It probably is. But when I write here, I say what I have to say, then wrap it up. So if I have a lot to say, and the blog post is around 500 words, fabulous. But if I said everything that I had to say on a topic and I see that I wrote 200 words, I don’t worry about it too much. Google is smart. I figure, the algorithm will figure out this is a legit blog, even if it has many short blog posts.
Generally speaking, long, keyword-rich blog posts and articles are great for SEO. Search engines love text, they thrive on it, and if you can offer them quality, keyword-rich, varied text, you should be rewarded for your efforts.
After the recent change to the Google algorithm, this is truer than ever. The Google search engine now attempts to reward high-quality sites with better rankings, and drop “content farms” – sites who produce large amounts of low-quality content – to lower positions.
But I still don’t think we should focus on number of words. Seth Godin’s blog is of course the best example – most of his blog posts are extremely short, and yet Google loves his blog, as does everyone else. Of course, in his case, his ultra short content is very high quality, and – more importantly – generates backlinks that point back at his site. No one knows for sure, but it’s safe to assume that Google is the search engine that places the most value on backlinks and on a site’s reputation.
Back to the original question: I wouldn’t necessarily say that short blog posts are bad for SEO. Low-quality posts are. But if you write high-quality content, especially if that content generates links back to your site, I don’t think you should obsess too much about the length of your blog posts.
I'm Vered, a blogger for hire and social media consultant. I create and implement social media campaigns for my clients, with the goals of increasing brand awareness and loyalty, improving search engine rankings and driving targeted traffic to my clients' websites.
