Does Longer Content Rank Better?

by 19 replies
22
Hello
I've heard that longer content ranks better but I am not sure if this is a reality or just a myth.

A lot of my sites have articles that are about 400 words, but I am curious if I beef them up to 800 words if G will like them a lot better?

Any case studies?
#search engine optimization #content #longer #rank
  • Longer content has the ability to be ranked for long tail keywords for the mere fact its longer and many will be lower competition. As for it being ranked better for targeted keywords no. That boils down to relevance and web backlinks.
    • [1] reply
    • The purpose of one's website content should be based on readers purpose as google does see the matter of your website but largely makes its decision on the inbound linking part and your recent work.
  • Yes, averaging longer articles on your site is one of the "quality factors" that google looks at, although it is not in the top 10 most important factors. Going back and adding content will increase another quality factor though: how often pages are changed. Just by revising and adding to your existing articles you'll see a boost, whether or not you make a specific word count.
  • If the longer content have good quality and more information I think it will be rank better.
    Try to think about your visitor, create good content about what your visitor search and google will rank you better.
  • Yes longer content ranks for many keywords(if you have them in your article) which will bring more traffic.
  • Longer content = more long tail keywords. If you can try keep every article at 1,000 words.

    You will soon noticed random long tail targeted visitors coming
    • [1] reply
    • You must have to need fresh, unique and better quality with the longer content to better rank on SERP.
  • Banned
    Longer content has nothing to do with ranking a keyword.

    It's not even a myth, it's just people either posting BS on the forums just to get a sig. backlink or they don't have a clue about SEO.

    Surrounding text matters, but to create a bunch of text just because you can is ridiculous.

    If having more text than competition was an SEO factor (it's not), I would be creating 10,000 word pages. Instead I rank pages with very little text (been doing it for years) because my traffic doesn't care about text, a short description for my pages is more than enough.

    Some of you guys should step outside of WF, I think a few get tunnel vision.
    • [1] reply
    • Disagree. Check out the long-form articles that CPA/physical product affiliates make on Squidoo. They are regularly 5000+ words, and they do a phenomenal job out ranking comparable DA sites.
      • [1] reply
  • If longer content equaled better ranking for targetted keywords every spammer on the web would be writing tens of thousands of pages of spun content.

    Longer content just creates the potential for more longtail low competition keywords you werent targeting at all, period.
  • This debate has been going on for a long time.

    There are those women that say the size of your content does matter and makes a big (no pun intended) difference. Other women maintain it is not the size of your content, but how you use your content that really matters.

    All I know is I have never heard any complaints about the size of my content.
  • Banned
    For you guys that think the amount of text on a page has anything to do with SEO (it doesn't) for ranking a keyword, here you go.

    Keyword: car insurance



    As you can see Progressive only has 550 words (including anchor-text) on the #1 ranked position in Google SERPs.

    Wikipedia has 5703 words & ranking at the bottom of the 1st SERP page (position #10).

    I'm sure there's probably a million more examples in Google SERPs.

    Again, longer content has nothing to do with ranking a keyword.
  • Banned
    [DELETED]
  • Longer content helps capture tons of long tail variations. No one really knows if it has any other benefits as far as SERPs go. But it definitely helps when aiming for dozens of keywords/page.

    Basically, it all comes down to what you want to do with a page, lol. Oh well.
  • The only benefit I can see is if the content is really good the long tails will back link to it raising its value more and more for more competitive keywords over time. Even that comes down to quality of content though, the long tails just sped up the process. Same could occur on a short oarticle but probable far less likely
    • [1] reply
    • In general it is good to have articles that are over 400 words long. If you write longer posts and provide compelling information, the chances of ranking for your targeted keywords increase. It depends on how much value your content provides.
  • I see it as if the content is good quality iy doesnt matter how long it is.....

    However the age old saying of the more you tell the more you sell stands very strong with my sites and I try and get 1000 words on each page but only if it warrants having that much.

    lots of factors come into play when it comes to on page seo especially since panda and penguin....

    tryvand keep in mind about user experience and if the page answers what the user was looking for...

    Danny


  • Content should not be large enough,Google is keep on saying from starting and in every update.Keep the content qualitative not quantitative.
  • Its not just the length but its the quality and good placing of keywords that makes a content to rank better...combination of quality and quantity
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