Definition
Content pruning is an SEO strategy that identifies and addresses low-quality, outdated, or underperforming pages on a site. The goal is to improve the site's average quality, optimize crawl budget, and concentrate authority on the best-performing pages. Three actions are possible: delete the content (with a 301 redirect), merge it with similar content (consolidation), or significantly improve it. Content pruning is particularly recommended for sites with a lot of thin content, internal duplicate content, or zombie pages (pages with no traffic and no backlinks). Google Panda and the Helpful Content Update reinforce the importance of this practice.
Key Points
- The site's average content quality impacts overall rankings (Helpful Content)
- Three options: delete (301), merge, or improve
- Frees up crawl budget for important pages
Practical Examples
Blog pruning
A blog with 500 articles identifies 150 with 0 visits over 12 months, no backlinks, and obsolete content. Removing these pages (with 301 redirects) improves average quality and overall traffic increases by 20%.
Content audit
An e-commerce site with 10,000 product pages identifies 3,000 permanently out-of-stock products. Removing them and redirecting to parent categories frees up crawl budget.
Frequently Asked Questions
In Google Analytics, find pages with 0 visits over 12 months; in Search Console, find pages with no impressions; and in Ahrefs, find pages with no backlinks. Cross-reference this data to identify zombie pages.
If the topic is still relevant and has search potential, improve the content. If the topic is obsolete, has no potential, or is redundant with another article, delete with a 301 redirect to the most relevant page.
Go Further with LemmiLink
Discover how LemmiLink can help you put these SEO concepts into practice.
Last updated: 2026-02-07