When Is Your Title Too Long

[carlalexander]

For those of us who are into blogging selecting the title of your post can either make or break your article in terms of traffic and SEO. So how long should the title to your post/ article be? How long is long and how short is short.

 

[BruceBanner]

Your post title is important, but it isn't the end-all and be-all for SEO. In fact, you don't even need your keyword to appear anywhere on your article or title in order to rank for that keyword -- properly anchored backlinks will do that for you (try it. it works).

I wouldn't worry too much about length either -- the search engines will truncate it in the search results anyways. And if you're posting links to your article, you can use a shortner yourself, or just use anchor text. The biggest concern is whether or not the title is worded well enough to entice people to click through and read it. I much rather have a boring article with an awesome title, than a boring title with an awesome article. Click bait for the win!

 

[invisibled]

I was wondering about the same thing a while ago. Everywhere you read about SEO you see that title is the most important thing on your page, as it helps establish main topic. So I searched a lot about this issue and done my own experimenting.

I have found that it really doesn't matter how long the title is. What is most important is the placement of your main keyword. Your target keyword should appear near the beginning of the title. As it moves further towards right, it starts losing its effectiveness.

 

[wasi90lk]

I do not think there is any specific length you should follow, when you are giving your article a title.

The length should be enough to say what your article is about.

 

[Yorozuya]

I don't pay attention to my title's length. I use titles to catch people's attention - in my opinion it is much more important than catching search engines' attention. You can rank an article without mentioning your keyword in the title. Just make sure you mention your keyword a few times, especially at the beggining and at the end of the article. A few backlinks will help a lot with this, but you shouldn't overdo it with new sites and/or new articles. Just send some visitors there with your social media accounts (if you already have some), that will hopefully generate some likes/tweets, and that'd be a good start.

 

[ozadin]

Agreed with Yorozuya. Title length does not matter if your title is a hook, or something to catch a persons attention. The only downside is your title might get drowned out by ellipses which doesn't show your full title if it's too long. I think the limit is enough for you to include your keyword, and a hook.

 

[RomanAnthonysMama]

I don't think length matters as much as keywords and terms that people search for on an everyday basis. I try to keep my article titles short and sweet so that keywords stand out, and more people are apt to find them. I also find that if I title my article with a frequently searched question that has to do with the article, it generates a lot more hits.

 

[fltdude]

I never really thought of that to be honest. I just make sure my titles are short but long enough to highlight the content that follows.

 

[Nymph]

This is one of those aspects of content development that people tend to pay way more attention than they really need to. It has been proven that the best kind of titles are the titles that hook potential traffic or tempt readers to click, since it captures a larger percentage of your traffic to your site. As long as your title is not obscenely long, it is pretty irrelevant. One thing you should keep in mind is to make sure your title is not longer than the search engines project, because at some point a part of your title will be cut off in the results. In this case, you want to get your point across as early into the title as possible.

The shorter you make your title, though, the better. It uses a similar logic as to why people prefer shorter domain names. Most people will skim through the results and not thoroughly read your titles, so you want to make it as easy for a potential viewer to read and plug in as much information as you can in the least amount of words possible to suit the time frame of their skimming.

 

[TheDerpMan]

A good title will catch the reader's attention and convey just the amount of information (in the shortest time possible) for the user to want to click the link. Most people today seem to be rather impatient and want everything as quick as possible. The same applies to titles. If the title is long enough to be an article of its own, then it's too long. A good title will be short, quick, and to the point.

 

[Viktori]

I try to keep my titles brief, but that is mostly for reasons of being more efficient rather than for better SEO. I don't think it will affect too much of your SEO if you have a few articles that have long titles, but I think it would look a bit odd if all the articles have long titles.

 

[thevirtualtraveler]

Your title should be no more than 60 characters or else people can't see the whole title in the search engines which means they might not click on your link if they are not sure what the article is about and if it is relevant to their search.

 

[Trista]

Your title should be no more than 60 characters or else people can't see the whole title in the search engines which means they might not click on your link if they are not sure what the article is about and if it is relevant to their search.

Yes, that is the length, 60 characters. If using a longer title, it's important to have enough of the title visible so that people will have an idea of what to expect to see if they visit your page.

On the other hand, with titles these days, it's also important to not go to the other extreme. By that I mean, don't create a title that is solely comprised of key words. The days of writing for search engines are long over. That kind of title will look unnatural to the human visitor and it can result in a penalty in Google.

Along with an appropriate title, it's also helpful to have a really good meta description as that will help to entice a visitor; you have 156 characters maximum.

 

[OhioTom76]

Both Google AdWords and Bing Ads impose a Title character limit of 25 characters, and a Description limit of 70 characters total. Granted part of this is so the ads can fit neatly into the right sidebar listings as well, but it would be a good starting point for your SERP listings or blog post titles/excerpts too.

 

[ViperDove]

No matter how long the title is suppose to be, the first 3 sentences are very crucial. Internet users have short attention span and so you have to capture their attention with the first 3 sentences.

 

[James]

The title of your articles isn't as important as some people make it out to be. The title is there for one main reason - to catch your users attention.

Typically, shorter titles do this better than longer ones, but as far as SEO goes, it's not greatly important.

Still, it helps to have your keyword mentioned somewhere in the title.

 

[calebmelvern]

Try to limit your title to no more than 70 characters. Posts whose titles have more than 70 characters may have their titles truncated in the search results. And generally, people like to read short and concise titles. Be straight to the point, capture their interest, and follow through with amazing content.