How Many Articles Does It Take to Have a Successful Website?

[StartingAgain]

What is the minimum number of posts I could launch an Amazon affiliate site with? Should I wait until I have 20 posts? 50?

How many words is the bare minimum for a post to be successful these days? Is a post of 1000 words with an introduction and comparisons (pro's and con's) going to succeed?

 

[Future State]

What is the minimum number of posts I could launch an Amazon affiliate site with? Should I wait until I have 20 posts? 50?

I don't know that there's a specific number, but I've read people suggesting to flesh out the site fairly well, like at least 25 posts. That probably does play into the acceptance or rejection, but the problem I see people uncover more than anything is a lack of adding any value.

Dummies get rejected then share their URL and it's always the same story. They're listing Amazon items and not adding any value at all. They're trying to make another shopping portal or they're just rewriting the item descriptions.

I would also make sure that the site isn't 25 posts of reviews. You need to add value in other ways too, like having information and educational content surrounding the products. I don't think this is a must, but I'd do it anyways so I'm not some bottom-of-the-funnel affiliate that Google ends up penalizing.

How many words is the bare minimum for a post to be successful these days? Is a post of 1000 words with an introduction and comparisons (pro's and con's) going to succeed?

Word count isn't a major determining factor in whether or not a post will rank. I'm not even sure it's a minor one any more.

You're not asking the right questions. The questions should be:

• What keyword am I going after?
• What posts are Google ranking in the top 10 and what are their word counts?
• What is the intent of the keyword and how does the top 10 deal with that intent?

If a search query is "euphemism definition" do you think you need 1000 words? 50 words is probably enough and the top 10 probably are in that range.

I just realized this isn't a separate independent question and is related to the Amazon discussion. My bad. Same answer though. Look at the top 10 of a query and see what they're getting away with. Yes, 1000 words can do it, with an intro and product reviews only. That's as dead on target as it gets for that intent, really.

Google has to show its cards. It has to show you what ranks and doesn't. You just have to search the query and look at the results.

 

[Noisegen]

What is the minimum number of posts I could launch an Amazon affiliate site with? Should I wait until I have 20 posts? 50?

Assuming this is a brand new site, just publish as you complete your posts. Plan to go back and edit them later to improve them as you get more comfortable writing about the niche. There's no reason to wait to publish your posts. No one is going to read them for a few months or more unless you're promoting them on social or paying for traffic. You might as well start that clock now as opposed to after you have 20 posts written.

Apply for Amazon Associates approval from the start. If you don't get 3 sales in 180 days, you just reapply. Eventually, your site should start attracting viewers and getting sales.

Of course, you'll want to keep adding posts until you've blanketed the niche. By then, you may have stumbled upon a whole bunch of shoulder ideas you will be able to explore.

How many words is the bare minimum for a post to be successful these days? Is a post of 1000 words with an introduction and comparisons (pro's and con's) going to succeed?

You'll need to look at the competition and how they're ranking. If you're going for a keyword that is low value and the competition is ranking with 500 words, you may be able to rank for that keyword with less than 1,000 words in your text, assuming it's high quality.

Realistically though, in 2019, if you're going to be doing any decent quality product reviews or information on a topic, you should be able to coherently write 1,000 words of helpful content on the topic. You may need to touch on some ancillary points or related questions to achieve that word count, but I have almost 0 blog posts that are under 1,000 words on my sites. Many go up in the 4,000-7,000 word range for long, in-depth topics.