If your blog post is too short, you shouldn’t even bother writing it.
How long should a blog post be? Your blog post should be as long as they need to be, in order to be better than your competition on those particular keywords. That might be 1,000 words, or it may be 3,000 words or more. It depends on how competitive the search term is. I don’t recommend ever going below 500 words for a blog post.
In this article, I’ll explain how long I think blog posts should be to maximize your search ranking and amount of visitors that come to your site. Plus I’ll teach you how to quickly gauge your competition to get a better idea of how long your post should be.
Don’t Feel Like Reading? Check Out My Video On This Topic!
How Long Should You Make Your Blog Posts?
If you’re just writing a blog post for your own interest or as a hobby, then there’s not really any reason that your blog needs to be a certain length.
The same is true if you’re just writing a post for an existing audience that you already have.
The one caveat I’ll give is that I don’t think you should ever make your blog post less than 500 words.
If your post is only a few hundred words long there’s a high chance that Google will flag it as “flimsy content” and it will be nearly impossible for your post to rank in search results. It won’t just hurt that post, but has the risk of negatively impacting your blog or website as a whole.
Should you start a blog at all? Read my article Should You Start A Blog? to find out!
Write Your Blog Posts With A Purpose
If you’re writing a blog post or article for your website, I’m guessing there’s a specific reason for it. You want to attract people to visit your website and read your content, and maybe buy something from you as well.
In that case, I would say your blog post should be as long as it needs to be.
Kind of a cryptic answer, right? Allow me to explain.
I think the length of your blog post will largely depend on your competition and the specific keyword that you’re looking to target.
Of course, this assumes that you have some say in how long you’re making your blog post. If you’re writing for a client, they may tell you up front how long they want their article to be. In that case, you need to just respect their wishes and go with it.
Assess Your Competition
Really when you’re making a blog post, your aim should always be to make it better than your competition.
So I would start off by Googling the specific title or search term that you’re wanting to rank highly for, and then work backward from those results.
Take the top 3 or 5 pages that currently rank for the term that your blog will be about. Then copy and paste them into a Word document and see what the word count on them is, and find the average for those. I think there are also Chrome plugins where you can just right-click on a page and see the word count without the intermediary step as well.
Word count isn’t everything, but it provides a pretty good guideline for how long you will want to make your article. It speaks to generally how comprehensive and full of content a piece needs to be.
For example, with the title “How long should a blog post be?” the competition is coming in at anywhere from 1,500 to 2,500 words.
So I would try to aim for the higher end of that range, since you want to create the best and most extensive resource possible. Although personally I’m just making this particular post as and extra resource for my Youtube video and I’m not necessarily trying to get it to rank in the top results of Google.
Beating Competitor Blogs and Articles
If you’re writing your blog or article to rank on the first page of search results, the same 500 word minimum rule applies. Otherwise Google will flag your post as flimsy content, and at that point it’s not really even worth writing.
But when you’re writing to drive traffic instead of just writing a passion blog, I would actually strive for a higher minimum word count.
Personally, I don’t write any blogs or articles that are less than 1,000 words in length. Otherwise you just can’t compete, except for the absolute least competitive keywords. And even if you win a top page on Google with a 700 or 800 word blog post, it’s too easy for someone to come along and write something slightly longer to take that spot for them. You’ve got to at least make them work for it!
The Blogging Word Count Sweet Spot
Depending on who you ask, you’ll get all kinds of answers about what the ideal blog length is.
If you Google “how long should a blog post be?” right now, the snippet says 300 – 600 words, which is ridiculous in my opinion!
Other sources will give you numbers anywhere from 1,000 to 4,000 words.
Personally, I think the sweet spot is blog posts that are about 1,500 to 2,500 words in length.
If you go below 1,000 words, it’s really hard to get all of the SEO stuff into your post organically, without stuffing in keywords.
If you go over 3,500 words, you’re very likely to win the top spot. But there’s also diminishing returns for the amount of effort that you’re putting in past a certain point.
If you’re looking to win an ultra-competitive search term like “credit cards”, then maybe making an absolute beast of an article that tells the reader everything they need to know is the way to go.
But there’s also such a thing as making a post too long. Nobody wants to read a book, and at some point readers will just drop off. Or worse yet, be too intimidated by the length to even start reading.
What should your publishing schedule be? Check out my article How Many Blog Posts Should You Write Per Week or Month? for details!
Make Your Blog Posts Stand Out
Aside from word count, there are others things that you can do to add extra value to your blog posts.
Instead of just regurgitating the same obvious information that every other site is sharing, try to find some “secret tip” that really sets your post apart from everyone else and offers something unique.
You can also use other forms of media besides writing.
An infographic is a great way to summarize the main points of your post, or related statistics and information, into something more visual for your readers. Having an infographic is also far more likely to get shared on social media than just a blog post.
If you really want to stand out, you can even add calculators and other useful tools to your page. That won’t just give people information, but additional resources that might keep them coming back time and time again.
For example, if you’re writing about a fitness topic, you may include a body fat or calorie calculator built into your article if it’s relevant to the topic you’re discussing.
Conclusion
If you’re writing a blog post without any real purpose in mind, then you can make it as short or as long as you want.
But most people nowadays are writing blog posts and articles to attract readers and drive them to take some kind of action.
In that case, I think your blog post should be a minimum of 1,000 words in length. And there’s usually not much added value going over 3,500 words for all but the most competitive keywords. So the sweet spot to aim for is about 1,500 – 2,500 words.