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Getting rid of DEAD content & cleaning up your index can provide significant SEO benefits
Here's what you can do
1. Export your last 16 months of search console data (pages) – or, if your site has over 1000 pages, use SiteAnalyzer SEO Tools to export larger volumes.
2. Export GA4 data for the last 16 months – you want all channel data for your URLS in terms of visits.
3. Merge the GA4 data into your exported GSC page data sheet and then against GSC pages, use VLOOKUP to path match visits against URLS – get Visits, Engagement, Bounce, Time on Page.
4. Crawl the website with SiteAnalyzer and export the crawl into another tab in your GSC/GA4 data sheet.
5. VLOOKUP the number of Unique INLINKS, Word Count, Readability against your GSC page data.
6. Copy your GSC page URLS and paste them into AHREFS batch analyser to see if any have external links.
7. Now – blend ALL THE DATA together – what you want is:
- URL
- Clicks
- Impressions
- CTR
- Position
- GA4 Visits
- Engagement Rate
- Duration
- Bounce
- Unique Inlinks
- Word count
- Readability
- External referring domains
VIABILITY CRITERIA
HTTP 410 + Remove internal links
- > 0 Clicks / 0 Visits / 0 Referring domains / Low Impression
You could also HTTP 410
- > 0 Clicks / < 10-100 visits if no conversion / 0 Referring Domains / Low Impression
HTTP 301 URL + Remove internal links
- < 10 Clicks / < 10-100 visits of no conversion / 1+ referring domains / Low Impression
Potential Unhelpful Content
- > 0 Clicks / < 100 Impressions / 2-3K+ Words / < 0-30s engagement / High bounce
- < 10 Clicks / < 100 Impressions / 4-5K+ Words / < 0-30s engagement / High bounce
- High word count i.e. 3k+ Words / Low engagement / Poor or Hard Readability
Content Renovation Opportunities + Link Building
- > 1000+ Impressions / Low CTR / 1+ referring domains
- Low unique internal link counts < 5
- Decayed content where word count >2k+ words & poor engagement/duration i.e < 30s
- High impressions / Low Ctr / 0 Referring domains
BASICALLY – long story short
1. Get rid of content that just doesn't add any value (no visits) where there's some age behind it, where the page is barely served for anything or is no longer indexed.
2. Rule out poor performance content by reviewing NLP/quality and internal links, alignment with SERPS / end user intent – content COULD do well if sufficient internal/external links and where the content is up to scratch in terms of being factually correct, focused on end user intent.
3. Anything that's NOT adding value, check for traffic and external links – if there's anything to preserve 301 redirect the URLS but remove internal links to the URL being removed.
If nothing to preserve HTTP 410 it so that G knows its gone.
4. Make your CONTENT EVALUATION criteria mindful of:
- End user intent and alignment
- Information prioritisation
- Consensus
- Is this content you would find useful
- Word count vs. time engaged
- Readability
- NLP
Cleaning up dead or low-value content with this data-blended approach (GSC + GA4 + crawl + Ahrefs) is one of the fastest ways to improve site quality signals and recover momentum.
Author: «Daniel Foley Carter»
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