Page Staleness & Content Freshness
Never miss a page that is losing search visibility due to age. Automatic weekly digests identify which pages need updates.
What it measures
Content freshness directly impacts search rankings and AI citability. Google favours recently updated content for time-sensitive queries, and LLM platforms are more likely to cite pages with current information. The Page Staleness module monitors your key pages and scores their freshness on a 0–100 scale.
The score combines up to three independent signals — page age, GSC impression trends, and AI citation trends — into a single composite. Each available signal contributes to the composite. The final score determines the page’s tier: Fresh, Ageing, At Risk, or Stale.
How the score is composed
The staleness score combines every available signal factor into a single 0–100 composite. When a signal cannot be computed — for example, a page with no detectable publication date — the score is based on the remaining signals and the confidence value is reduced to match.
Page Age
How long ago the page was last published or modified. We extract dates from JSON-LD structured data, HTML meta tags, and HTTP Last-Modified headers. Recently updated pages score low on this signal, and the factor climbs steadily as content ages — approaching the maximum for pages more than a year old.
GSC Impressions
The recent impressions trend from Google Search Console compared against the prior period. If impressions have dropped, the staleness factor increases proportionally — the steeper the decline, the higher the factor. Pages with negligible prior impressions are excluded so the signal is not driven by noise.
AI Citability
Change in citation frequency across AI platforms. If the number of LLM responses citing this page has decreased compared to the prior period, the citability factor increases proportionally. A page losing AI citations is likely losing relevance in LLM knowledge bases.
Staleness tiers
Each page is assigned a tier based on its composite score.
Fresh
0–24Content is current and performing well. No action needed.
Ageing
25–49Early signs of staleness. Schedule a review in the next content cycle.
At Risk
50–74Material decline in traffic or citations. Prioritise an update or refresh.
Stale
75–100Significant drops across multiple signals. Immediate attention required — this page is likely losing search visibility and AI citations.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which pages are tracked?
By default, the platform auto-seeds your top 50 pages by GSC impressions over the last 30 days. You can also manually add any URL to the watchlist via the Content Refresh page.
How often are scores updated?
Staleness scores are recomputed daily as part of the intelligence pipeline. The weekly digest email summarises the current state every Monday.
What if a page has no publication date?
If we cannot extract a date from JSON-LD, meta tags, or HTTP headers, the age signal is omitted and the score is based only on GSC impressions and citability. Confidence is reduced to reflect the missing signal.
How does the snooze feature work?
You can snooze a page for 1–365 days. During the snooze period, the page still receives daily scores but is excluded from digest emails and alert notifications. After the snooze expires, normal alerting resumes.
What happens when I mark a page as refreshed?
Marking a page as refreshed records a baseline snapshot of its current score, tier, and signal values. The system then tracks recovery over 7, 14, and 28 days, showing you whether the update actually improved performance. This creates a closed-loop feedback cycle.
How does the weekly digest work?
Every Monday, the platform compiles a list of pages in the At Risk and Stale tiers for each organisation. It sends an email to org admins and editors with a summary table and action links. Each link is cryptographically signed to prevent unauthorised access.