general news last. For gaps, look at the questions buyers ask you on sales calls, the searches competitors win (see website competitor analysis), and the formats that work for a small team (see B2B content marketing).

Content audit template

One row per URL. Add the data columns from step 2, then:

How to measure the result

Note the totals before you start: indexed pages, search clicks, impressions and enquiries from organic search. Check them again 8 to 12 weeks after the changes go live. A successful content audit often shows fewer pages, the same or more clicks, and more enquiries per visit.