The word count dilemma has long been circling the minds and heated up discussions in the SEO world. Here I am sharing a lot more than a personal opinion based on my experience, I am combining it with statistics, and common logic. Even if you decide to hire professional website content writers, you still need to know what the word count fuss is all about.
The Perfect Word Count Is Not a Number
It is not a myth either.
If this was a Depeche Mode song, it would probably go like this “Words are very unnecessary, they can only do harm” when describing the word count dilemma (that’s a great song, by the way). And while some studies show that the average first page Google result contains around 1900 words on average, the question is not in the number itself, but rather what stands behind it. If you stretch out a 1000-word blog into a 2500-word piece and fill it with tons of keywords because of (SEO) reasons, you will have indeed achieved two things: loss of reader interest, a.k.a. poor user experience and Google deciding you’re just another spammer and there goes ranking.
Google Cares About One Thing Only
Reaching an x amount of words won’t automatically boost your ranking and have it high above your competition. It is often the case that shorter content outperforms longer copies. Many website content writers would disagree to this but trust me here… Google only cares about satisfying users and providing the best possible answers to their search queries. Those answers are not necessarily the wordiest ones. If your content does not provide meaningful information or a solution to a problem, you can kiss high ranking goodbye.
Spammy, Low-Quality Content Leads to Higher Bounce Rates
Wow, back up a little bit. What is a bounce rate? It is the percentage of visitors that leave your website after viewing just a single page of it. High bounce rates mean people “bounce” right after seeing your landing page because they are not interested in learning more about you. If they don’t learn more about you, they can’t buy your product or service. Mission failed.
However, if you only publish quality content with well-structured, unique information about your offering on your site (especially your landing pages) and don’t forget to include testimonials in your product pages and quotes from verified sources in your blogs, you will succeed. You will engage users and persuade them to do business with you. Mission accomplished.
The Bottom Line
Only worry about having unique, to the point content on your site. Don’t aim for a specific number. More importantly, don’t pour a rain of keywords and adjectives over your copy when push comes to shove and you’re short on words. No one needs that. Your readers will find your copy off-putting, leave your site, and your Google ranking won’t improve. If you are posting tons of words on a page to get ahead of the competition, it can come back and bite you. If you have a hard time dealing with it all, consider hiring a website content writer or even a professional writing agency.
I would love your feedback, questions, and ideas. Let’s start a discussion in the comment section below!
