Stop writing 2000 word novels. Cutting fluff is the easiest win right now.

Ben Arthur

Ben Arthur

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Hey everyone. I know the 2026 Google core updates have been incredibly volatile, but there's one specific strategy working right now that I think we can all agree on.

Word count padding is dead. If you're still generating massive walls of text just to hit an arbitrary length, you're actively hurting your own rankings.

I recently tested this on a few of my sites that stalled out after the May and August rollouts. I took several 2,000 word posts and completely gutted them. I removed the generic introductions, stripped out the filler, and reduced them to about 700 words. I made sure to answer the user's actual question in the very first paragraph. Within two weeks, almost all of those pages started climbing again.

What actually matters right now is user retention and stopping people from bouncing back to the search results. A long dwell time doesn't mean anything if the user eventually goes back to Google and clicks on a competitor. You have to satisfy the search intent right at the top of the page so they stop looking elsewhere.

Topical depth is also beating raw domain authority. I'm consistently seeing 30 DA sites that own one highly specific niche completely outrank 70 DA generalist sites.

Stop worrying about word count and start answering the question immediately.

Who else has been trimming down their old content and seeing ranking bumps this month? :)
 
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Very true.

I’m actually seeing more and more pages with only few sentences rank these days.

Those sentences are super on point though.
 
I agree that word count alone should not be the goal a shorter article that answers the user is question clearly can often perform better than a long piece full of unnecessary information content quality and matching search intent matter more than hitting a specific word count.
 
tiiberius said:
Very true.

I’m actually seeing more and more pages with only few sentences rank these days.

Those sentences are super on point though.
Click to expand...
Exactly. If three sentences solve the user's problem, that's all you need. Google is clearly getting better at figuring out when someone actually found what they came for, instead of just counting how many words are on the page. :)
 
Ben Arthur said:
Hey everyone. I know the 2026 Google core updates have been incredibly volatile, but there's one specific strategy working right now that I think we can all agree on.

Word count padding is dead. If you're still generating massive walls of text just to hit an arbitrary length, you're actively hurting your own rankings.

I recently tested this on a few of my sites that stalled out after the May and August rollouts. I took several 2,000 word posts and completely gutted them. I removed the generic introductions, stripped out the filler, and reduced them to about 700 words. I made sure to answer the user's actual question in the very first paragraph. Within two weeks, almost all of those pages started climbing again.

What actually matters right now is user retention and stopping people from bouncing back to the search results. A long dwell time doesn't mean anything if the user eventually goes back to Google and clicks on a competitor. You have to satisfy the search intent right at the top of the page so they stop looking elsewhere.

Topical depth is also beating raw domain authority. I'm consistently seeing 30 DA sites that own one highly specific niche completely outrank 70 DA generalist sites.

Stop worrying about word count and start answering the question immediately.

Who else has been trimming down their old content and seeing ranking bumps this month? :)
Click to expand...
the same goes for me a lot of old posts could fit the same information into half as many words once u strip out all of the unnecessary text. the one major change i have seen is the way that making sure the ressponse can be used immediately saves a lot of time for the user over an introduction.
 
tiiberius said:
Very true.

I’m actually seeing more and more pages with only few sentences rank these days.

Those sentences are super on point though.
Click to expand...
Is this also reason Google is giving preference to sites like reddit and x on google search results.
 
Same here. I think the biggest win is putting the useful part first. Most people don’t want to read a 500-word intro before getting the answer. If the first few paragraphs solve the problem, the rest of the content can just add useful details instead of padding.
 
It wouldn't be a surprise, Google will need to adapt to the new reality, people have 3 second span attention, they can't read a 2000-word article, most of them just want a sloppy tiktoker to explain it in 41 seconds
 
Venusaur said:
It wouldn't be a surprise, Google will need to adapt to the new reality, people have 3 second span attention, they can't read a 2000-word article, most of them just want a sloppy tiktoker to explain it in 41 seconds
Click to expand...
Exactly. People just don't have the patience anymore. If we don't get straight to the point, like a short video does, they click right back to the search results. It is frustrating, but it is the reality we have to deal with. We either adapt to how fast they want their answers now, or we lose them completely. That is just how it works these days.
 
For me it’s usually content first but not just pumping out new articles. A lot of time goes into updating existing pages and tightening internal links.
 
Cutting the fluff worked really well for us too, but it was less about making pages short and more about delivering value without the intro filler. We moved the direct answer to the very top and pushed the actual data tables and breakdowns lower down for anyone who needed the full context. Making the page scannable while keeping the real depth beats padding an article to hit some arbitrary word count every single time.
 
OnlineProxy said:
Cutting the fluff worked really well for us too, but it was less about making pages short and more about delivering value without the intro filler. We moved the direct answer to the very top and pushed the actual data tables and breakdowns lower down for anyone who needed the full context. Making the page scannable while keeping the real depth beats padding an article to hit some arbitrary word count every single time.
Click to expand...
That's exactly the way to do it. Put the quick answer right up top so people don't just bounce, and save the deeper details below for those who actually want to dig in. That way you're covering both types of visitors without losing anyone.
 
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Front loading the core answer works exceptionally well for search intent people just want their problem solved immediately so placing summary tables or direct answers above the fold usually keeps bounce rates low.
 
Ben Arthur said:
Hey everyone. I know the 2026 Google core updates have been incredibly volatile, but there's one specific strategy working right now that I think we can all agree on.

Word count padding is dead. If you're still generating massive walls of text just to hit an arbitrary length, you're actively hurting your own rankings.

I recently tested this on a few of my sites that stalled out after the May and August rollouts. I took several 2,000 word posts and completely gutted them. I removed the generic introductions, stripped out the filler, and reduced them to about 700 words. I made sure to answer the user's actual question in the very first paragraph. Within two weeks, almost all of those pages started climbing again.

What actually matters right now is user retention and stopping people from bouncing back to the search results. A long dwell time doesn't mean anything if the user eventually goes back to Google and clicks on a competitor. You have to satisfy the search intent right at the top of the page so they stop looking elsewhere.

Topical depth is also beating raw domain authority. I'm consistently seeing 30 DA sites that own one highly specific niche completely outrank 70 DA generalist sites.

Stop worrying about word count and start answering the question immediately.

Who else has been trimming down their old content and seeing ranking bumps this month? :)
Click to expand...
Less fluff=better results. Do it the Spartan way or not at all xD.
 
Ben Arthur said:
Exactly. If three sentences solve the user's problem, that's all you need. Google is clearly getting better at figuring out when someone actually found what they came for, instead of just counting how many words are on the page. :)
Click to expand...
LLMs solved a problem that Google couldn’t solve for over a decade. :D (Un)lucky Google! Bigger changes are on the way, so let’s see how Google copes with them.
 
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