PPC - Pay Per Click Management

Evergreen content is the term that is given to content online that is independent and irrespective of time. This means that the content never ages, and is just as relevant and useful as it is when it is published, as to many years into the future.

This makes evergreen content extremely attractive from a website publisher’s perspective. To have content that will continually bring in traffic for years and years makes websites a ‘cash cow’ for making money.

However, is evergreen content actually evergreen? It’s an interesting question and one that a lot of people assume to be ‘yes’. However, it’s worth noting there are a few things that can make evergreen content reduce in the ranking. Here are the main calls for concern regarding this.

 

Competition change over time

When your evergreen content ranks, it will gain a rank in search engine results page. This does not mean that rank is forever set in stone. To imply that evergreen ranking stays the same over years is a gross overshadowing of many factors.

One such factor is the competition for common search engine keywords. If the competition content is better that is published over time, then, naturally, your evergreen content will reduce in the ranking, reducing traffic to it.

For this reason, its always a good idea to see why evergreen content reduces in the ranking, and look to update and improve it.

 

 Search engine algorithm updates

Google makes updates to its search engine a few times a year. With each update, the signals that rank articles can sometimes change, be it in a minor or major way.

Keeping up to date with such changes will help you understand whether your evergreen content will continue with its current ranking, or improve/decline. If the rank does decline, or there is strong evidence it will decline over time, then it is a good idea to improve the content to adjust for such algorithm updates.

 

User behavior

The web we all surf the internet has changed a lot in the last 20 years. For example:

• Websites were very basic 10 years ago
• Internet speeds were very slow
• Browsing the web was all done by computers
• Then tablets/mobile phone touch screens came into play
• Internet speeds increased
• Mobile became dominant
• Voice search has picked up in popularity
• Web design has changed to become more like material design

Hopefully, this makes clear that the way web users surf the internet and interacts has changed over time. This means evergreen content from 20 years ago might not be the best way to process the content nowadays.

A great example could come with ‘how to tie a tie’. 10-15 years ago, an article on how to tie a tie would have done well. However, now it would be useful to have a bullet point list for rich snippets, or even a video to go through the process. In 20 years from now, virtual reality might be the go-to way to tie your tie using Google, who knows. The point to the matter is that the way we digest content is changing, which means evergreen content, in terms of SEO, is never set in stone.