Stop hoarding content! How to run a website content audit and trim the fat

Most websites grow like gardens with no gardener. Pages pile up, messages blur, old services linger like forgotten relics and before you know it your site is a confusing, bloated (and slightly misleading) reflection of who you are today.

Maybe it’s time to stop adding - and start subtracting.

Meet the problem: the 'content dump dilemma'

Most websites suffer from this same problem - where every update, announcement and campaign gets its own page or post, but no one ever goes back to clean things up. It’s like digital hoarding. If you're part of this club then chances are, you’ve got:

• Pages promoting services you no longer offer

• Blog posts with five views and zero relevance

• SEO-focused articles competing with each other

• Navigation menus that are six feet long and send you round in circles

This is not just untidy - it’s harmful. Because your site isn’t judged by how much is on it, it’s judged by how easy it is for the right person to find what they need.

So why do we cling to this clutter?

The reasons are often all too familiar:

• Fear of deleting something that might still rank

• Internal politics (“But the CEO wrote that blog post!”)

• Lack of time or process to review what’s there

• Assumptions that more content = more SEO power

But let’s be honest - no one sets out to build a bloated site, it happens gradually and quietly, in the background. A blog post here, a new landing page there. A page for an event that happened in 2018 that still gets linked to from the homepage. A well-meaning knowledge base that turns into a labyrinth.

Over time, what started as useful content has become digital noise, but because the website "still works," the clutter goes unnoticed - until performance starts to suffer. Maybe your bounce rate climbs, maybe leads drop off, maybe customers are asking questions your site should already answer.

By the time most teams realise it’s a problem, they’re looking at a mess that feels overwhelming to untangle and nobody wants to start deleting pages willy-nilly without knowing what the implications might be.

And that’s exactly why content audits are so crucial - not because they’re technical, but because they’re one of the few tools we have to step back and see the whole picture clearly.

If you're sitting there thinking, 'hang on, I've been told more content = better SEO and more visibility" - not quite. While Google does like fresh content, it values relevance and authority more.

And yes, sometimes the right move is to improve - not remove - a page. If search intent exists and your page just isn’t hitting the mark, that’s an opportunity, not a red flag.

What's the answer?

Instead of asking "What should we add next?" ask:

"What can we remove to make this site more useful, relevant and clear?"

That's where a content audit comes into play - not as a technical SEO task, but as a strategic decluttering project. You’re not deleting for the sake of it. You’re editing, curating and sharpening your focus.

A clean, considered website isn’t just nicer to look at - it’s easier to use. It tells your story more clearly. It moves people faster from curiosity to clarity. And it shows your audience that you respect their time.

User experience doesn’t live in fancy animations or clever design. It lives in how quickly someone can find what they need and feel confident they’re in the right place.

A focused, uncluttered site also makes your message stronger. When everything isn’t competing for attention, the right things get attention. That’s when your value proposition can shine, when trust is built and when conversion happens.

So the question isn’t "What’s missing from our website?" It’s "What’s no longer pulling its weight?"

That’s where the real clarity begins.

A leaner, smarter framework

Auditing your content isn't just as simple as ranking pages by number of visits - a low-traffic page could be outperforming your big-hitters with greater leads and a higher conversion rate for instance.

Here’s a simplified 4-step audit framework to give a more accurate impression of what's going on:

1. Create an inventory of your content
   Use a crawler tool (ahrefs, screaming frog etc.), an export from your CMS or a manual audit to list every page and post

2. Score each page against some core filters:

   • Is it still relevant? (is it aligned to your offer and audience?)

   • Is it performing? (traffic, bounce, conversions, Google ranking)

   • Is it useful? (does it serve a real user task?)

   • Is it unique? (or could it be merged with another page?)

3. Decide whether to Keep, Kill, Combine or Improve

4. Take action and monitor the impact

You don’t need to get it perfect first time. You just need to get started.

Curate, don’t just create

Every piece of content should earn its place. It should be working for your audience and with your business.

So here’s your challenge for the week: start with just a random 10 pages. Ask the hard questions and be ruthless! Because clarity isn’t about adding more. It’s about making what’s there count.

And if that means breaking up with a few underperforming pages? So be it. Your users - and your future self - will thank you.