Monitoring: Content Decay and Change Alerts
Track Search Console traffic drops and crawl baseline changes on the Monitoring page. Catch content decay early and see what changed between crawls.
The Monitoring page combines two proactive signals: content decay from Google Search Console and change alerts from crawl baselines. Use it after you have regular crawls and GSC sync so you react to traffic loss and site changes before rankings compound.
Prerequisites
- At least two crawls on the property (change alerts compare to the previous baseline).
- Search Console connected and synced via Analytics for content decay rows.
- Enough impression history in GSC for decay detection (very new pages may not appear).
If you see “Run a crawl to start monitoring,” complete another crawl after your first baseline.
Summary cards
- Decaying pages — URLs whose clicks dropped by at least your threshold vs the prior 28-day window.
- Clicks at risk — Estimated click loss on flagged pages.
- Change alerts — Non-info alerts since the last crawl (critical/warning counts).
Content decay tab
Compares two GSC windows (current vs prior period):
- Adjust Min drop % (15–40%) to tune sensitivity.
- Each row shows URL, click change, impressions, position shift, and a likely cause hint when available.
- Open URLs in the page viewer to inspect content and technical issues.
Use decay to prioritise refreshes and rewrites on pages that already had search demand.
Change alerts tab
Lists structural changes detected between crawls:
- New or removed URLs at scale
- Spike in verification issues
- Redirect or status-code shifts
- Security or robots changes
Severity icons (critical, warning, info, ok) help triage. Critical items often deserve an immediate re-crawl verification or rollback check.
Workflow
- Establish a baseline crawl after a stable release.
- Sync GSC weekly (or before opening Monitoring).
- Review Change alerts after each production deploy or competitor move.
- Review Content decay monthly; cross-check with Action plan and Template Analytics.