Updating events site - performers change, venues stay the same

[NVentouris]

Hi all

I have an affiliate site for reservation in live stages but I have a problem.

Every 4 or 6 moths the live stages change the singers, usually they go in duets. For example, the live stage "livenow" now has the singer Madonna and Eminem. People search for the name e.g. "livenow" and also they search for the duets e.g. Madonna Eminem. The link of my site example.com/stages/livenow has a 500 words article about "livenow" and Madonna and Eminem. After 6 months the duet changes but the name of the stage remains the same.

My question is: Should I change the article with a new one (and the Title of Course) and keep the link or should I write a new article with all new information and 301 redirect the old one ? But Is it OK to redirect the links every 4-6 months or change the title ?

Thanks for your answers

[tangor]

If the page utl is the same, but the content changes every six months, that's the way I would do it... no need for redirects and is truthful to the end user. If the url is stagenameANDduet, then that has passed (after six months) and is no longer accurate... though it might be historical. For an entertainment site doing reservations you can't book a gig that's already over... thus a redirect isn't necessary.

That said, there's no reason not to keep a historical page (archive) of past events... as that would show the quality of the stagename over time.... but under a different URL than the stagename current...

[netmeg]

I do a lot of events, most of which are recurring yearly. I'm a big fan of keeping the same URLs whenever possible. As far as expired events - if there's a good chance the event will recur, I will leave it up (with a big EXPIRED - WAITING FOR UPDATE notice on it) but take it out of the site navigation. As soon as it's updated to the current year (or in the future) it goes back in the nav. Haven't had any search engine problems yet across multiple sites.

[NVentouris]

Thanks both for reply.

I don't use the names of the duets on url on purpose in order to keep the same URL. Of course when a livestage remain closed for 2 or 3 months I Upload an Image with a watermark that this livestage is closed and i suggest some others. But I am not sure about how google will respond if i change the Title and the content of a Url every 4 months sometimes. I see that my compatitors does that and when i search for the old duet, google apear the old Url but with the new title and the new content in it. Thats a problem because i searched something different and google showed me and old indexed page witch now has different Title and content. Can this be considered as manipulation of SERPs ? And be punished ?

[Nutterum]

Unlike @netmeg, I do the opposite . The site structure I use is /year/event-name and I use add start and expiration date of the event. Granted I drop off the ranking day or two after the event ends but what I gain is that the system automatically puts /year+interval/event-name that is ranking on the same SERP position and sometimes higher. Both ways are good and have their strengths and weaknesses, so what it comes down is how your back-end and automation process works and can be fitted to your needs.

[netmeg]

But I am not sure about how google will respond if i change the Title and the content of a Url every 4 months sometimes.

If it directly relates to the content of the page and is not full of spammy keywords, I don't think they'll have a problem with it. I don't change them every four months, but I've been known to change them 2-3 times a year with no issue.

I generally only change the year (or sometimes the date) on a page title, but lately I've noticed that Facebook doesn't do a very good job of picking up the changes unless I run them through the debug (and I get a ton of Facebook shares) so I'm thinking of dropping the dates out of the titles completely, and just relying on the schema to post a rich text snippet.

[NVentouris]

OK Guys, thanks all for your answers. I think I made my decision here.

[aok88]

What about noindexing the pages that are for events that just passed, and bring them back if the event happens again in the future?

[netmeg]

I thought about that, but decided against it. Taking them out of the nav seems to work out okay.

[ken_b]

Taking them out of the nav seems to work out okay.

By leaving them in place and taking them out of the site nav don't you run the risk of a doorway page issue?

Added - because they are still in the index

[aok88]

Yeah, that's why noindexing them takes care of any bad signals - of course I would also remove any links to them too.

[netmeg]

By leaving them in place and taking them out of the site nav don't you run the risk of a doorway page issue?

I don't think so. Hasn't been an issue so far, across eight sites for quite a few years. If Google started penalizing sites with expired event pages because they might be doorway pages, that'd probly halve the indexed sites right there.

I'd think they'd be more likely to be considered doorway pages if they were still in the nav (but expired)

[jimbeetle]

I work my event site basically the same as netmeg, I reuse every url I can. I figure that a site with the same structure, aged pages and aged links has to send some sort of (hopefully positive) quality signals.

I try to do the same with my local travel and entertainment sites. Hotel and venue names change so wherever possible I use some form of the street address as the page name.