STOP Playing the ‘Higher Word Count’ Game in SEO

Google the search term ‘SEO case study’ and you will likely see Ahrefs’ webpage within the top 3 positions.

This single SEO case study webpage is getting ~1.6k organic visits every month.

This page has 176 words of content (only).

Google ‘Is SEO a Good Career’ and one of the top three results is this article written by Nathan Gotch.

And, guess what? This article has 535 words of content.
The above two examples highlight a point that:

Higher word count ≠ better content quality AND higher ranking

Obviously, there will be some niche or topic where you need detailed guides to compete.

However, the SEO mindset should match the search intent and improve content depth (not word count).

Content depth = How well you’re covering a topic (maybe answering all relevant questions, covering related subtopics in detail, adding expert insights, etc.)

So, instead of just focusing on giving writers a specific word count target, instruct them to improve content depth.

Here are some ways to do that:

• Check headings of top-ranking pages (to find what subtopics are covered)
  - Get question suggestions from Google auto-suggest and PAA
  - Get real-world problem ideas from Reddit
  - Check YouTube comments and e-commerce product reviews (if relevant to your topic)

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