Just take the unhelpful content you already wrote and put it on a site Google likes then BOOM – helpful again.
SEO is now like real estate.
Location, location, location.
Google is not equal in it’s handling of sites.
Be it due to “vitalness” (get out of jail free card for some domains), or bias due to links (enough links makes you mostly bulletproof), Google will punish smaller sites harder, faster, longer.