Removing Dates From WordPress Blogs

It’s not a good idea to remove dates from WordPress blogs.  Although, sometimes reasons for doing it often seem to make sense. Also, they may seem clever on our part. But, in reality there is almost never a good reason for removing dates from WordPress blogs. Let’s take a look at why that is true.

No Good Reason for Removing Dates From WordPress Blogs

If our plan is to present more of an information resource like Wikipedia with our blog, then we might also be tempted to exclude our blog dates. Since Wikipedia or the WordPress codex both leave dates off their articles, at first our plan would seem to make sense. Another side benefit might be getting our blog to look like evergreen material. While that sounds like a must have, we’d be ignoring some things that are game changers in digital content creation.

But, what about user bias for outdated content? If the date is older, they will assign it to the not-so-relevant bin and pass it up. That may not be always justified. Although, it’s simply a fact with our online reader base. Removing the dates of our blogs would end that. Yes…but not.

Removing Dates From WordPress Blogs Gets Even Dicier With Google Algorithm Updates

It’s kind of alarming to hear about some SEO’s actually advising people to remove their blog dates recently. Why? For one thing, the very architecture and nature of a blog was not set up as a dateless, evergreen feature. Here’s the knock out punch: Search engine know that. With the advent of Google’s Panda and Penguin, it’s become an even dicier proposition to alter blog format.

Another devastating downside to removing dates from WordPress blogs comes directly from the reader base. How so? those reading our undated info presume it is accurate and current, as well. If some things have changed since an article’s publication, we will likely hear about it from our readers. As a result, we must go in and update the article. The more we blog in this way, the more we will end up getting complaints and back tracking with updates. Not time and effort well spent!

We should all simply face facts. Blog content is not intended to be evergreen, nor should it be! My advice is if you want evergreen content, create a Page on your site, and put up that static info. That’s content that was not really intended to be time sensitive or change generally over time. Also, if you really need to update an existing post, here’s what you can do to help with the “outdated” concern. Just apply the “last updated” function to your post. That way, rather than the published date, the last updated date will show up. Not only will your readers take note, but so also will the search engines.

If you want to learn more about turning your blogger experience into a great success story, increase your reader ship and escape inefficient updating, talk to the pros at Prostyle Development.