What are the four content-opportunity categories?

Missing topics (traffic potential where the property has no page and competitors rank, fixed by creating content), thin coverage (a page exists but is too shallow to compete with topical hubs, fixed by deepening or clustering), outdated content (ranked well historically but lost ground to staleness, fixed by refreshing and re-promoting), and decaying content (lost traffic for non-obvious reasons, fixed by diagnosing then refreshing, merging, or redirecting). Each category needs a different action, which is why classifying first matters.

Which tools does the audit use?

Ahrefs MCP is the primary backend, surfacing keyword and topic gaps from Content Explorer and competitor top pages. Similarweb adds traffic-driving page-level gaps (which of a competitor's pages earn meaningful traffic rather than rankings alone), and Semrush adds SERP-feature gaps (where competitors win answer boxes, knowledge panels, and People Also Ask placements). The three platforms often disagree on individual data points, and that disagreement is a useful signal rather than a problem to resolve.

Should I create new content or update what exists?

Default toward updating. Teams have an all-create bias, but updates and merges often outperform new pieces by a wide margin and at lower cost. The audit classifies every existing page (healthy, thin, outdated, decaying) before proposing anything new, and it treats publish date as information rather than currency: a five-year-old page can outrank a one-month-old one if it is genuinely better, so reflexively deleting old content is a mistake.

How do I tell decay from seasonality?

Compare year-over-year, not month-over-month. A 30 percent click drop in summer for a back-to-school topic is a season, not decay, and reading it as decline leads to needless rewrites. Watch separately for intent shifts: some keywords have moved from informational to transactional, or to SERPs dominated by AI answers, video, or featured snippets, where the page's existing format can no longer compete. Recognize an intent shift before refreshing, because a better version of the wrong format still loses.

Why does the roadmap need effort estimates and traffic forecasts?

Because a roadmap without effort sizes cannot be sequenced realistically, and one without forecasted impact loses the funding fight. Estimate the effort for each action and forecast the traffic it should recover or earn, even with wide confidence bands. And remember that a refreshed page needs re-promotion to take effect: update the sitemap, the internal links, and the distribution so the page earns a re-crawl rather than sitting unchanged in the index.

Skill · SEO content gap audit

SEO content gap audit.

Find the topics worth creating, deepening, refreshing, or pruning.

Find content gaps and decay across an existing catalog, then produce a roadmap of create, update, merge, and prune actions. Every opportunity falls into one of four categories: missing topics, thin coverage, outdated content, and decaying content, each needing a different action.

The audit runs on Ahrefs MCP data and weighs existing pages before proposing new ones, because updates and merges often outperform new content at lower cost.

Audience: SEO and content teams planning a content roadmap, refreshing a stale catalog, building topical authority, or diagnosing why publishing is not driving organic growth.

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The framework

Four categories of content opportunity.

Every opportunity falls into one of four categories, and each needs a different action.

01Missing topics: traffic potential where the property has no relevant page and competitors rank in the top 10. The fix is to create new content.
02Thin coverage: a page exists but is too shallow or single-keyword to compete with topical hubs. The fix is to deepen it or expand into a topic cluster.
03Outdated content: pages that ranked well historically and lost ground to staleness. The fix is to refresh with current information and re-promote.
04Decaying content: pages that lost traffic for non-obvious reasons (SERP-feature changes, competitor publishing, intent shifts, internal-link dilution). The fix is to diagnose, then refresh, merge, or redirect.

Pairs with these platforms

Three sources sharpen the gap analysis.

Gap analysis is sharper with multiple sources, and the SKILL names three. Ahrefs is the primary backend for keyword and topic gaps; Similarweb surfaces traffic-driving page-level gaps; Semrush surfaces SERP-feature gaps. The three often disagree on individual data points, and that disagreement is itself a useful signal.

How to read the gaps

Update bias beats create bias.

Teams default to creating new content, but updates and merges often outperform new pieces by a wide margin at lower cost. So the audit classifies every existing page first (healthy, thin, outdated, or decaying) before reaching for the create action, and treats publish date as information rather than currency: a five-year-old page can outrank a one-month-old one if it is better.

