Where to Find & Fix Orphaned Content on Your Website
Do you know if you fix orphaned content on your blog or website it can help your site rank better?
A few years ago, I noticed in my WordPress dashboard the orphaned content column when I looked at my posts. I was looking at them to find old blog posts to update.
Therefore, I had to know how to fix the orphaned content that was staring me right in the eyes.
To my surprise, I had over 550 total blog posts that were orphaned! Has it really been that long I’ve been blogging here? (The answer can be found on my about me page.)
But what intrigued me the most was the orphaned content had over 350 blog posts. (The screenshot here shows I since fixed a few). Hmm, I wondered?
The Orphaned Content Blog Posts
But, if you don’t have Yoast, you would need an SEO tool like SEM Rush to find out your orphaned pages and fix that orphaned content.
(By the way SEM Rush is a great tool, even the Free version! You can even find your broken links with this SEO tool. I’ve been loving the suggestions that they email me weekly for my site’s SEO here.
Of course, fixing it slow and steady is the best way. You don’t want to overwhelm yourself with updating them. And while you are fixing them you can make your content more relevant and up to date with new information.
So, here is how you can fix that orphaned content on your site: (And at the bottom of this post is a YouTube video on how to do it if you prefer to watch and learn.)
Being An Orphan
Now, I could really relate to those orphaned pages lately as my dad passed away a few years ago and I’m an adult orphan. It started to hit me after I was no longer in the busy stage of emptying the old homestead and such.
(I know how these pages feel being alone in left field without a parent to watch over them. There is a missing link to my family tree.)
Hence, think of your website as a family tree. All the roots need to be interconnected and talk to each other.
Think of your website as a family tree. All the roots need to be interconnected and talking to each other. #SEOtips
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What Does Orphaned Content Mean?
Orphaned content means that a page or post that is NOT linked to any other page on that same website. It’s all by itself. The orphaned page is all alone. No internal links are pointing to it.
The orphaned page is like this dog by himself below waiting for a missing link.
According to Confluence, the technical answer is: “ An orphaned page is a page without any incoming links and is located at what’s called the ‘root of the space’, meaning it sits alongside the space’s homepage. This means that, unless you know the page exists, you’re not likely to come across it during the natural course of navigation.
Navigation of your blog or website is key when doing search engine optimization.
Readers of your content need to be able to find things quickly, otherwise, they will leave and go elsewhere. Therefore, having fewer orphaned pages on your website will lead to a lower bounce rate!
The SEO gods love lower bounce rates as people stay on your website for longer periods of time-devouring content.
The SEO gods love lower bounce rates as people stay on your website for longer periods of time-devouring content. #SEO
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Why Fix Orphaned Content?
- SEO Benefits – You will see a higher amount of traffic as the SEO of your site gets better with fewer orphaned pages. Your site structure will be better for your readers. The Google bots will LOVE you for interconnecting all your blog posts.
- Lower Bounce Rate – Readers will stay longer on your site with links pointing to other content that is RELEVANT for them to read. Relevant is the keyword here! Do not point to useless information just for the sake of it.
- Readers Will Love It – Your readers will appreciate reading more on a topic if you point them to the most relevant content about it. It will be easier for them to find things on your website.
Now, I’ve always linked new posts to old ones but not the other way around. Yes, now link your old posts to new ones when it makes sense. And don’t forget to link to your pages too. So, I’m in the process of fixing these, a few per day, and of course, updating the older posts and pages along the way!
Now, after doing these (months later) the site Inspire To Thrive’s traffic grew. It’s a great way to grow your website’s traffic organically.
#SEO Benefits – You will see a higher amount of traffic as the SEO of your site gets better with less orphaned pages. Your site structure will be better for your readers.
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Fixing Orphan Blog Posts and Pages Increase Your Ranking
Not only do they increase your website’s traffic but they can increase your ranking when people are searching online for content. These orphan pages of your site may not be crawled thus causing them to rank further down from other sites.
In the old days of blackhat SEO, orphan pages were hidden for no good reasons. The search engines caught on.
Now, the search engines think these orphaned pages are not important since they were not interlinked on a website. Make them appear more important by fixing them for your site.
These search engines can even punish a whole site with the presence of orphaned pages. (Blog posts are considered pages too in SEO speak.)
These orphan pages of your site may not be crawled thus causing them to rank further down from other sites. #SEOtips
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How Else Can You Fix Orphaned Pages?
You can update your old posts and pages. How long since some of these pages have received any attention from you?
Some of my old blog posts made me cringe. How could I have written that? And the creative art was another part that needed a refresh! Recently I did an overhaul of Content Viral Bee.
It was like rewriting the entire post. But things have changed, and the post had to reflect that. What was surprising to me was that some people still haven’t heard of the services from Content Viral Bee. You may have many blog posts like that yourself that can use a refresh.
So not only will you be fixing your links to other pages, but you may update your old content and make it fresh! You know how much Google loves fresh content if you have been a reader here.
For my dog lover blogger friends and clients, Hunter now has a stepbrother and loves being linked to another dog. (I babysit him from time to time, imagine me with 2 dogs when I was once afraid of dogs?) So if you are thinking about links, think about your dogs as part of that family tree.
So not only will you be fixing your links to other pages, but you may update your old content and make it fresh! #seotips
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SEO Changes Frequently and Often
SEO is not all about keywords and the old keyword stuffing method.
Today, it is more about site structure, website speed, helpfulness to readers, and mobile friendliness. There are still over 200 factors that count towards your website’s SEO score and how your website ranks in search.
As a result, when you fix orphaned content you are increasing the SEO juice of your website by refreshing content and linking pages and posts of your website.
As a matter of fact, you can add some evergreen SEO to your content. This will ensure it is quality content that is everlasting.
The structure of keywords and the way people search has really changed over the years. #SEOTips
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Have You Fixed Your Orphaned Content?
Finally, I’d love to know if you knew about orphan posts and pages or if you have fixed orphaned content on your website already.
Please leave a comment below about it today! I’d love to know if it helped your traffic increase.
