Content By Numbers

Just how long is too long when in comes to web writing?

It can be hard to tell when you've written just enough, or totally overshot the mark.

Social Media Today  posted an article about the ideal length of various forms of content marketing. From Tweets to presentations and everything in between, they covered - in detail - just how long (or short!) your verbiage should be.

And, get this, it's backed by data! Actual, scientifically proven data!

It's an April miracle.

The article was a long one, so here I've boiled down a bit of what they found:

1) Multiple sources (including Twitter itself) reports that tweets get the most retweets when they hit around the 100 character mark.
So don't go pushing the limits of your 140 character max, but don't sell yourself short either.

2) Facebook posts should be 80 characters or fewer for 66% higher engagement - around 40 characters if you're playing in Hard Mode (and want 86% higher engagement)!
It can be hard to keep posts concise yet still convey the full message you're trying to share, but even in the land of unlimited characters, shorter is definitely sweeter.

3) Email subject lines incur both the highest open rate AND the highest click-through at 28-39 characters, which amounts to just a few short words.
You only get a few words and precious little time to catch a recipient's attention as they sift through their email inbox. Use your subject line wisely!

4) Surprisingly, the ideal blog post length is a whopping 1,600 words, or 7 minutes of reading! According to Medium's own data, anyway.
This seems mighty long, but the trick is in the writing itself. Anyone can blather on for a few thousand words, but having enough real detail and keeping attention for 7 minutes requires skill and knowledge.

Of course, there are always exceptions to the rule, but the key is in delivering quality content that people want. If you're providing something of value - and demonstrate it clearly (whether it's hard-hitting info or a funny gif of kittens), you're sure to score with your audience.

The balance between succinct, concise writing and delivering adequate detail and sentiment is a difficult one to strike. But when you find it, you've struck gold!



As Mark Twain once said,

“I didn't have time to write a short letter,
so I wrote a long one instead.”