Don't be mislead by industry averages...
Sarah McDowell
Podcast Producer & Manager. Digital Marketing Consultant & SEO Specialist. Experienced Podcaster, International Speaker, Moderator, Mentor, Coach, Book Co-Author, Awards Judge & Community Co-Founder.
Like most Fridays, I start my day watching a White Board Friday from the geniuses at Moz, whilst enjoying a lovely cup of coffee. They cover a whole lot of interesting topics related to SEO, each week focusing on one particular area or topic. The videos aren't that long either, with most lasting just shy of 10 minutes or so. If you are new to SEO or want to expand your knowledge - I would definitely recommend checking this out. A cup of coffee isn't compulsory... I will allow you to have a tea if you so wish...
This week they covered a topic that got me thinking... queue the jokes "don't hurt yourself" or "are you sure you should be doing that?"
The title of the Webinar was, 'The Perfect Blog Post Length and Publishing Frequency is B?!!$#÷x'. To give a brief overview, it basically was saying that there is no perfect blog post length or publishing frequency. Yes, there has been research done, where people have looked at a whole bunch of keywords or amount of blogs and come up with the average e.g. most blog posts that are in the top pages have over 2,500 words or pages that post 11 times a month get the higher volumes of traffic. However, this is just an average and not gospel. Google is Smart and takes a lot of other factors in, not just the amount of words a post has or how often a website posts. There have been cases where blogs rank higher with far fewer words because they have answered the users intent in a more concise way, which is better for the end user.
You also have to bare in mind other factors such as, was the traffic quality? Surely it's better to have less traffic that actually converts rather than sending anyone your way? Also, with the keywords researched, are they related to your business? Keywords in your industry may have a different average when it comes to blog length.
Similar to perfect blog lengths and frequency, there's also other averages that people follow e.g. the best amount of tweets a day, when and how often to send emails, the prime time to send a Facebook post. Again, I just don't see the value in following these as it will never be a 'one size fits all' answer. It depends on your audience and who you are trying to reach. Rather than following 'best practises', work this out for yourself and focus on the stuff that matters. With everything you do ask yourself... Am I engaging with the right people, at the right time, on the right platform?
Would love to hear your thoughts on this matter...
