Readmore or not to Readmore

**cldnails** · 07-27-2006, 05:14 PM

As of late I have recognized 2 very different styles of posting to blogs. In addition, with my limited and juvenile research it appears that one style is prevalent on successful blogs.

What I'm referring to are page breaks, where only a snippet of your actual post is shown on the front page and then your reader must click on the readmore or title to get the rest of the story. It appears to me that the opposite is more prevalent on successful blogs.

What I've noticed is that successful blogs seem to place the entire post/article on the front page with no page breaks. Made me wonder if I should be doing the same thing.

What do you guys think? Am I just over analyzing and what benefits could this have?

Kalina · 07-28-2006, 08:24 PM

I don't think it matters, could be wrong.

waffles · 07-28-2006, 08:41 PM

Looking at it from a laziness perspective here, so keep that in mind.

It's extra work to have the visitor click a link to read the whole article. And if I'm not mistaken, isn't it extra work to set what is shows on the front page and what is shown for the whole article?

So why would you want to create extra work? And why do you expect me to do extra work?

Aries · 07-28-2006, 09:48 PM

Linking or writing? Is there a way to track or test this theory?

Kalina · 07-29-2006, 12:04 AM

When writing a post, you click the "more" quick tag button, so no extra effort really to put it in there.

waffles · 07-29-2006, 10:48 AM

Still some. And I'm lazy. But I think the reader end of it is more important anyway.

Buildingbodies · 07-29-2006, 11:24 AM

You know its funny because I never thought of this untill like last night and I started mulling it around in my head. Your right, almost all the big blogs dont use the "readmore".

I saw your post and voila, I think I am going to start full posting.

Perhaps it has something to do with more "absolute" content being added regularly without the readmore? I mean more content in total has been changed on the "mainpage" then just a snipit? I really dont know but there has to be a reason and if someone has a succesfull blog they arent doing full posts because they are lazy.

For example: http://problogger.net/
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/ and
http://www.jamesbrausch.com

My fave blogs and I know they get traffic....

BinkyMelnik · 07-29-2006, 12:29 PM

cldnails:

Quote:

What do you guys think?

One thing to bear in mind is that the majority of the world is STILL on dialup. If you've got a massive, massive page it may very well not load for your audience. If you're writing a high-tech blog, then your audience may (mostly) all have broadband and enough RAM to load anything they want. If you're writing a blog related to crocheting, then your audience is more apt to have lower-end hardware (cast off from their children) and dial-up.

I *always* go with not overloading a page. Folks can't read what they can't load. But take youre audience into consideration.

Always blows me away when I load a blog and it goes on for 48 screensful. You want the majority to see what you're offering, not the minority.

Julie · 07-29-2006, 02:00 PM

I prefer to have it all on the front page. I'm not fond of clicking to a new page just to finish what I was reading.

**Cricket** · 07-29-2006, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BinkyMelnik

cldnails:

One thing to bear in mind is that the majority of the world is STILL on dialup. If you've got a massive, massive page it may very well not load for your audience. If you're writing a high-tech blog, then your audience may (mostly) all have broadband and enough RAM to load anything they want. If you're writing a blog related to crocheting, then your audience is more apt to have lower-end hardware (cast off from their children) and dial-up.

I *always* go with not overloading a page. Folks can't read what they can't load. But take youre audience into consideration.

Always blows me away when I load a blog and it goes on for 48 screensful. You want the majority to see what you're offering, not the minority.

You can choose how many posts to include on a single page though.

waffles · 07-29-2006, 02:45 PM

But that doesn't solve the problem of having to load another page to finish reading the article. It just makes no sense to me. You've got to finish writing it anyway, why not publish it all at once?

**Cricket** · 07-29-2006, 03:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by waffles

But that doesn't solve the problem of having to load another page to finish reading the article. It just makes no sense to me. You've got to finish writing it anyway, why not publish it all at once?

Either way you are publishing it all at once. It is just a matter of if you are adding the more tag in the post or not.

My comment was concerning if she was choosing not post full articles on the front page because of load time that she could limit the number of articles being posted on one page.

**cldnails** · 07-29-2006, 03:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Buildingbodies

You know its funny because I never thought of this untill like last night and I started mulling it around in my head. Your right, almost all the big blogs dont use the "readmore".

I saw your post and voila, I think I am going to start full posting.

Perhaps it has something to do with more "absolute" content being added regularly without the readmore? I mean more content in total has been changed on the "mainpage" then just a snipit? I really dont know but there has to be a reason and if someone has a succesfull blog they arent doing full posts because they are lazy.

For example: http://problogger.net/
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/ and
http://www.jamesbrausch.com

My fave blogs and I know they get traffic....

My point exactly, I don't think it's just a coincidence. Whether the authors did it on purpose or not is one thing, but I definately think it has a bearing. As far as the SEO benefit, I'm not sure, because you still have permalinked posts.

Just something to thinka bout and I'm glad that a conversation was started out of it. Some very interesting points have been brought up.

**Cricket** · 07-29-2006, 03:09 PM

I have tried it both ways for extended periods of time. In the end I did not find it to make a difference for search results one way or the other. I did however find my visitors preferring full articles posted without having to click the link to read more. Certainly that may vary with different target audiences. Some may argue that it is easier to scan the articles for one of interest to them if they only post a partial article with a link to continue.

Just my humble

BinkyMelnik · 07-29-2006, 03:11 PM

Cricket:

Quote:

You can choose how many posts to include on a single page though

Oh. Then why the heck don't more people use it? <- rhetorical question

cldnails:

Something else to consider is contextual ads. Seems to me a blog post on a page by itself (ie, "Read more" was clicked) will have more targeted ads than a buncha not-very-related posts all bunched on a single page.

waffles · 07-29-2006, 03:15 PM

I have mine set to show 10 posts. That number might go up when I have more things on there, but I don't ever see it going past 20. And my things are never that long anyway.

**Cricket** · 07-29-2006, 03:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BinkyMelnik

Cricket:

Oh. Then why the heck don't more people use it? <- rhetorical question

cldnails:

Something else to consider is contextual ads. Seems to me a blog post on a page by itself (ie, "Read more" was clicked) will have more targeted ads than a buncha not-very-related posts all bunched on a single page.

At least in WordPress, the page the more link goes to is still the same full article that is created with every post regardless of using the more link or not. It is just a matter of where they found the post, such as on the front page, in your navigation, or in the search results, etc.

edit: I am just commenting on the fact that if the blog is optimized properly people will be finding the articles from far more sources that just your front page. Hopefully they are finding your individual articles (posts) in the search engines and from incoming links from other websites. If not, it might be time to reconsider the way the blog is configured, such as SEO friendly urls and page titles.