Does Your Site Suffer from “Content Mullet” Syndrome?

Remember the mullet? That late 70’s – 80’ish hairstyle that all allegedly cool dudes (and hot chicks) once sported? You know,`a la those hair-tossing rock ‘n roll bands and tough leathered chicks of the time (circa Styx, Journey, Pat Benatar, etc.)?

Well, in this week’s Web-writing video, Heather takes the notorious mullet into another dimension altogether, asking: does your site suffer from “content mullet” syndrome?

Beginning with what a “content mullet” is, Heather walks us through recognizing the signs and symptoms of content mullet syndrome, easy and organic remedies for the malady, and a preventative prescription to guard against relapse…

The content may have looked great…once upon a time…

So what is a “content mullet”?

It’s much like the mullet hairstyle: it might have looked great once upon a time, in its time – meaning it was in, it was fashionable, it was hip – but when you look at it now, it looks a little dated (in the kindest words).

Translating that to your website, your content mullet might have worked very well for you once upon a time, but now it’s marked by:

• Outdated articles
• Outdated sales pages
• Conference/event pages that haven’t been updated
• Press pages and links that haven’t been updated

These all represent great opportunities for content marketing, and they are all very important to the conversions process.

It may not seem like a big deal…but it sends a message…

You may be inclined to shrug off this out-dated content warning, thinking yeah, yeah, I’ll do something about such-and-so page eventually…but keep in mind that:

• People notice and wonder what’s going on.
• This is especially true if your competition is kicking out new, fresh content.

If your website appears to be out-of-touch and its content neglected, your prospect is liable to click back to one of your competitors’ sites – you know, the one with the newest and most relevant information beckoning her and thereby underscoring its relative credibility. (Not to mention that your competitors’ sites are most likely out-ranking yours’ on the SERPs, with Google’s preference for sites with fresh content.)

The key is to take care of business – fast!

Again, this presents an opportunity for you to at once revitalize your site and market your content. And it is something that is relatively easy to evaluate and fix.

All you need to do is:

• Comb through your site and make a list of outdated pages.

This is going to take a little bit of time if you have a larger site. But check things like your blog posts, press release and conference pages, and any articles to see what the opportunities are. Go through that list and then:

• Focus on revising a few pages a month until you’re done.

Tip: If one of the outdated pages on your list is a sales page, you probably will want to prioritize it because it will help you make money! Then you can work on the other pages as you go along.

• Consider if you need to develop a new process.

For example, it is so common for companies to send out press releases and then forget to upload them to their site. If that sounds like something that’s afflicting your business, then make it a point of the process that once the press release is sent out, it goes online as well.

Tip: Just inserting such key points into your content marketing process is a simple way to keep everyone involved informed of when to automatically update any given web page.

• Moving forward, review your content once a quarter.

Now you’ve ditched the mullet for a far more trendy and attractive  look, make it a policy to review your content at least once a quarter.

An ongoing, quarterly inventory of your content is a smart way to keep on top of the newest content creation and marketing opportunities that will keep your website competitive.

Besides that, it ensures that you regularly discover new ways to tweak your content, update pages, and do anything else that will keep your website fresh and new, and give your readers the best possible content you can deliver!

photo credit to IndiePics!/Valarie Apperson/Talamantes