In Business Blog Writing Does The Length Of The Blog Post Really Matter?

Is the length of a blog article related to its quality?

Freelance blog writing is not as simple as posting to Facebook or other social media.  Successful
business blogging takes planning and the time and patience to deliver quality content to your target audience.  There is a lot of discussion on the right length of a good blog post, but in business blog writing, does the length of the blog post really matter?

Examples Of Blog Elements In Business Blog Writing

 

Let’s look at five elements of a quality blog article and hypothetically assign a word count to each element:

• Title/Heading:  8 words

• Introduction:  80 words

• Conclusion:  75 words

• Call to Action: 70 words

In this example, your article is already 233 words in length and you haven’t written the body of the article yet.  Let’s assume that the body of your article will contain three paragraphs of 75 words each; that would make your entire article 458 words, plus the by-line. This might be sufficient for non-technical articles, but the important thing is – is it long enough to get the job done?

Good Business Blog Writing Demands Quality Not Necessarily Words

 

Many blog writers make the mistake of inserting a lot of “fluff” just to make the post longer.  There is no reason to say – “The night gave me the intense feeling of being at the depths of a turbulent sea.” when you could simply say – “It was dark.”  Your sentences should be short and your paragraphs should be no more than four or five lines each.

Successful Business Blog Writing Requires Good On-Page SEO

 

It is not necessary to be an SEO expert to be a quality business blog writer.  That being said, it is important to keep basic SEO techniques in mind as you craft your article. If you are targeting specific keywords or phrases, you must let the search engines know that this is what you’re trying to do.
You must not make your article sound artificial by writing just for the sake of inserting keywords and you must not stuff so many keywords into your article that the search engines only see “spam”.  A good sprinkle of keywords should be included in the different elements of your blog article:

• Heading/Title 

• Introduction (First Paragraph)

• Article Body

• Conclusion

• By-Line

If you write your article in a conversational manner that is easy to read and understand, your on-page SEO will more than likely take care of itself.

Google Is Not Specific About Post Length In Business Blog Writing

 

It appears that Google doesn’t like longer blog articles simply because they are longer, but because longer posts are what people like and link to more frequently.  Studies conducted by SEOmoz revealed that posts between 1800 and 3000 words attracted 15 times more links than posts with less than 600 words.

In deciding whether or not your blog post is of appropriate length, just be able to answer this  question – “Have I written a blog article that is fresh, relevant, informative, search engine friendly, and one people will want to read?”  If the answer is “Yes”, go for it; if not, fix it.

To discuss ways to help freelance blog writers improve the quality of blog content, please join us at Blog Writer's Cafe.  Also, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn and Google+.

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