Decay is not seasonality. A 30 percent click drop in summer for a back-to-school topic is a season, not a decline, so compare year-over-year rather than month-over-month before diagnosing decay. And some keywords have shifted intent (informational to transactional, or to AI-answer-dominated SERPs) where the existing format can no longer compete; recognize that before refreshing.

The content-gap and keyword-gap audits feed each other, so run them adjacent. Every roadmap item carries an effort estimate and a traffic forecast, because a roadmap without effort sizes cannot be sequenced realistically and one without forecasted impact loses the funding fight. And a refreshed page needs re-promotion (an updated sitemap, internal links, distribution) to earn the re-crawl.

Reference files

The reference that goes alongside the SKILL.md.

references/content-decision-matrix.md
The detailed decision tree for classifying pages and choosing the create, update, merge, or prune action, with worked examples.

Browse all reference files on GitHub

Bridges to other skills

The audits and outputs around it.

This audit works in topics. These cover the keyword-level twin, the prune-focused audit, the program it feeds, and the page execution.

Run adjacent
seo-keyword-gap-audit
The competitor keyword gap, worked at the level of individual keywords. The two audits feed each other, so run them side by side rather than in isolation.
Prune and redirect
seo-content-audit
Pure keep, merge, and redirect decisions on existing pages live there. This audit adds the missing-topic and decay side a prune-focused audit does not cover.
The program
content-strategy
Turns the roadmap into pillars, a calendar, and governance. The audit's output is one of its required inputs.
Pure research
seo-keyword
Keyword discovery without the competitor frame. Research finds the queries; this audit finds the gaps between the property and the field.
Page execution
seo-onpage
Once the audit names a page to deepen or refresh, optimizing that single page is on-page work.

Open source under MIT

Read the SKILL.md on GitHub.

The skill source lives in the rampstackco/claude-skills repository alongside dozens of other skills covering the full lifecycle of brand and product work. This page is a structured overview; the SKILL.md is the source. MIT licensed.

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Frequently asked questions.

What are the four content-opportunity categories?: Missing topics (traffic potential where the property has no page and competitors rank, fixed by creating content), thin coverage (a page exists but is too shallow to compete with topical hubs, fixed by deepening or clustering), outdated content (ranked well historically but lost ground to staleness, fixed by refreshing and re-promoting), and decaying content (lost traffic for non-obvious reasons, fixed by diagnosing then refreshing, merging, or redirecting). Each category needs a different action, which is why classifying first matters.
Which tools does the audit use?: Ahrefs MCP is the primary backend, surfacing keyword and topic gaps from Content Explorer and competitor top pages. Similarweb adds traffic-driving page-level gaps (which of a competitor's pages earn meaningful traffic rather than rankings alone), and Semrush adds SERP-feature gaps (where competitors win answer boxes, knowledge panels, and People Also Ask placements). The three platforms often disagree on individual data points, and that disagreement is a useful signal rather than a problem to resolve.
Should I create new content or update what exists?: Default toward updating. Teams have an all-create bias, but updates and merges often outperform new pieces by a wide margin and at lower cost. The audit classifies every existing page (healthy, thin, outdated, decaying) before proposing anything new, and it treats publish date as information rather than currency: a five-year-old page can outrank a one-month-old one if it is genuinely better, so reflexively deleting old content is a mistake.
How do I tell decay from seasonality?: Compare year-over-year, not month-over-month. A 30 percent click drop in summer for a back-to-school topic is a season, not decay, and reading it as decline leads to needless rewrites. Watch separately for intent shifts: some keywords have moved from informational to transactional, or to SERPs dominated by AI answers, video, or featured snippets, where the page's existing format can no longer compete. Recognize an intent shift before refreshing, because a better version of the wrong format still loses.
Why does the roadmap need effort estimates and traffic forecasts?: Because a roadmap without effort sizes cannot be sequenced realistically, and one without forecasted impact loses the funding fight. Estimate the effort for each action and forecast the traffic it should recover or earn, even with wide confidence bands. And remember that a refreshed page needs re-promotion to take effect: update the sitemap, the internal links, and the distribution so the page earns a re-crawl rather than sitting unchanged in the index.