SEO Strategy Guide: How Long Should Your SEO Blog Post Be?
Marketers and business owners are often unsure how long a blog post should be for SEO. If the post is too long, you may fear your audience won’t read it. If your post is too short, you may be worried that it isn’t substantial enough to rank.
Does Google want a specific word count or range? Or does it depend on the particular keyword, topic, or competitive landscape?
One thing is true: the length of the post will impact how well you rank. So, determining how long it should be is critical for SEO performance.
This article will discuss why blog post length even matters for ranking.
We’ll also discuss:
How SEO-focused blog posts differ from others.
The skyscraper technique and how it can help determine the length.
Other factors in determining the ideal SEO blog post length.
Balancing length with other factors
By the end of this article, you should thoroughly understand how SEO-focused blog posts differ from others. You should also understand the importance of content length and how to create comprehensive SEO blog posts that perform well.
Why Does Blog Post Length Matter for SEO?
You might know that SEO is about targeting keywords. But SEO goes way beyond this starting point. You must provide your users with comprehensive, valuable, and well-researched content that addresses their search intent.
Creating long blog posts for their own sake is meaningless and unhelpful. There is no magical minimum word count you need to exceed. What you want to do, however, is provide the best answer to a particular query. You want to create the most helpful content for that keyword.
In some cases, that may involve short-form blog posts. But often, the best content will require a longer post. How long it should be depends on what is necessary to cover the article's topic thoroughly.
In digital marketing, different types of blog posts have different goals. SEO blog posts are one particular type of blog post. Their goal is to improve your website’s search rankings. This should lead to increased traffic, leads, and sales.
Thoroughly covering your topic is essential to ranking well. When writing for SEO, search crawlers are part of your ideal audience. You must satisfy what Google’s algorithm is looking for in addition to your human readers. The assumption is that your audience and search bots want comprehensive, thorough content on what they are searching Google for.
That’s why you should provide it to them.
How SEO Blog Posts Differ from Other Types of Posts
Not all blog posts are created with SEO in mind. Understanding the key differences between SEO-focused and other types of posts is essential. Some blog posts aim primarily to inform, entertain, or otherwise engage your readers.
SEO blog posts are primarily designed to attract organic search traffic. They do this by meeting:
the audience's needs
search engine requirements
SEO blog posts target specific keywords, entities, or topics. And they are optimized to fulfill search intent. They are crafted to capture organic traffic, improve Google SERP visibility, and drive conversions originating from organic search.
Other blog posts may focus on brand-building, engagement, or storytelling. Examples include personal essays, thought leadership or opinion pieces, or brand announcements and news.
In SEO posts, we research keywords based on search volume, competition, ranking difficulty, and relevance. This ensures that the blog post aligns with the terms users seek.
For non-SEO posts, keyword research is typically not a priority. The content is often crafted more freely. It may focus on an author’s voice or message without considering how it will rank for particular searches.
What the Research Says About Ideal SEO Blog Post Length
Marketers have conducted some studies on how long SEO blog posts should be to perform. Recently, Wix found that the ideal blog post length is between 1,500 and 2,500 words. The sweet spot was 2,450 words. In my decade-long experience in the SEO industry, this is about right on average.
An older study from HubSpot in 2021 showed that for SEO, the ideal blog post length is between 2,100 and 2,400 words. They determined this by averaging their 50-most-read blog posts of 2019. Those yielded an average word count of 2,330 words. While individual posts ranged from 333 to 5,581 words, the median post had 2,164 words.
Another study by Backlinko found that the average Google page one result contains 1,447 words. This result is shorter than the other two studies found. But, one should remember that results lower down on page one may have lower word counts than those that rank up top.
The Skyscraper Technique
One longtime effective SEO strategy is the Skyscraper Technique. Developed by Brian Dean of Backlinko, this approach focuses on creating more comprehensive, valuable, and better content than your competitors.
Here’s how it works:
Find high-performing content in your niche or for your target keywords. You can use SEO tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, or BuzzSumo to identify high-performing articles.
Create even better content by adding more value. This can involve:
Covering the topic more thoroughly.
Including recent data or original research
Improving design or UX (e.g., better visuals, better structure)
Promote your content to the right audience.
To make your content more valuable, you may have to go further in-depth than the competition. This often means writing longer blog posts. You may cover every topic aspect, providing readers with a one-stop resource.
Here’s how blog post length plays a role:
Thoroughness and Depth
Longer content allows you to explore topics in greater detail. This makes your post more informative than your competitors. You might turn a 1,500-word blog post into a 2,500-word article by adding valuable examples, data, and actionable advice.
Covering Multiple Subtopics
Address related subtopics. This helps you rank for multiple associated keywords. For instance, if a competitor’s post is focused on "content marketing strategies," yours could include sub-sections on SEO, social media, and email marketing strategies.
Improved User Engagement
More in-depth content tends to keep readers engaged longer. Increasing blog length helps increase dwell time. This metric can signal to Google that your content is valuable. This will improve rankings.
More Shareable and Linkable Content
Providing maximum value in your post gives readers something more shareable and worth linking to. This means crafting content that is likely to earn backlinks from authoritative websites, boosting SEO.
Determining How Long Your SEO Blog Post Should Be
You’re likely balancing an SEO strategy with other KPIs. These may include engagement and conversion rates. This can influence the length of your content.
Your content will also differ depending on which part of the marketing funnel you focus on. For top-of-funnel content, consider longer, informative posts that educate potential leads. For bottom-of-funnel content, you can perhaps create shorter-form content that focuses on brand keywords or those with stronger buyer intent. This may help with conversion rates.
Highly technical industries or B2B sectors may benefit from more in-depth content. Meanwhile, B2C audiences might prefer shorter, snappier posts.
One way to decide how long your blog post should be is to watch your competitors. Don’t get outranked because your content is too thin. If you see that the top-ranking blog post has a large word count, your content may not be comprehensive enough.
Length isn’t everything. Experiment with different word counts and track performance over time. As I like to say, ABT, “Always Be Testing.” While SEO blog posts often need length to rank, there are keywords where shorter pieces might outperform. SEO consultants should provide clients with custom recommendations based on their research and tests.
While blog posts between 1,500 - 2,500 words tend to perform better for SEO, they must also be informative and engaging. Quality should never be sacrificed just to hit a word count. While SEO content often minimizes voice and tone, you must still write engaging pieces. These must be clear and concise, well structured, and free of spelling and grammatical mistakes.
How Long Should Your SEO Blog Post Be? It Depends!
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer to the ideal SEO blog post length. However, if you aim for an average of 1,500–2,500 words, you’re probably in the right zone. The key is to combine thoroughness with high-quality writing that answers your audience’s query.
By focusing on the right length for the right audience and query, you can deliver content that drives traffic, ranks well, and achieves your business or client goals.