How Important is the Word Length of a Post Anyway?

byRGFraser84

443 followers

10 years ago

So, I woke up this morning with the intentions of completing my "low hanging fruit" post from Training 2, and I did start it. What I'm struggling with is the amount of information I should include in this particular post. I've been on the live chat and several times, other members have stated that I should be looking to keep my posts at around a minimum of 1000 words, but what do you do when this particular "low hanging fruit" topic just doesn't really warrant 1000 words? I'm torn. I know that I want to keep my readers engaged, but at the same time, overwhelming them with senseless chatter isn't going to do any good either, and in fact, personally, when I get on a page that's filled with BS, just for the sake of providing filler content, it turns me off and I'm likely to not return to that site again. I was thinking, that instead of shooting for the "1000 word mark", I would just write what I feel is sufficient, add in some visual aides, and then end with a question, to encourage and possibly engage my audience into partaking in the post, and thus, coming back for more. Besides, some topics don't really need a lot of "discussion" on the part of the author, do they? Sometimes, the point of the post is just to draw people in so they can see the other content associated with your site, is it not? So, do we really need this "1000 word mark" anyway? If my intent is to draw people in, to get site traffic, and people in general, aren't quite as into reading as we used to be, and in fact, just want to cut to the chase, or get to the point, not beat around the bush, then why worry so much about the word count over the actual content itself? Of course some posts will be longer than others, but if every post, and every page, is long winded when it could just be direct, then don't you risk losing your audience by worrying about numbers instead of actual content?