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Before you plan new navigation or layouts, decide what the existing content should do. Inventory pages, identify their users and purpose, check whether they are accurate and usable, then assign each one a clear action: keep, update, combine, remove, or create. A low-traffic figure alone is not a sound reason to delete a page.
What should the audit cover?
Set the scope before reviewing pages: the whole site, one section, or a specific cleanup tied to a redesign. Identify the people who own, maintain, review, or approve content. Those decisions determine which pages belong in the inventory and who can make or validate changes. Tulane University’s content-audit guidance and Digital.gov’s content goals guide describe inventories as a way to connect content with ownership and user tasks.
What does each page help someone do?
Record the page title and URL, its audience or user task, likely entry points, owner, and last review or update date. Include relevant files as well as web pages when they are part of the experience. A site crawl can help produce a list; a spreadsheet is enough to record findings and decisions. The goal is not merely to count URLs, but to understand what people come to the site to accomplish and where the content supports that work.
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Is the content still useful and trustworthy?
Assess each item against the job it is meant to perform. Check whether the information is accurate and current, whether users can find and understand it, and whether it is accessible and usable. Look for broken links, outdated instructions, duplicated material, and tasks that the site does not address. Oregon’s design guide and Mass.gov’s audit guidance emphasize qualitative review as well as inventory.
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Who uses it, including a small audience?
Traffic can help describe how a page is used, but it does not establish whether the page matters. A page may serve a small, specific audience or provide information needed at a consequential moment. Tulane’s guidance says, “Do not remove a page solely because it receives limited traffic.” Consider the user task, accuracy, links, and any retention or approval requirements before deciding that little traffic means little value.
Can people find and use it?
Review navigation and internal links, not just the page itself. Check accessibility and usability, and note whether users can complete the task without unnecessary friction. A useful page that is hard to locate may need a better place in the site structure rather than deletion. Likewise, a page that is accurate but difficult to use may call for revision rather than removal.
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What action should each item receive?
Give every inventory item one explicit next step. Tulane’s audit guidance outlines actions that can be adapted to a redesign:
- Keep: The page is accurate, useful, and still serves a clear need.
- Update: The page remains necessary, but needs defined corrections or improvements.
- Consolidate: Overlapping pages should become one authoritative resource.
- Remove: The content no longer serves a user need and has no suitable role elsewhere.
- Create: The audit reveals a meaningful gap that existing pages cannot fill.
Write down the reason for the choice and, for updates or new content, the owner and next step. There is no source-backed universal score or quota for how many pages a team should remove. If you use a scorecard to compare accuracy, task fit, accessibility, redundancy, findability, ownership, and removal consequences, treat its weights as a local decision aid—not a validated formula.
Can overlapping pages be combined?
Compare pages by the needs they serve, not just by similar titles or wording. If several pages answer the same question or guide users through the same task, decide which one should become the authoritative destination. Preserve distinct information that serves a separate audience or task, and make sure the combined page remains clear and findable. Use the inventory to identify relationships between pages before changing the site structure; Digital.gov’s guide connects content review with identifying gaps and shaping a sitemap.
What happens to a page’s URL if it moves or disappears?
Before unpublishing or consolidating a page, check its replacement, links pointing to it, retention value, and any required subject-matter or leadership approval. Update internal links and navigation that refer to the old destination. If a page has a direct replacement, redirect its old URL to the relevant destination rather than leaving visitors at a dead end. Google’s site-move guidance covers redirecting URLs when content is consolidated and monitoring a move.
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Removal checklist
- Is there a current page or resource that fully replaces this one?
- Do internal links, navigation, or known inbound links point to the URL?
- Does the material need to be retained, or does removal require approval?
- Should the old URL redirect to a replacement?
- Have links and navigation been updated to reflect the decision?
How should audit findings shape the redesign?
A content audit is preparation for design, not the redesign itself. Mass.gov states, “A content audit is not a redesign.” Use findings about user tasks, gaps, duplicate material, ownership, and relationships between pages to plan information architecture and content work. This gives the redesign a clearer basis than simply carrying every old page into a new layout—or deleting pages based on a traffic cutoff.
What should you test after changes?
After publishing updates or removing content, check navigation and links, confirm that redirects reach the intended destinations, and review important pages on desktop and mobile. Verify that users can still find the information they need. For a site move, Google recommends monitoring analytics and server logs; its migration guidance explains that monitoring alongside URL changes.
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