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Do long form articles really work?
So I’m working at this start up as a marketing specialist and we are trying to build a blog from scratch for the company website.
My supervisor has asked me to write an article on this reaallyyyyyyyy comprehensive guide on a topic. He’s created an outline that basically covers anything and everything about the topic.
I’m assuming it’s going to be 10k+ words. However as I’m writing this I am also realizing that there is a lot of content already on the internet about what we’re writing. He has dabbled in SEO and according to him this is how you get ranked on google.
My question is, does this really work? I’m a beginner at SEO but from what I have read is quality content matters the most, that’s how you get traffic. Isn’t it?
I would appreciate any comments from people who are experienced in the subject!!
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8 Replies
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Depends on the topic. If the topic needs long-form, then yes. But, content needs to be supported with a solid website and page structure.
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Yes, but it’s not just for the amount of word. Longer post take more attention and can drive more backlinks, also it covers more keywords so it’s look like is bringing a lot of visitors.
Focus a bit on the experience when the reader lands there: put a menu so the visitors can go where they need to.
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Google says they like longer-form articles, but the real question is if your readers are going to read it. If your readers aren’t going to read it then what’s the point of putting it out.
Since your building the blog from scratch you can do either (put out long-form or short-form articles). It really just depends on how often content is going to come out (it’s really hard to put out a long-form content every day) and the quality of the content (if it’s bad quality nobody is going to read it).
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> quality content matters the most
Bingo.
When it comes to blogging just be aware it’s a marathon, not a sprint.
I’m sure over time you can come up with short and long-form content for the subject matter.
Don’t think of a page or a post as just a page, think of it as part of an ecosystem for ranking keywords. You’ll link this post or page to another piece of content – maybe multiple related pieces, creating your own rabbit holes.
You can have a long form guide for people who read in depth articles, you could also create a video series and post them in separate articles, you can create short form articles and then stick them in a series. Link them all together. Have a pillar page (long form, usually part of the site), a landing page (short and quick, prompts action, also usually part of the site), and then as many extra-curricular supporting pages as you can (like a long from guide, and a video series).
It’s important to have a robust categorization/URL structure to handle all of the various content types and filters. The more control you give users over finding content on-site, the more you keep them there.
You can build autoloading features into the website to handle navigating pages, display a related entries section, and/or just good old fashioned pagination – the reaction to these formats is mixed and you might want to A/B test once you have solid traffic to determine which your users prefer.
A single long form article vs. a single short form article is not the way to look at this. You have an entire website to leverage, and the blog should naturally fill with all kinds of different content over time.
There is no way to rush this process if you’re looking to capture organic search traffic for high volume keywords.
You can try to prompt a viral response on social media platforms, but that’s kinds of like the ‘I’m moving to LA to become an actor’ approach. Still – it’s worth some effort in that regard because you just never know who will see/share it. The biggest fires can start from the smallest sparks.
I think setting reasonable and loose expectations is really important for you guys at this stage because if you’re expecting one thing and you get something entirely different it can cause issues in other areas of the business.
Digital marketing is not a silver bullet, but it can be a highly effective ROI strategy. It’s standard for a company to put 8 – 12 points of annual revenue towards marketing. Your company has to determine how much of those resources, from that slice of the pie, should go towards the SEO and content marketing segments. Depending on the product or service it may be worth putting a large portion towards it, but in also may not! It’s definitely worth a discussion or 3.
Once you have a plan, target low-hanging fruit – determine which content marketing activities will take the least amount of time and get them done ASAP. For example say you want to have at least 2 topics covered, giving you 2 long form pieces, plus 3 smaller supporting articles each, giving you 8 pieces of content to promote and launch with. Start writing! You can scale this to the capabilities of your company. Important to note, dropping a “bomb” of content on a new site isn’t natural to Google, and it’ll take a while to scan and index a ton of content anyways, slow (but not too slow!) and steady wins the race.
Good luck with your blog and startup!
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Sure long form work, but short ones also can. I rank 1-3 on 3 posts/pages with less than 200 words per page.
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Quality and structure matter most. A lot of people will quickly regurgitate “quality” but it really does go beyond that. Great quality is advice anyone could give to somebody, but people who have ranked for difficult keywords and converted would say a lot about structure and intent.
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Some people consider articles longer than 700 words to be long-form, whereas others think that … can provide a solid example of how large-scale data analysis can actually be used
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The first might say that *long*-*form* content is a gamble, given audiences’ supposedly miniscule attention spans. The other might say that producing longer *articles* is an excellent way to engage with readers and offer them genuine value and a rewarding experience.
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