proper length of a good article

There's a reason why journalists thrive in the online writing world. Writing for the paper is the same as writing non-scholarly articles for the Internet. All the same principles apply. In fact, journalism is where all these little tidbits, like short attention spans, scanning, key points, piece-based writing and so forth came from.

 

Again, you prove why I don't think we were given enough information to answer the original question correctly.

Just taking a few phrases from your reply:

• The attention span of youth
• depending on who your audience is
• people tend to be looking for more specific information
• unless you're targeting a specific audience that's more likely to read more content in one sitting (such as a business or medical professional who has an interest in reading through an entire study or report on a subject)

Any one of those can greatly impact what makes an article effective or "good". The original question mentioned neither intended audience or topic.

Actually my point, was good writing depends more upon the writing than the length; and I believe the comparison is a fair one. Again, the original poster did not clarify what type of content they were talking about.

Perhaps I should have used the more web-related example of Stephen King's book he serialized on the net? Did the scrolling and length deter folks from reading the story? Your own reply answered that - No, it was appropriate to the audience.

I've read quite a few blog entries that were quite informative and very-well written that were only a few sentences long; and others that went on for several screens that were just as compelling. Neither one was better than the other as they both conveyed information that was useful and readable.

There's also the long-running debate on the long sales-letter as a website. There are many who would argue that they are quite effective, yet they require the reader to scroll through numerous screens. Who's right? Again, it depends on the targeted audience.

That said, I think my point as well as MarketJunction's is that length alone is a horrible yard stick to use when determining what makes "good" writing; even if it is for the web.

My intended point, and one your own reply would confirm, is that what makes writing good or effective is totally dependent upon the topic and audience - neither of which we were given when the original question was asked.

 

I don't want to be overly argumentative, because I think if anything we actually agree on the fundamental of "good" writing. But the original post wasn't asking about quality. Simply a quantity:

"what do you think is a good length for an article? is it different for submitting an/or posting to your site?"

Also, it's obvious they're talking about Web content here as they're asking about posting it to their site. It sounds as though they're simply looking for a general rule for Web writing, which is something I think they've already gotten a few good answers for and plenty of feedback on. As we've both established already, other factors do come into play. But at the same time, there are certainly more general rules as to length on the Web that apply, and by the general consensus here between most of us w/in a set range, and coming from experience from major content networks to bloggers to our own sites, I think we've all already given the original poster what they wanted... as estimate and something to work from.

Jenn

 

This is one of those differences between web content and writing for a magazine or periodical. Typically magazines want close to 4000 words. If you put that much on a web page, you won't get many visitors that read it.

Most of my clients want articles between 700 to 1000 words. This is a good length for most subjects that need to be covered further than surface scratching. It also gives you room to bring the reader into the article.

The articles I write for d-a-l.com for example are usually about this long. Sometimes they go longer for subjects that have a lot of ground to cover.

Shorter articles, such as the 400-600 word variety are generally requested by someone that has read an SEO book. They believe that the search engines require at least 400-600 words on a page and don't want to pay for more than is necessary to achieve the goal of search engine indexing. They are not concerned with (on the whole) the topic being covered well, or the article being worth reading. I'm not suggesting this is wrong or bad, it just is.

For web copy, focused on the "worth reading" goal, I would suggest that if your article breaches the 1000 word mark, you go through it (after you are done), and see if you can re-write/edit/clean up the article so that it becomes shorter, but retains the message. This is good practice with any article, but especially for web content.

Some questions you might ask are:

"Do I need this whole paragraph, or can I just link to another article which explains that topic more fully",

"Am I putting too much into this article, when breaking it into two or three would be better.",

"is this joke really necessary, does it add to the message, or distract from the message",

"is everything in this article focused on the goal of this article"

Web content has a specific goal (another reason for the shorter length of the articles). This is caused by the readers. Readers of magazines and periodicals are "generally" interested in the large category their magazine or periodical covers. Readers of web pages are specifically interested in a couple of key areas.

Readers of a Hunting magazine are interested in Hunting, as a sport, as a supplemental food supply, as a gun enthusiast, as a survivalist, as a 'manly' thing.. etc. The reader is okay with just about anything, as long as it as to do with Hunting.

Readers interested in Hunting on the web however are asking a specific question and want the article they find to answer that question quickly. They don't want to wade through 4000 words in the hopes that the article eventually addresses the question they are interested in.

Hope this helps.

Glenn Hefley

 

Mine bet would be between 300 and 4000 . I really don't care about words (sometimes I do), it is the message that counts.

p.l.u.r.

 

Magazines don't want 4,000 word articles much. Those are features. Many want short 100 word sidebars, 300-500 word fillers and so forth. Pick up any good magazine and see how many pieces it has. Features are a small fraction.