451 words
That is a question I find myself thinking about for some time now. I do enjoy blogging but writing and reading other blogs are two different things in my mind. I type my posts out in Word and usually I fill ¾ of a page, title included, standard spacing. It comes down to 700 words per post. I add a picture and heading and boom … what I usually end up with is quite a lengthy post. I would call it a ‘medium’, not a small or a large one.
When I started blogging, I was contacted by other bloggers who sell courses on how to blog and how to grow your blog and off course, how to earn money with it. The length of a post was discussed quite often as I remember well. I also read that Google likes it when you publish lengthy posts, 2000+ words. It would be good for their crawling machines. So there were pros for shorter but definitely also for longer posts.
What does my reality say?
My friend Mr Bump, likes to write shorter posts. Shorter than mine, I don’t remember his desired amount of words, I guess it was around the 300. I find his posts just the right length to read. My friend Ashley from MentalHealth@Home publishes every day but her posts are also not that lengthy. Just right for my attention span. I also enjoy reading posts from Don’t Lose Hope, always short and to the point. I would love to read longer posts but can’t always find the energy.
As you see here, I myself write longer posts. But as my concentration is out of the window due to mental illness, I enjoy shorter posts to read myself on a daily basis. I have a blogging friend, Ceridwensilverheart, who publishes more lengthy posts. But she doesn’t publish that often and mostly in the weekends. When I see her post popping up in my reader, I know that it’s time to lean back and to take the time to be endorsed in the world of strange creatures. Just check her blog out, if I made you curious enough.
I guess I could conclude that a certain style or some predictability is in place with blogging. As a creature of habit, I like to know what to expect so I can adapt accordingly.
What are your thoughts about the length of a post? Do you prefer shorter or longer posts or maybe it doesn’t matter to you at all as long as the content is interesting. Do you read other blogs daily or just once in a while? How do find the fine line between writing, reading and commenting? Let me know in the comments!
Food.for.Thoughts 
My stats say my average so far this year is 677; last year it was 500-something. I usually just write what comes out. If it’s below 400 words, I’ll usually add a bit more. I don’t have 2000 (or even 1000) words to say about anything on a regular basis. In terms of reading, anything over 1000ish words becomes pretty hard to read.
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For me your posts are just about right in length (and of course in content too). I know they vary in length but they are never too long.
I don’t know what would be my max of words but I find myself starting to read enthusiastic but I can’t concentrate long enough to read a whole, longer post.
Thanks for commenting!
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I myself feel that I lose concentration while reading post longer than 500 words. So I try to limit my post within 500 words too.
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That is vary valuable input, thank you! 500 seems like short and sweet. One can say a lot in 500 words.
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My posts do tend to be quite long (850-1500 words usually) and while I try to keep them as short as possible (because I know how hard it is to read long posts), my mind won’t stop until I’ve properly explained my idea. I think shorter posts are more popular because they make quick, satisfying reads.
I think it depends on the subject, and your aim with what you’re writing. Some posts just have a particular amount of information to share, or maybe your aim isn’t to get views but to just express yourself. So there seems to be no structured algorithm for how one can approach this – it just depends on what you’re going for!
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That is so, it depends on how it rolls on onto the screen 🙂
Thanks for sharing your view and word count of your posts. It’s interesting to know.
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Yup. My current average is just short of 300, but ideally, I’d like posts to be even shorter. One of the reasons I have taken to poetry is that it also makes for a short post.
The longer I blogged, I just became better at editing. If we, as writers, cannot be bothered to take all the unnecessary words out of our posts, then why should we expect people to bother to read all those unnecessary words?
Note that I could easily justify a 2,000 word post, as long as all 2,000 of those words were necessary to convey the desired sentiment.
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Hmm, I think my posts are all over the place in length, and I had no idea that WP had a word count counter. I’ll have to find it. I tend to prefer short-ish posts, depending on the topic. Problem is that I’ve been so tired that making my own posts consistent is not going very well, at the moment, so shorter is better.
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When you work on a post, there is an ‘i’ in a circle at the left upper side. Click that one and it will show you the structure of your post and the amount of words you’ve typed.
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Oh! Cool, thanks!
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Welcome!
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😶
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😂😂😂
Yours are always good!
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I’m someone who is of the belief that if someone is interested in what you’re sharing, they’re going to be interested in it whether it’s 200 words, 2,000 words or 20,000 words. From an SEO perspective, I could be way off but I think the value of the content matters more than the length. I post both short and long posts to my blog. I will say that the short posts are found via search engines.
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Thanks for your input! I think a mix of short and longer posts can be very interesting too.
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I’ve seen suggestions both ways on posting length. Like you, I read that Google likes longer posts, but I’ve also seen lots of advice that human readers prefer shorter posts. And I can understand that. I follow a fair number of blogs and if they were all super long, I’d never be able to keep up with them. I do tend to write longer (thanks for the shout-out, by the way!), and that’s one reason I don’t post as often. I figure people probably need a break between posts when they’re that long. 😅
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For me your longer posts are like a treat, like a piece of cake that I eat in the weekend. When I would eat cake everyday, it wouldn’t taste as good 🙂
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Aw, thanks! 😊
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I can’t seem to stop myself so sometimes just type out freely and the. Try to cut it into segments of 1000-1500 words (ish), this is as much for my own ability to re-read my own blog though!
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I’ve been wondering the same thing, I prefer shorter posts but I suppose as long as the article is good quality, the length isn’t much of an issue. Interesting read, defo food for thought!
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