Best way to change theme and update outdated content?

So I am in the process of changing a bloated low speed theme to a better one and updating my articles with proper structured layout.

Is the best way to do this making a staging version of the site and changing the theme, cleaning the code, making everything ready and also updating the old articles? After everything is done, I will push the site live?

Thanks.

Yup, that's usually the best route, particularly if your site currently gets traffic. That way you don't create any downtime and break things if the new theme isn't compatible with certain plugins or breaks something.

Also make sure to take a backup of your current site just in case the changes have a negative impact for some reason.

I'm assuming you're using WP. If so, I've tried WP Stagecoach to do swaps like this before and it worked well.

Steps to Change Your WordPress Theme :

Step 1: Back up Your Site. Before you do anything else, make sure you have a full site backup in place....
Step 2: Navigate to Your WordPress Themes Section. Now you're ready to change your theme....
Step 3: Install Your WordPress Theme....
Step 4: Activate Your New WordPress Theme.

Steps to update outdated content :

• Identify the posts you want to recycle.
• Keep your URL the same and optimize your CTA.
• Delete ancient content.
• Do some fresh keyword targeting.
• Optimize old posts for new keywords.
• Use existing e-books for blog articles (and blog articles for e-books)
• Build some infographics
• Republish guest posts on your own site
• Follow up on old posts (or just rewrite them)
• Create an email series
• Promote content again and again to get the most traffic possible .

Conclusion :

Old content on your pages has tons of potential, and you can unlock it if you know how to optimize it in the right way.

Google loves fresh, updated pages. By recycling old pages, you can bring rankings back from the afterlife and double your traffic.

Start out by using Google Search Console to identify the posts that you want to recycle.

Be sure that you keep your URLs the same once you update pages because you don’t want to lose the value they’ve already earned.

Then, delete ancient content that is irrelevant, like old job postings or discontinued products and services.

Add a 301 redirect if you need to, or just write a message with a link where current content can be found.

Do some fresh keyword research with a queries search. Then, make the top query your focus keyword.

Optimize old posts for new keywords that they may not already be ranking for. And use Yoast’s WordPress plugin for recommendations.

Use existing e-books to create new blog articles, and existing blog articles to create new e-books.

Build some infographics to add to your articles or at the end of your blog posts to summarize the main points and statistics.

If it’s OK with the site owner, republish any guest posts that you have written in the past on your website to attract more site visitors.

Follow up old posts with a “part 2” article, or just rewrite them if they could use some improvement.

Break up content into smaller pieces to create a daily, weekly, or monthly email series.

Finally, promote old content over and over to gain traffic year after year.