A typical audit captures, per page: word count, organic traffic, last-update date, inbound internal links, conversions, and a quality score (often manual). The output is a triage decision: keep, update, consolidate, or remove.
Most established content sites have 30–60% of pages contributing under 1% of traffic. Some are wrong (low-quality content that can be improved); some are dated (timely posts that have expired); many are redundant (multiple posts covering the same query). Each category has a different remedy.
The biggest unforced error is treating an audit as a one-time project. A content engine that publishes weekly needs an audit cadence — typically quarterly for top performers, annually for long-tail — to keep the catalogue from accumulating dead weight.