Study: How Long Does It Take to Rank in Google (Answer: Too Long)

[onlineagent]

UI/UX is important, but SEO guys get caught up in a one size fits all. I think Insurance is a completely different animal as compared to other sites.

I think a lot of agencies just have a "Need a quote, great! Give me your personal info" It needs to be much more.

 

[suranceman]

There are many things that go into your overall ranking. As a software engineer who works for a carrier and spends the entire day with web design and development, SEO and rating engines, I can assure you, that there are numerous ways to improve your quality score, but it needs time, focus and investment. As a previous poster pointed out, you could by a google trusted domain, like geico.com. Rest assured, Google trusts geico.com not only because it's a multi billion dollar company but also because Geico pays Google 70 bucks for a click in some states. All that put aside, it is very possible to drive traffic to a site. I have done it to the most obscure sights you can think of. You just need the following;

1.) Targeted ad campaigns on google (very important as these are your advertising dollars and you don't want to waste them)
2.) Good quality content
3.) A qualified web developer to support your website (very important as this could make or break you)

Um what?

This thread about ranking via organic search results. Paid advertising has nothing to do with organic search. Furthermore, Google trusts Geico because it is a well established brand. Their website is old, has thousands of very high quality relevant back links to their site, has good content, and they are a real established company.


Nobody should listen to this guy if they are interested in ranking organically. He probably has experience with paid ads, but that's an entirely different animal.

 

[scagnt83]

I never understood the 1000 word minimum .. .why is that necessarily a good thing.. I do see good sites out there that post articles that WAY TOO LONG .. i'm sure they're doing it for SEO purposes .. It seems as if Google like it.. but that's not necessarily a good thing for the visitor..

I just read an article about this by Neil Patel (a big SEO and web marketing guru).

It is all based on visitor behavior. The stats show that people prefer long form articles. This is why google values them as higher quality. Its not what google thinks, its what googles users think.

I will try to find the article. But here are a few key stats I remember:

- A majority of visitors only read about 25% - 30% of the average 3000-word article. They skim for key takeaway points, or for sections that interest them the most.

But they only read around 10%-15% of short-form articles that are under 1000 words.

So your view time and read time increases exponentially the more you write.


- Human nature is to see a larger volume of info as more authoritative vs. a smaller amount.

- 3000+ word articles get more social shares on average

- 3000+ word articles have more backlink sources on average

- They also get more comments vs. shorter articles.

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Obviously, that is all just averages. And it can differ a bit per industry. He also pointed out that quality is king. There are some very successful 500-word articles... but they have extremely high-quality content and often get lots of social shares and engagement.

But at the same time, if you write 3000 words of nonsense, that will only hurt you.

 

[djs]

Obviously, that is all just averages. And it can differ a bit per industry. He also pointed out that quality is king. There are some very successful 500-word articles... but they have extremely high-quality content and often get lots of social shares and engagement.

But at the same time, if you write 3000 words of nonsense, that will only hurt you.

So, you are saying my college professors were right.... its not just about knowing the answer, but about explaining why its the right answer and doing it in a convincing way.

Who knew that my professors from the 80's would have made good SEO experts!!!

Actually, this is mostly common sense stuff. A well researched and referenced article should be seen as more authoritative then a straight opinion piece. Of course, the opinion piece may be more entertaining

Dan

 

[scagnt83]

So, you are saying my college professors were right.... its not just about knowing the answer, but about explaining why its the right answer and doing it in a convincing way.

Who knew that my professors from the 80's would have made good SEO experts!!!

Actually, this is mostly common sense stuff. A well researched and referenced article should be seen as more authoritative then a straight opinion piece. Of course, the opinion piece may be more entertaining

Dan

LOL. To an extent, yes.

But the ones that ranked well with 500 word articles often had been established for years most likely. The number of new sites doing that is probably in the 1% range if I had to guess. I dont think the article had an exact figure for that.

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The article actually broke out recommended word count by industry, based on top ranking websites for those industries.

Optimal range for finance was in the 2000 - 2500 range. Sales was slightly more than that. I think 2500 is a decent goal for an agent to shoot for.

Here is the article:

How Long Should Your Blog Articles Be? (With Word Counts for Every Industry)

 

[jboussea]

I just read an article about this by Neil Patel (a big SEO and web marketing guru).

It is all based on visitor behavior. The stats show that people prefer long form articles. This is why google values them as higher quality. Its not what google thinks, its what googles users think.

I will try to find the article. But here are a few key stats I remember:

- A majority of visitors only read about 25% - 30% of the average 3000-word article. They skim for key takeaway points, or for sections that interest them the most.

But they only read around 10%-15% of short-form articles that are under 1000 words.

So your view time and read time increases exponentially the more you write.


- Human nature is to see a larger volume of info as more authoritative vs. a smaller amount.

- 3000+ word articles get more social shares on average

- 3000+ word articles have more backlink sources on average

- They also get more comments vs. shorter articles.

-----------

Obviously, that is all just averages. And it can differ a bit per industry. He also pointed out that quality is king. There are some very successful 500-word articles... but they have extremely high-quality content and often get lots of social shares and engagement.

But at the same time, if you write 3000 words of nonsense, that will only hurt you.

Thanks for clarifying... I didn't know who Neil Patel was ..until he took over my facebook news feed ads a few months ago..

I was referring to the term insurance websites I see out there... a lot of them spend so much time explaining what a disease is before they start talking about underwriting .. I would assume most consumers want to start finding how to get a better rating based on their health issues... they already understand their disease. They probably know more about it than you do.

 

[Elsie]

UI/UX is important, but SEO guys get caught up in a one size fits all. I think Insurance is a completely different animal as compared to other sites.

I think a lot of agencies just have a "Need a quote, great! Give me your personal info" It needs to be much more.

Again, it's better UX isn't it?
That 'much more' part is ... well... better User Experience... right?

 

[jboussea]

I wonder how the SEO folks would view a format like this

https://getquilt.com/blog/life-insurance-decline-next-steps/

The main points are bulleted and you click on them to reveal a more detailed explanation .. Would the reader not see as it as authoritative since it's visually not a long article. I actually like this format better than these long essays I see out there full of fluff,.

 

[suranceman]

I wonder how the SEO folks would view a format like this

https://getquilt.com/blog/life-insurance-decline-next-steps/

The main points are bulleted and you click on them to reveal a more detailed explanation .. Would the reader not see as it as authoritative since it's visually not a long article. I actually like this format better than these long essays I see out there full of fluff,.

Even with that format, his content is far too short. He won't rank.

 

[Justin Bilyj]

Even with that format, his content is far too short. He won't rank.

Not true, Life Happens.org article has the same word count for "declined" and "denied" life insurance keywords and they're number 1 for both.

But aside from the length, that post isn't designed to rank, its a "process" supportive blog post - unless the guy's going after "declined life insurance" which is only 20 monthly searches which seems pretty low of a search to go after when you consider the time it takes to create and promote content.

If the guy wanted to rank for "declined life insurance", he would've put together a 1,500+ word article on being declined (number 2 is 1,350 words long), and pack other similar terms into the article like "denied life insurance" which has 4.5X the monthly searches that "declined life insurance" has. He would also optimize the page better throwing the terms into the headers, and ending the article with them.