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When it comes to online content, there’s one constant: the rules are always changing.

With every Internet enhancement, media advancement and social platform update, the type of content consumers use (and search algorithms prefer) shifts a bit. One day it’s keyword-stuffed brevity, next it’s long-form relevance. One day it’s tweets and pins, next day it’s video and AR.

For marketers trying to maximize content marketing results, it can be tough to pin down which content methods score highest when the goalposts keep moving.

The long and short of content marketing
One area of controversy is how much the length of content plays a factor in SEO. Note we didn’t say “whether” it plays a factor: that data shows it does. But how long or short your content should be doesn’t just come down to word count. There are a lot of variables at play: who is your audience? What type of content do they prefer? How much info is actually necessary to communicate your message?

Focusing exclusively on fitting to ideal length of content at the expense of relevance and clarity is not a recipe for success. No matter how long your content is, it must provide users with what they’re looking for—answers, advice, information, entertainment—without unnecessarily wasting their time.

Content counts
With that disclaimer out of the way, there’s no doubt that search engines and users DO have preferences when it comes to content length. It can’t hurt to keep performance results at your fingertips when creating your content. Just remember, good content will beat bad content every time—no matter how many words you use.

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