Articles for SEO, and what they should be

You don't need to chase word count. Your goal is to write a coherent, engaging, well-researched post that is exactly what it should be: no less and no more.

However, if you're reading this, you've probably heard that Google ranks long posts better than short ones.

In this post, we'll look at why this is almost certainly not true and what you should be doing instead to optimise for search engines.

Why do people think long posts are better for SEO?

Many studies show a correlation between content length and what is commonly thought of as good SEO performance.

However, correlation does not prove causation.

So let's discuss a few common arguments in more detail.

Longer content gets more links

Links are one of the most important ranking factors in Google.

We know this due to the fact that links are the foundation of how the PageRank algorithm works. Google also talks about the usefulness of links in the context of page ranking.

If we look at the relationship between word count and links, we do see a strong positive correlation.

In this case, the data comes from analysing a sample of around 900 million pages out of over 3 billion pages in Content Explorer.

Why does this correlation occur?

Let's start with the most likely scenario: longer posts make a stronger impression and therefore many people link to them.

While this seems plausible, our data doesn't support it.

Look again at the graph above and you'll see that it's clipped at 1,000 words. For longer posts, we found an inverse relationship between word count and link count. In other words, the average number of links from unique sites (referring domains) drops after 1000 words.

So what's the big deal?

Our theory is that the correlation, at least in part, comes down to a balance between elaboration and brevity.

Let's explain:

In general, longer content is more likely to contain "link-worthy" talking points. But these "need to know" talking points are hidden among less important "not bad to know" information. The result is content that few people will read to the end. Which means fewer people will get to those theses that are "link-worthy." And if fewer people get to them, the post will get fewer links.

It's also true that most people won't link to a post they haven't read. And there will be fewer such people if your post takes three hours to read.

What to do.

Make sure your posts are concise and without "water". At the same time, they should contain important "link-worthy" statements.

Makes sense. But how do you figure out which statements are link-worthy?

One way is that you need to paste the URL of the post that is top for your target query into Ahrefs Site Explorer. Then go to the Backlinks report and look at the anchors and surrounding link text.

For example, if we do this for one of the top posts for the query "SEO copywriting", we can see that most of the links are derived from mentioning the APP method.

Thanks to the fact that we know this section got so many links, we can use something similar when we write more on this topic.

Don't think too much about the length of the text. Focus on talking about all the points that are "link-worthy".

Long content gets more organic traffic

According to page analyses in Content Explorer, there is an average positive correlation between content length and organic traffic.

But again, you shouldn't look for a cause-and-effect relationship here.

Why does this correlation occur?

First, let's look at the idea that Google likes long texts more. Therefore, it ranks higher and gets more traffic.

Again, the data tells a different story.

If you look at the graph above again, you'll notice that it's clipped at the 2,000 word mark. That's because we found a moderate negative correlation between word count and organic traffic for posts that are over 2,000 words. In other words, on average, a 10,000-word post gets less search traffic than a 2,000-word post.

It's certainly possible that Google favours content of less than 2000 words, but we find this argument untenable. It makes no sense to penalise posts for being too long.

Firstly, there is a positive correlation between word count (under 1000 words) and links. We already know that. And we know that links are important for ranking.

Secondly, longer content is usually more detailed and covers more subtopics. Therefore, longer content is more likely to rank for long-tail keywords.

What should you do?

Instead of writing about everything so you don't miss anything important, start by finding what exactly is most important. This way you can make your posts concise. You'll talk about the important stuff and discard the unimportant stuff.

This is simply done by running your eyes over the pages in the top looking for something in common.

The very fact that several pages in the top are talking about the same things suggests that these are most likely the most important points.

You can also do an analysis of missing semantics and find common keywords that several pages from the top are ranking for. Then run your eyes through the report looking for subtopics and important points.

Don't think about length. Focus on covering all relevant subtopics and talking about them as succinctly as possible.

Why should posts be as concise as possible?

Besides the fact that data shows that the average blog post gets fewer links and less traffic after a certain word count, are there other reasons why you should make your posts as succinct and concise as possible?

Yes, because no one will want to read more than they need to.

It may take more than 1,750 words to cover some topics in enough detail.

However, even though there is more material, you should still aim to keep water out of your text as much as possible.

AVSEO advises against chasing the word count. Instead, focus on creating short but concise posts that engage the reader and follow SEO best practices.