7 Reasons Why List Posts Will Always Work

7 Reasons Why List Posts Will Always Work
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Reader Comments (16)

  1. I think every poster on Digg this week reads your blog. I’ve never seen so many lists in my life. It’s getting so bad with the lists, I’m almost to the point I don’t want to read a post if there’s a list.

    Of course, I’m still writing posts like that, because it works!

  2. What amuses me is there’s been a whole online generation doing this before the advent of Digg, del.icio.us and blogs. That is.. the ‘free article’ sites and e-zines. ‘Free’ articles are usually just shills to sell some e-book in the byline, but they’ve had these sorts of headlines and list elements since I first saw them in the mid-90s 🙂 It’d do some of the Digg-baiters a world of good to use some of headlines from the free article word as a swipe file 🙂

  3. The increasing use of lists in posts and articles could be seen as a result of the increasing competition for the readers’ attention. With so much info to wade through everyday lists are the best way to get your info across as quickly as possible. I’m not sure if readers would be too keen to spend much more time reading your blog if its just a series of lists though – finding the balance, as always, is the key.

  4. Having numbers in my post titles also helps me think more concretely about what I’m really saying. Yesterday I posted about the responses of 22 bloggers to the newest version of the coComment blog commant tracking service. Everything in my mind was 22, 22, 22 … so I was limiting myself to a specific set of individuals, but analyzing that particular group more deeply than I had simply said, “Here are my gut feelings about the general response to this new thing.” Numbers can help people focus.

  5. 1 Reason Why List Posts will Always Work….. People are *insert your word of choice here* and they don’t like to read. Instead they prefer something that they can skim.

  6. In the magazine world, it’s proven that numbers on covers draw in readers more. It has to do with getting to the point, less fluff, more useful information.

    Seems like the same idea fits online lists perfectly.

  7. Hmmm .. I resisted doing this exactly for the reason someone mentioned earlier, Digg is full of lists. But I guess “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” and “If you can’t beat them – join them” works well together in this case.

    I guess I’m off to my first list of 10 ways to … errrr let me see …

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