Does changing a Squarespace blog post's publication date affect SEO?

“If you update an old blog post, should you change the ‘published date’? Are there any SEO benefits for doing this?”

This is a question that came up recently during a Squarespace SEO Audit & Consulting client meeting and I figured since this topic has come up before, it’s worth creating a blog post about it to help out the rest of my audience - that would be YOU, my lovely little website & SEO nerds :)

When it comes to SEO and ranking high for your desired keywords/key terms, we can all agree that Google (and other search engines) favour both new AND refreshed/updated content. This is pretty much true across the board.

If we think back to the very basics of SEO and how Google decides what content to return in search results, it always comes back to the best and highest quality content on the internet.

Whether we’re talking about a web page, a blog post, a product description - whatever, really - the principle remains the same.

If you want your website to rank well for your desired keywords, then it’s a good idea to regularly publish new content on your website/blog. But at the same time, you also want to go back & revisit old blog posts to update them and make sure that the content is as valuable, current and up to date as possible.

This is something I’ve been focusing on recently, here on my own website and blog. Personally, I’ve been going back and updating & improving old posts on my blog and wow, there’s no denying that I’ve already seen major SEO benefits! We’re talking an increase in website traffic, better opt-in rates for my newsletter and freebies, content that ranks higher for my desired keywords, etc. It’s a lot of work but I can already see the impact it’s having so I’m going to stick with it!

But today we’re focusing specifically on BLOGGING - the relationship between blog post publication dates on Squarespace websites and SEO.

And this is perfect because the topic is timely for my own website’s SEO efforts, and it was also a client question during a consulting meeting! Hopefully this post will help out anyone who might be wondering the same thing.

I’m answering this question with a lot of detail here in this post but we’re going to look at two things:

Whether or not there’s any SEO impact/benefits that comes from changing a blog post’s publication date
Instructions on how to actually change the blog post’s publication date.

So let’s take a look, shall we?

How and why I created a promotional marketing video for my online course, Top Squarespace SEO

Hello hello!

Coming in HOT with another “how I did this” educational blog post for you!

I’m about to give you a behind-the-scenes look at the brand new promotional marketing video that I created for my online course, Top Squarespace SEO.

These types of posts are really fun to write for you guys because it’s my chance to share with you, my lovely audience, exactly what I’m working on and show you how I’m doing it.

I can truly show you what I learn, as I go.

There’s something wild about experimenting in your business and then slapping those results/takeaways on the internet for the whole world to see in a blog post LOL! But you know me, always happy to (over)share!

Alright, let’s get right to it!.

To start things off, please take a look at said promotional marketing video (below) so that you know what I’m talking about, and then I’ll catch you on the flip side to discuss how I created this video etc.

An in-depth recap of my birthday flash sale for Top Squarespace SEO (online course)

Coming in HOT today with a really fun blog post, cause I’m another year older and another year wiser! 🎈

Earlier this week, I celebrated my birthday (on November 4th, it’s scorpio season baby) which is and of itself is pretty fun - but this year, I went all out!

I decided to celebrate this special occasion with a flash sale of my online course, Top Squarespace SEO!

This was the first time that I’ve ever run a flash sale and I learned SOOOO much during the process - seriously it was so much fun but it also meant that I had to master a whole new skill!

As such, I figured this would be a neat & actionable post for anyone who’s also interested in online marketing, experimenting in their business or trying something different with their online course :)

Alright so let’s talk flash sales.

In theory, they are pretty simple.

You just go all out and market/sell a product (or service, I guess) for a short period of time.

All your marketing efforts go towards that one sale and you want to spread the word as loudly and widely as possible! Everything else gets put on hold, it just chills on the back burner for a little while until the flash sale is over.

But if you’re like me and you’ve never run a flash sale before, then you probably have NO CLUE how to actually run a flash sale haha!

I mean, I figured I would need to make some changes to my website to announce and promote the flash sale for Top Squarespace SEO and I knew I’d likely send out some emails to my list… but beyond that, I was in the dark.

Because I was a flash sale first timer, I was basically starting from scratch and that meant I needed to learn everything and plan it all out ahead of time if I wanted the sale to be a success.

Luckily for me, I found several really helpful flash sale guides and templates online (thank you, Google!) and from there, I was able to hack together a pretty effective marketing plan and strategy.

So that’s what we’re going to go over in today’s blog post!

I’m sharing a lot of really actionable advice here so hopefully this helps you out if a flash sale is something you’re interested in trying out in your own business!

Ready to dive right in? Get comfy, this post is a long one :)

How I create new lessons, guides and bonus resources for my online course, Top Squarespace SEO

Mixing things up a little with today’s post to give you a “behind the scenes” look at what actually goes into creating, marketing, up-keeping and improving an online course :)

Consider this your chance to peek behind the curtains of this part of my online business - happy creeping LOL!

Jokes aside, I’m sharing this information because I’m learning all about marketing and running an online course as I go, and I am super excited to document my process and share my take-aways and strategies with you, my audience! This is the kind of post I would have liked to read a few months ago when I getting ready to create new course content so I hope someone else finds it valuable too.

If you’ve been following my work online, you probably already know that I am primarily a web designer/developer and Squarespace SEO expert, but I also have an online course called Top Squarespace SEO.

You can read all about my experience creating and launching Top Squarespace SEO here:

An in-depth recap of Top Squarespace SEO: Exactly how I launched and marketed my first online course

Top Squarespace SEO is my baby - I launched it earlier in 2019 and it’s been SUCH a fun project to work on and I’ve been thrilled with the results my students have gotten so far! It’s actually the top-rated online course in this niche, which is pretty cool and something that I’ve very proud of.

If I’ve learned anything about having a successful online course, it’s that you can’t simply publish it, sell it, then never touch it again - LOL that would be one way to get some pretty crappy reviews!

Instead, online courses require regular updates and you’ve got to add new content to make it even better and more valuable to your customers.

So, in this blog post I’m going to show you everything I did recently to update and improve Top Squarespace SEO, my top-rated online course.

i’m giving you an insider’s look at how I decide on the content that’ll be added to the course and how I identify gaps in the course content to see where new lessons, resources, bonuses etc. will be a value-add or improve the customer’s experience.

I’ll also share my process for actually creating that new content, how I research and plan out the information, how the new content gets added to the online course, and so much more!

So grab a cup of whatever the heck you want and settle in, this post is a good one!

squarespace seo checklist

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squarespace seo checklist

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