Ch. 12: My Quarterly Refresh Checklist (Saved a Dying Page)

Ch. 12: My Quarterly Refresh Checklist (Saved a Dying Page)

Month 14, my best earner — a $900/mo "best robot vacuum" page — slid from position 2 to 7. Instead of panicking I ran my refresh routine.

— Compared GSC last-90 vs prior-90: clicks down 38%, impressions flat. So I was losing CTR, not relevance
— Rewrote the title and meta with the current year and "tested" — CTR is the fastest lever
— Checked all 6 affiliate products: 2 were discontinued. Swapped them, killed the dead links
— Updated the comparison table with new prices and 2 newer models
— Added a "last updated" date in the visible body, not just schema

Five weeks later it was back at position 3, revenue recovered to $850/mo.

Lesson banked: decay isn't always Google punishing you — sometimes your page just went stale and you stopped noticing.