When it comes to starting a blog, or building a website one of the most pressing concerns is how much content should you use. What is the ideal word count length for a blog post? How much should you really be writing? What is the average post length that will help you rank in Google search results?
The question of blog post and website content length does not always have a simple answer. Instead, a little online research will yield a collection of averages based on a variety of factors.
Finally, the length of your posts will be determined by a unique set of variables within your company.
In this post, we'll look at the best way to determine how many words per page you should have on your website, common word count ranges, and factors to consider when deciding on blog post & web page length. We'll also go over some of the factors that will influence your decision as you develop a blog strategy.
Try telling THAT to your SEO person...
Word count alone will not tell you how well your content will be received by readers (or with Google). Instead, the information itself must be of good quality and provide significant value. Quality content that is presented to the correct audience and provides something of value to the reader will always win out above word quantity - It can also convert more leads too, making your phone ring.
Your material should also be appealing to your intended audience. It's vital to remember that everything you post on your blog should be useful to the people who read it. That may imply that you need to review your content in light of your audience demographics and the level of interaction you're currently receiving online. If you're releasing lengthy content that don't resonate with your audience, the length of your blog entries doesn't matter.
When it comes to web content, there's a common misconception that the shorter the blog article, the more likely it will be read. We're here to refute this fallacy and clear the record!
Google is less likely to show shorter content pages at the top of their search results, and therefore the content will not be read because nobody will find it.
Here are the various blog lengths and their respective values:
A variety of additional factors may come into play when establishing the appropriate blog post length for your site. Here are a few variables to think about:
It's time to put your blog post length plan into action now that you've devised it. You'll be able to make changes as you go, so get started. Once you've started writing your blog, you'll have a lot of data to assist you decide whether you need to adjust your strategy.
However, there is a smarter way than blindly following numbers pulled out of thin air if you are looking for a good way to make more informative decisions about content length and what to include within your content.
Another way to look at content length is to compare it with what Google is already preferring for your market, and your target keyword.
There are now many tools available that can assist with finding average word count for the top ranking pages. Some are highly detailed and technical too.
Using on page SEO tools that help web marketers produce perfectly optimized pages for Google with ease is a great way to go. We use a range of them including
All of these tools provide you with data about your competing pages and help you make better decisions about what you should be including on your web pages. Not only do they tell you how many words per page is optimal for your SEO, but they also show you a large amount of information about what your competitors are writing about, relevant keywords and how they are formatting their pages.
Using tools like these, you can essentially plan out a content outline and use a paint-by-numbers approach that is data driven to assist you in producing content that Google is expecting to see. I like to consider them the 'Grammarly' of SEO.
By following a data-driven approach, you will not only produce better content that also ranks in Google, but you will also save time and money by being more efficient with your writing.
For example if the data shows all of your competitors have a page length on average of 500 words, then it makes sense to aim for slightly above that - say 700 words. If you were to blindly pull a number of 3,000 words out of thin air for your web page content length it might mean a lot more un necessary writing.
Producing content is only a part of the process when putting together a website or writing a blog. You should be smart about it and make sure that you have a content plan.
How frequently are you going to publish articles?
What topics are you going to write about?
How will this content help your business?
How will you market your content once it is live?
These are all valid questions you should be asking yourself, and planning to work into your content strategy.
You don't want to be writing content that nobody cares about or aren't searching for. Instead, you want to have a plan to ensure that it gets read by people and they find it valuable giving a good user experience and increasing user engagement
The content length always needs to fit the type of content you are creating. Data driven content not only helps generate useful content for your readers, it also helps you get more traffic to your site and bring in more leads.
Content should always be about quality, not quantity. When you pair word count with high-quality content that resonates with your audience, you’re more likely to enjoy a successful blog.