Old details on a website create new doubts

A visitor cannot tell whether your business is thriving or dormant. So they read the small signals, and a page mentioning a service you stopped offering three years ago is a loud one.

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Out-of-date content costs trust and enquiries: old prices produce awkward conversations, retired services waste everybody's time, departed staff make the business look neglected, and stale statistics undermine everything around them. Audit the pages that age fastest twice a year rather than rewriting the site.

The reader is looking for signs of life

When somebody is deciding whether to trust a business they have never dealt with, they read the details for evidence of attention. A recent example of work, a current year, staff who still exist: these say the business is active.

The opposite signals are just as clear. A copyright line stuck several years back, an offer for a season long past, a news section whose last item is old. None of these are lies, and all of them suggest nobody is minding the shop.

What ages fastest

Rather than reviewing everything, concentrate on the parts that genuinely go stale. Most of a good service page stays true for years; a small set of things does not.

  • Prices, and anything implying a price.
  • Services you no longer offer, or now offer differently.
  • Staff, especially named people who have left.
  • Statistics, studies and any figure with a year attached.
  • References to tools, platforms and regulations that have changed.
  • Seasonal offers and event pages.
  • Photographs of premises, vehicles or equipment you no longer have.

The particular danger of old prices

A price on a website is a promise in the mind of the person reading it. When it is out of date, either you honour a figure that no longer works or you begin the relationship by explaining that the website is wrong.

If prices change often, that is an argument for describing what drives cost rather than publishing a figure you cannot maintain. Silence is worse than either, but an unmaintained number is worse than an honest explanation.

Old figures undermine everything near them

A statistic with a year attached ages in public. Citing something from several years ago as current does more damage than leaving it out, because a reader who notices begins to doubt the rest of the page.

If you use figures, name the source and the date so the reader can judge for themselves, and review them when you do your seasonal pass. If you cannot verify a figure, remove it rather than let it sit there unsupported.

A twice-yearly pass, not a rewrite

The whole exercise takes an hour or two if you do it regularly, and becomes a project if you do not. Work through the short list above rather than reading every page.

Add one habit alongside it: whenever something changes in the business, ask which page mentions it. A new service, a price change, somebody leaving, a new certification. Handling it at the moment of change prevents most accumulation.

  • Check prices and anything implying cost.
  • Remove services you no longer offer.
  • Update staff and photographs.
  • Verify every figure and its date, and drop what you cannot verify.
  • Fix the copyright year and any obvious date stamps.
  • Remove expired offers and past events.

Freshness is not about dates on a page

One caution, because it produces a lot of wasted effort. Changing a date stamp without changing anything else does not make a page current, and it deceives readers who assume the material was reviewed.

What matters is whether the page is still accurate and still answers the question well. Update the substance and let the date follow, rather than the other way round.

How Licheo keeps sites current

The work continues after launch rather than stopping at it, which is when most sites begin to drift away from the business they describe.

We do not publish figures we cannot source, and where something cannot be verified we leave it out rather than letting an unsupported number sit on a page for years.

Part of a larger guide

This page is one part of Where the money escapes. The other parts:

Questions people ask

How often should I update my website content?
Do a short pass twice a year over the things that actually age: prices, services, staff, figures, photographs and dated offers. Most of a good service page stays true far longer than that.
Do old dates on pages hurt rankings?
The bigger cost is trust with human readers, who use stale details to judge whether the business is active. Changing a date stamp without updating the content does not help either, and it misleads people who assume it was reviewed.
What should I do about prices I cannot keep current?
Describe what drives the cost instead of publishing a figure you will not maintain. An unmaintained number forces you either to honour it or to open the relationship by explaining that your own site is wrong.
Should I remove old blog posts?
Only after checking whether they bring visitors or enquiries. If a post is still useful, update it. If it is genuinely obsolete and brings nothing, merge anything valuable into a current page and redirect it.
Is it worth keeping a news section?
Only if you will keep it fed. A news page whose most recent item is years old is a clear signal of neglect, and it does more damage than having no news section at all.

Keep the site as current as the business

The work continues after launch, which is exactly when most websites start drifting away from the business they describe.

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