Yoast Readability checks the length of your paragraph to ensure whether it is under the pre-defined limit or not. Usually, users skip the article having long paragraphs instead of shorter paragraphs with supporting images.
Writing Paragraphs & Analysis
Writing good content requires practice and knowledge but creating readable content requires experience too.
When we are creating content for websites, the message you want to send is tailored according to what the people reading can understand. But it doesn’t end there. The readability of the content is based on presentability too.
Reading paragraphs is a habit decreasing steadily. These are not the times where people can read entire texts without a paragraph change.
Various studies pointed out that the acceptable limit of paragraph length has been decreasing over the decades. When everything used to be printed or written, reading long, unending texts was commonplace. But with smart media, graphics and just shorter attention spans, writing crisp, concise content is the way to go.
This incites the need for paragraph analysis.
Importance Paragraph Length Yoast:
Writing good content isn’t an exact science. But we have attempted to quantify what needs to be done. Writing may not come to you naturally, but readability analysis will fix that by guiding you as you write.
Maybe you can read long texts, but the average joe can’t and the content is for them. It should be tailor made for them. People get scared after seeing big chunks of large words. It will make them unwilling to indulge in the paragraph even before reading it. This fear alone will drive away many users.
What needs to be done is to break them down into smaller bits. Each bit teaches one aspect of your lesson or tells one part of your story. These bits or small paragraphs also act like pauses or cooldowns for the person to rest and reflect before moving on to the next content.
The small paragraphs also allow users to scan the content. Many readers just like to have a quick look into what they are getting into. This helps them save time, especially when they are researching and want unique content they can learn from. If your content is good, this increases your chances to get returning readers.
How to write good paragraphs?
Writing anything online begins by visualizing the ones who will read it. Specialized articles call for specialized language and simple ones need easy words. So, the first step would be to write easy words.
The size of your paragraph is directly related to the motivation of the readers. The current maximum for common people is to read a paragraph of 5 lines or fewer. Any more will cause a decrease in readability.
A question, however, arises here that the number of lines is based on the size of the screen. So, try to keep the word count of your paragraphs at 150 words.
A good way to control your paragraph length is to form a skeleton of the text beforehand. The paragraphs become more focused on individual aspects and end up becoming specialized and high quality.
We can take this article as an example to show a structured representation of information:
- Introduction
- Readability
- Studies and History
- Why write good paragraphs
- Uses of analysis
- Benefits to users
- How to write good paragraphs
- How to start
- The absolute maximum
- Forming this skeleton
- Cheat-Sheet
- Conclusion
This simple skeleton made after collection of information leads you to focus on what matters and present it in a readable fashion.
Your experience as a writer will guide you towards quality. But till then, remember this cheat sheet:
- We should relate paragraphs to a single topic
- The paragraph should begin with a core sentence: with the most important keyword
- The word count needs to be near 150 words
Concluding Paragraph Length Yoast:
Let’s conclude the article Paragraph Length Yoast. Writing good content comes naturally to some but with practice to others. Till then forming guidelines and absorbing wisdom gained through the experience helps.
Good research and good planning go a long way. Keep writing with your best quality and keep on understanding better ways to optimize content. You will find a special place.
Always remember: “What matters at the end is the satisfaction of the readers”
Next Lecture: Does Sentence Length Matters?