The Ideal Blog Post Length for SEO—According to Experts
April’s SEO Fact of the Month comes to us from one of the leading experts in the SEO industry, Backlinko. As a side note—yes, believe it or not, SEO is an entire industry in itself. And much like a weed, it’s growing every day.
If you’re new to the digital marketing world, SEO is all about the strategies you use to get your web pages to rank higher on search engines. Because the higher you rank, the more visitors you’ll get to your website… and the more sales you’ll close. I explain SEO and why it matters more in this blog. If you’re looking to build some background knowledge, you’ll want to start there.
Let’s Talk Blog Post Length
On to the good stuff! Spoiler alert—you’re about to read a whole lot about numbers. Put your math cap on. Did you hear the fourth-grade teacher inside me just jump out?
The SEO tidbit I’m sharing today is the best blog post length in 2022 according to the experts. But let’s get one thing clear before I throw out some numbers—as you might have expected, the jury’s out. And it probably always will be. So I compiled what some SEO and blogging giants had to say on the issue. Even though they have different ideas on the optimum blog length, they each have solid reasoning. Take this into account when deciding how long your blogs should be.
Backlinko’s Blog Post Length Study
Backlinko did a study of over 11 million Google Search results. They wanted to find out what helps a website land on the first page of results compared to its competition. Here’s what they found…
The average word count of pages in the top ten results is 1,447 words.
In other words, high-ranking blogs have an average length of 1,400-1,500 words. What does Backlinko credit as the reason why longer content ranks higher on Google?
Backlinks, of course.
A backlink is a link from another website that refers readers to yours. For example, I backlinked to Backlinko’s study in the first paragraph of this section. The more backlinks that lead to your website, the more Google trusts you as the authority in your industry.
Here’s Backlinko’s reasoning: longer content has more information, so it’s more likely that someone else will use it as a reference (and backlink to you). But this doesn’t mean you should write everything you know about X in one blog post, hoping someone will reference it. Relevant content beats backlinks any day, and if your blog isn’t relevant to your readers—they’ll stop reading.
Other Opinions About Ideal Blog Post Length
According to Yoast, your blogs should be at least 300 words long.
That’s much easier to achieve, right? Keep in mind that’s the bare minimum they recommend in order to rank, and they still say your blog should be at least 1000 words.
Yoast thinks longer content ranks higher because it gives Google more information. When Google crawls your site, it wants to see what it’s all about in a nutshell. That way it can rank your site for the users that will benefit most from it. Simply put, more content gives Google more clues about what your website is about.
Here’s another reason why your blog post length should be at least 1000 words—with more content, you’ll naturally use more keywords. Since keywords and keyphrases are what people type into search engines, using them wisely will lead more readers to your blog. This is not an excuse to “keyword-stuff,” though—always use them naturally. Don’t fit them in as much as you can. Google picks up on that, and they don’t like it.
Meanwhile, Wix says 2,450 words is the sweet spot.
The blog titan itself says this is the “golden” blog post length. However, this is going to be difficult for businesses in a lot of industries to achieve. A looser goal backed by Wix is writing between 1,500-2,500 words in each post. This length is still likely to give you the benefits you’re looking for—higher rankings, social media shares, and backlinks to your writing.
What’s “too short” for a blog post?
Most sources agree—300 words or less is too short. Blog posts at this length don’t rank as well on search engines. And they don’t get shared as much on social media or through backlinks. Wix says to avoid blog posts this short—they call them “thin” content—unless you have comments enabled on your website, which help drive up the word count. Here’s the problem with thin content:
It doesn’t give Google enough information to know what your blog is about, so you won’t rank as high.
It won’t be as educational for readers, so they’re less likely to share it.
Readers will be able to read or skim it quickly, which hurts your engagement data… and SEO.
With a blog so short, you’re limiting your use of headlines and keywords for SEO.
Avoid thin content. Since it generally won’t help your SEO or help you connect with your audience, it has the lowest return on investment. The money and time you spend on short blogs will most likely be a waste.
Even if you’re in an image-heavy industry, still aim for at least 1000 words. Wedding photographers with a blog can boost word count by telling the story behind the couple in their latest shoot. They can also share information about the venue and vendors, or unique moments during the wedding. Speaking of industries…
Does ideal blog post length depend on the industry you’re in?
You might have heard that different industries have different averages and requirements when it comes to SEO—that’s absolutely true. Some industries that are more technical (e.g. medical, financial, etc.) will naturally lend themselves to longer content. So you might be wondering, “What’s the right blog length for my industry?” Here’s how you can find out:
Think of 5-10 blogs in your industry that Google seems to love. Like the blogs that are always rated on the first page of search results.
Visit those blogs and check out 5-10 of their most recent blog posts. Remember that the more data you include (more blog sites and their posts), the more accurate your results will be.
Find the average word count of their most recent blog posts. To do this, copy and paste their blog into Google Docs, click “Tools,” and click, “Word count.” Next to “Words,” it will give you an exact tally of words in that blog.
Find the average number of words across different blogs. When you have an average word count for each blog site, find the average word count for your industry in general by adding them together and dividing by the number of sites you looked at.
Remember, this isn’t an exact science. The average word count you find will tell you what’s working for a handful of leaders in your industry. It doesn’t take into account how many backlinks they have, how long their page has been on Google, or other factors that play into their SEO. Use your results as a guide—not the Bible.
Don’t feel like doing the SEO word count math? I get it. Good news: if your business is in the wedding industry, I did it for you:
Here’s the average length for wedding blogs in 2022: 1,467 words
I followed the steps above and found the average length for leading wedding blogs in the United States. The average blog length for these sites ranged from 602 to 2,162 words. Overall, I found the industry average is 1,467 words… right on par with Backlinko’s average of 1,447.
What does this mean for you? You might want to think about beefing up your blog. But you don’t need to worry about pushing out new blogs fast to keep up with Google’s preferences—start by updating your old posts. Updating old blog posts has a similar effect on SEO as posting something new. It shows Google you’re still alive, well, and relevant to its users.
Get ready to blog with these Dos and Don’ts of SEO blogging…
DON’T: stuff as many keywords into your blog post as possible.
DON’T: publish a blog with a word count below 300—in that case, don’t bother!
DON’T: mistake thorough for boring—your readers should want to keep reading.
DON’T: obsess over word count and let it keep you from posting regularly. Consistency over perfection!
DO: plan out which keywords to naturally target in your blogs.
DO: aim for an appropriate blog length—at least 1,000 words. (1,500 is better!)
DO: publish thorough, educational content and copy your readers will want to share.
DO: take this research with a grain of salt and do what’s best for your blog.
Are you wondering how else you can improve your blog? Or not sure how you’ll manage to write over 1,000 words for each post? Or maybe you’re running out of ideas and feel like you’ve said all you need to say about your industry.
No matter your reason—if you’d like ideas to build a blog that brings in clients effortlessly, book a free consultation call with me. You’ll get game-changing pointers and ideas for blog topics your readers (and Google) will love. Use the button below to reserve a spot on my calendar:
