When to Rebuild a Piece of Content and When to Just Update It
Rebuilding costs as much as producing. Often all it takes is changing three lines and the date.
Content ages at different speeds. Some stays valid for years, some becomes wrong in six months. Treating it all the same leads to remaking things that were fine and leaving untrue information online.
An update is enough when
- Specific references changed: prices, feature names, procedures.
- The structure holds but something that emerged later is missing.
- The text is right and the format no longer works on a channel.
It needs rebuilding when
The underlying reasoning no longer holds, the audience it addressed has changed, or the position it takes no longer matches how you work. In those cases fixing the visible parts leaves something incoherent beneath the surface.
What to keep when rebuilding
The page address. Changing the path wipes out received links and accumulated history: if the new piece covers the same subject, it belongs at the same address.
The periodic review
Once a year, on the content receiving the most visits: check the references and update the date only if something genuinely changed. Raising the date without changes is a signal that loses value when used for nothing.
Content that works doesn't need rebuilding because it's old. It needs rebuilding when what it says is no longer true.
Sources and Further Reading
Official documentation and guidelines cited or useful for going deeper.