Removing Date from Blog
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I was reading reading an old thread on removing the date/time stamp from posts and found the suggestion made by hallluke very helpful. I tried this on my test blog and it worked well.
Before I do this on my primary blog and remove the dates from 100 plus posts, I was just wondering if anyone knew if it would have any adverse impacts on search engines being able to locate old posts. (Or if there would be any other potentially negative affect)
Thanks in advance for your help.
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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No adverse effects. The date will still be in the URL, and all you are doing is not displaying the date. It is still there in the HTML for the search engines to see, it is just not visible to your visitors.
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I’d like to wade in here. Since the introduction of Google Caffeine and the emphasis on display of fresh and relevant content at the top of the SERPs (search engine page results) I have witnessed many bloggers attempting to game the search engines by removing dates from their posts and the comments on them.
As reader who uses search engines to locate the most recent posts I am peeved right off when I click into a post that has no dates.
As TSP says you can do this but it will not change the dates in URLs it will simply annoy some readers to examine the URLs to find out which date they were puiblished on. In my case once I experience a conventional post structured blog where date removal hame the seacch engines tactic has been employed I refuse to ever click into that blog ever again.
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Thanks very much TSP. I appreciate the clarification and help.
Thanks as well Timethief. I wasn’t really interested in “gaming” anyone – I just didn’t want older posts to appear “outdated.” Still, I’ll give your comment some consideration – I hadn’t really looked at it from that perspective.
All the best and thanks again
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Hi There,
What’s going on is what I described. Many of those who have wordpress.ORG installs are removing dates from posts and comments with the intent of gaming Google Caffeine so their blog posts appear at the top of the SERPs. This tactic has sifted down the grapevine and now we are getting wordpress.COM bloggers who want to follow suit. -
Thanks Timethief,
Very informative. Again, though, my interest was in avoiding staledating my posts. I sometimes think that if people arrive at a post from 2008 they assume it is no longer relevant and just move on.
As always, I appreciate your input. Best regards.
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Some blogs do contain timeless content and IMO yours may be among them. However, in most blogs date and relevancy go hand-in-hand when I am resaearching and choosing which blog posts to backlink to in my own posts. Currently it appears that bloggers have changed their linking patterns. Baclinks are as sarce as hens’ teeth. Perhaps because people are “liking” and “tweeting” post links instead of backlinking to them and then wondering why their own blog posts aren’t getting backlinks … DUH. The advent of social media has change blogging radically. IMHO the changes have not all been for the better at all.
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Depends on the blog if I will go back into the past – techs stuff gets stale quick – other topics have more staying power – If I like a blog and has stuff that is interesting I will go back into the archive if it is dull or only has one Post that I like that is it –
Looking at your Posts I personally would not get too excited or worry about the dates on the Posts – people that like your style will wander back – those that don’t care for the content won’t go back – will not depend on the date or lack of it – there might be some differences at the margin’s with search engines but I am thinking you would have trouble measuring things –
My way less experienced than TT and others is to not worry and keep writing – it you want more traffic then read what @timethier has to say on her site on building traffic.
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Edit of my not proofreading:
I will go back into the archive if it is dull or only has one Post that I like that is it -Should be
I will NOT go back into the archive if it is dull or only has one Post that I like that is it -
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