SEO Tutorial for Travel Bloggers: Get More Traffic from Old Blog Posts

About Laura Peters

Laura Peters is a travel blogger and the voice behind Mike & Laura Travel, Scale Your Travel Blog and Travel Blogging Summits. Laura started travel blogging in 2014 while living in Thailand. In 16 months, Mike & Laura Travel has steadily grown her blog from $0 a month to $12,000 a month. She later launched two more blogs: Scale Your Travel Blog (one of the best travel blogging platforms) and Travel Blogging Summits (an event hosting platform that brings together travel bloggers from all over the world).

How to Get More Traffic from Old Blog Posts

Below is a summary of the webinar where Laura Peters shared the three main steps to get more traffic from her old blog posts.

Step 1. Determine Which Blog Posts Need to be Updated

The first thing you need to do is determine which of your posts do not need to be updated. There are generally three groups of posts:

1. Posts currently ranking in the top three Google search results for your target keyword. You can optimize these posts for affiliate marketing to take advantage of the traffic you already have.
2. Posts that already bring a lot of traffic. Even if they are not ranking for a particular keyword, it is better not to touch them. You can update them for affiliate marketing and let Google do its thing.
3. Posts published in the last six to nine months. It takes time for Google to recognize your post and rank it in search results.

So how can you optimize your posts for affiliate marketing? The key is to add affiliate links or creatives and create context that will encourage readers to click those links and discover the products you recommend.

If you have a travel blog, you can easily make money with affiliate programs from travel brands like airlines, hotels, tour companies and more. With Moyens I/O, you’ll get access to over 100 travel partner programs and world-class affiliate support.

Now let’s see which posts really need to be updated:

1. Posts that rank down but still generate traffic or affiliate revenue.
2. Posts in the top five to ten search results on Google. Raising them up in the search results will give your blog a huge boost.
3. Posts in the top eleven to twenty-two search results on Google.
4. Any post that isn’t generating any traffic and is older than nine months.

Now the question is: How do you know which posts are losing traffic? For this, make sure you have connected Google Search Console to your website. This is one of the best free analysis tools and very realistic. To see the current rankings on Google, go to the platform’s control panel and click on “Search Results” under the “Performance” tab in the left-hand menu. You will see your post’s total clicks, impressions, average CTR and average position. Second, it helps you understand where your blog posts rank for certain keywords.

You can filter your posts in “Search Results” by search type and date. The default date is three months, but the date range can be changed for comparison. For example, the last seven days, 28 days, three months, etc. You can choose to compare their rankings in

“Queries”, “Pages”, “Countries” etc. Scroll down to view. Select the “Pages” tab. You can dig deeper and find all the keywords that each post is ranking for and determine if it’s ranking up or not.

in Google Search Console. You will also see the publication dates and search results performance of your posts. Set the date to the last seven days and use the little filter menu with the arrow to eliminate blog posts or keywords that are not in the fifth or higher position on Google. In this case, you can set the filter to be greater than 4.9.

You can also use Google Search Console to find posts with no traffic. Use the little arrow and scroll up to see any blog post or keyword without any clicks.

Step 2. Understand How to Update Old Blog Posts

With Google Search Console, you’ll have a list of posts to choose from, which you can update. The second step is to understand exactly what needs to be done with these posts and prioritize your work. Basically, there are three options: delete the posts on your website completely, unindex the posts or optimize for SEO.

1. Delete + Repurpose

Here you can understand that some posts from your blog need to be deleted and reused. All criteria must apply:

1. Posts are not optimized for SEO. No obvious keywords to return. These are often personal stories written a long time ago.
2. Posts do not receive any traffic.
3. Posts have no backlinks. If your posts actually contain backlinks, it’s not worth removing the authority points you’ve earned.

How to redesign these posts? Creating free content with a signup form is a great way to gather leads or include content in a newsletter.

2. Remove + Repurpose Directory

Some publications can be indexed and reused. In this case, you won’t need to remove them from your website, but you can tell Google to ignore them.

There is a fine line between removing a post and removing it from the index. So, when in doubt, it’s better to de-index your posts and choose whether to remove it later.

Any of the following criteria may apply to posts that can be removed from the index and repurposed:

1. Posts are not SEO optimized, but contain an obvious keyword to rank for.
2. Posts do not receive any traffic.
3. Posts do not have any backlinks.

You can reuse these posts by creating a free opt-in or newsletter.

3. Optimize for SEO

One of the basic principles that any entrepreneur should follow is to focus on the things that will bring you more income. So make sure you only optimize posts that can earn you affiliate revenue. Basically these are posts where your reader can buy things. Also, these posts should have traffic potential. The more readers they bring, the more member revenue you get, the more email subscribers you gain, etc.

Any of the following criteria can apply for posts that need to be optimized for SEO:

1. Posts are not currently SEO optimized.
2. Keyword choice has traffic potential.
3. Your keyword has affiliate potential.

Make sure you keep track of which posts bring you the most revenue and create similar articles to get a positive ROI. As an entrepreneur, you should always monitor which content and campaigns are most useful and prioritize which posts to update accordingly.

What To Do With Posts That Are Not In Your Niche

In the meantime, another question may come up. What should you do with posts that are definitely not in your blog’s niche? For example, posts you wrote long ago before you chose the focus of your blog. Here are a few things to consider:

1. Do these posts get traffic? If your answer is yes, that means Google isn’t penalizing you for stepping outside of your niche.
2. Are there any backlinks? Before deleting any post, you need to consider your backlink profile so as not to lower your authority and overall Google ranking.
3. Can posts be optimized for SEO? All posts should be updated for search results, as Google takes into account not only the optimization of each post, but the SEO of your blog in general.

Step 3. Update Old Posts Using SEO

Now that you know how to find posts that need help and what you can do about them, you need to optimize them accordingly. Here are a few tips for the most efficient SEO:

1. The best way to rank high on Google, evaluate the top ten search results. From there, you can model what these top ten sites are doing to determine what you haven’t achieved so far, but still apply it for your own content strategy.
2. Pay special attention to posts with the lowest domain authority and rating. If they’ve been able to rank this high on Google, they must be implementing even better SEO tactics. Look at their titles, titles, content, word count, structure, meta descriptions and try to find common patterns. Never directly copy anyone’s content to avoid legal trouble. Simply use this information to model your own content just as efficiently.
3. Include the year in your title. People love up-to-date content and often type the year when searching Google. Including the year in the title of your post will push your post up in search results.
4. Add a keyword to your title. Be sure to check what other words are in the title of the top ten posts on Google. Include a keyword or two in your titles.
5. Update the meta description.
6. Add more body paragraphs. Google prioritizes long-form content, as these types of posts provide users with all the answers they need. Therefore, create content that will be a one-stop shop for all information about your keyword.
7. Optimize your posts for affiliate marketing to increase your revenue. Start by signing up with one of the best affiliate networks. In the travel niche, this would be Moyens I/O, which offers access to over 100 travel brands across a range of industries and provides high-level affiliate support to all contributors, including compelling creatives to drive more conversions.

If you want to know how often you should update your posts, how to check if your post has backlinks, and more, watch the Q&A where Laura answers these and similar questions.