Quality over quantity? Content length vs. SEO
In last couple of years the topic of content length was heavily discussed by many of SEO gurus. Most of them argued that in order to succeed, users must create long posts. While there are some important data that prove this, we can say for sure that it's not the most important factor.
Longer? Shorter?
Creating long posts may have some big disadvantages such as worse quality of the text. Why is that? Longer posts can indeed increase rankings of a site but only in the short term. Google wants to serve their clients only with the best quality and a post with 1,000 words instead of 500 will be just a text with too many words. Generally people look for more valuable and definite post, furthermore, they will choose shorter texts over longer ones. Although many SEO gurus claim that they found the „sweet spot", meaning optimal content length, there is no such thing. Length of a text should depend on a topic. If a topic requires longer text, just go with the flow. But in some cases it's better to optimize your images for SEO instead and limit yourself to a short post.
Word count myth
When it comes to the content for your site always focus on quality over quantity. It's not the length of the post is the most important factor, but how valuable and comprehensive it is. Whether you're going to write 250, 1250 or 2250 words, everything tends to one thing: your audience need to be satisfied with the content. Try to create more valuable texts and over time you will become a trustworthy source on a given topic. In order to snatch people attention you need to be innovative, and there are many useful „tricks" which will help in increasing the rankings. You can add some bullet points, scannable headlines, keywords in subheadings, some interesting image or video to get people's attention. Remember to be consistent in writing high-quality and unique content.
More than just words
These days a good post is not enough to grab users attention. You need to add some alternative forms of content, for example images, videos or audio. Sometimes it's hard to explain something using only words, especially when it's a difficult topic. Attractive graphic may successfully draw attention to your website, even if blog posts are as short as 200 words. Furthermore, people are more likely to link to this kind of pages instead of only plain texts. Words are simply less impressive than a good video or image and what is worth to add is that pages with graphic content tend to rank better.
Regardless of how long will be your posts, remember about high quality. A good text must be written with proper grammar and spelling. Ensure also that your content is optimized properly for valuable keywords. Don't think too much about word count, because forgetting about it will allow you to focus on the quality of your text.
