Don’t include too many items … or too few
Thank you, David Letterman.
The Top 10 list rules the web — or at least, Buzzfeed. The number of Buzzfeed listicles with the numeral 10 in the headline outranked the next most popular numeral (15) by 142%, according to research by Noah Veltman and Brian Abelson, two Knight-Mozilla fellows. Fiddle around with their addictive “listogram” for details.
But just because Buzzfeed writers like the number 10 doesn’t make that the best number for your listicle. So how many items should you include? Here are eight thoughts about that:
1. Consider including more items.
Abelson found a slight correlation between Buzzfeed list length and the number of tweets the list gets: The longer the list, the more tweets.
But don’t forget: Tweeting doesn’t mean reading.
“We’ve found effectively no correlation between social shares and people actually reading,” writes Tony Haile, CEO of Chartbeat, which measures traffic for sites like Upworthy.
2. But don’t include too many.
Hundreds of items might overwhelm potential readers. “6 steps to 6-pack abs”? Maybe. 66 steps? Forget it!
And no matter what the headline says, there really aren’t “99 Things You Need To Know About Franz Ferdinand Before The 100th Anniversary Of His Assassination.”
3. And don’t include too few.
When it comes to lists, remember what you learned at Three Dog Night camp:
One is the loneliest number. Two can be as bad as one. It’s the loneliest number since the number one
Why?
- One item is an item. So no “Top 1 Reason Why ‘The X-Factor’ Is Going To Be Better Than ‘The Voice’.”
- Two items are a couple. So no “2 Excellent Parodies Of Amanda Palmer’s ‘A Poem For Dzhokhar’.”
- It takes three items to make a list. “3 Classy Ways To Get Drunk On St. Patrick’s Day“? Sure!
Besides, posts with headlines promoting seven or more items outperformed those with six or fewer, according to an internal study of HubSpot’s blog. While HubSpot still posts pieces with six or fewer items, writes Pamela Vaughan, HubSpot’s lead blog strategist, the inbound marketing experts don’t promote that quantity in the headline.
4. Embrace your oddness.
Oddly, odd numbers on magazine coverlines sell better than even ones, according to Folio:. Bloggers have taken note.
“It’s long been a superstition in the business — for years — that an odd number will do better than an even number,” BuzzFeed’s Jack Shepherd told the folks at Neiman Lab.
So 7 Steps may be more effective than 10 Tips.
5. Or maybe 10 is the magic number?
Lists with 10 items received the most social shares, according to research by BuzzSumo. The provider of content marketing analytics itself analyzed the number of shares of more than 100 million articles.
Top 10 lists had four times the number of social shares — 10,621 on average — than the second most popular list number: 23.
Runners up: 16 and 24.
6. Steer clear of 20.
“Yeah, I think probably people shy away from 20,” Shepherd told Nieman Labs. “Twenty feels real weird.”
7. But do use a number.
Numbers sell, because they indicate quantity and value in the information.
“Honestly,” Shepherd said, “I’ve often made posts where the post didn’t need a number, and then I’ll throw a number into the headline — just because people like that more.”
We know, Mr. Shepherd. We know.
8. Or don’t.
The best length for your list: the number of items your research turns up.
How do you reach nonreaders with words?
Most readers spend, on average, fewer than 15 seconds on a page, according to a study by Chartbeat.
So how do you get your message across to skimmers, scanners and other nonreaders?
Learn to put your key messages where readers’ eyes are at Get Clicked, Liked & Shared, our content-writing workshop.
You’ll learn to write better listicles with our 6-step list-writing makeover. How to tear down the obstacles to reading your post. And leave with a simple search engine optimization approach that will help you get found while producing high-quality content.
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