Review broken and changed external references

Separate link health from evidential support

The deliverable lists the article URL, reference URL, statement supported, review outcome and action. Opening successfully is only one check. Identify what the article expects the reference to establish: a price, specification, procedure or additional background.

Separate a general related link from evidence that supports a consequential statement. Prioritising references that affect a reader’s decision lets a small team make useful corrections without reading every external page in the entire archive at once. A successful status code cannot establish that the original meaning is still present.

Record the statement attached to the link

Capture article ID, section, visible link wording, URL, source title, check date and owner. For a long document, add the relevant chapter or heading. If many articles use one source URL, make the relationship searchable so a changed source can reveal all affected articles.

Use link wording that tells readers what they will open instead of an isolated “here”. Google’s link guidance supports descriptive anchor text. This is useful editorially as well: a reviewer can understand the expected source before opening it, and a replacement can be assessed against a clear purpose.

Use automated checks to create a review queue

Collect external references and group responses into not found, redirected, failed retrieval and successful response. A failed automated request may reflect rate limits or a temporary connection problem, so do not immediately label it a broken source. Use a restrained request rate and confirm important cases through ordinary public access.

Read the destination of a redirect before updating the link. Even a successful response may now be a login screen, domain-sale page or unrelated article. Automation creates a queue; a reviewer decides whether the destination still supports the actual statement.

Example: an official pricing reference moves

In a fictional case, article A-012 supports a pricing explanation with official source S-008, which now redirects to a new pricing page. Check the billing period and plan scope as well as the number. Update prose, tables and reference together where necessary.

Changing only the address can leave an outdated explanation intact. Use the register to inspect other articles that rely on S-008. If the content remains valid, record the review date and a short reason for retaining it. This distinguishes a genuine recheck from a mass change to timestamps.

Handle unavailable or replaced sources

Look for an official successor and check whether it supports the same claim. If none can be established, narrow the statement to what remains supported, remove an unverified number or hold the affected material. Another website repeating the old claim is not equivalent to confirmation from the relevant provider.

For a replacement, record old URL, new URL, reason and affected wording. Open the link from the published article after the edit. Verify both the destination and the visible label, especially where the new source covers a narrower subject than the old one.

Prioritise sources that change reader decisions

A spreadsheet and manual checks are enough for a small reference set. If using Screaming Frog or another crawler, enrich its output with editorial importance and the statement affected. Start with sources supporting prices, limits and other decisions that could change what a reader does.

Budget for comparison and correction time as well as the crawler subscription. Completion is not necessarily a report containing zero retrieval errors. Important statements should have usable support, and unresolved sources should have a recorded action rather than disappear from the queue simply because automated access failed.

• Internal-link audits: broken paths, isolated pages and irrelevant recommendations
• Write an evidence-led SEO article brief that an editor can verify
• Prioritize article updates with evidence, exposure and reader impact