Why Bullet Points Are Still Going Strong
In blogging, many a fad has come and gone. List posts used to be extremely popular, for example – 10 Ways to Make a Milkshake, 7 New Potato Varieties You Must Try, 26 Reasons to Keep Eating Meat.
But list posts aren’t that popular anymore. Neither are really short posts, updated every two hours. Neither are posts about your personal life integrated into your business blog.
But you know what’s still popular, and will remain so forever?
Bullet points.
Speeding Bullets
One of the reasons bullet points are still a great blogging technique to use is that they help your readers get through your post faster. Even if the piece has the exact same number of words, readers actually read faster if you break up a post into lots of little bits.
- Bullet points draw the eye quickly to that place in the post.
- Bullet points seem shorter because they’re not surrounded by other sentences.
- Bullet points communicate one statement quickly and effectively.
What’s really fun is that those three bullet points could easily have been a paragraph, with only a little tweaking so that the words “bullet points” didn’t head up every sentence.
And here’s a dandy little fact for you: When you first started reading this post, you probably read the title first, and then, right after that, the bullet points.
Even though there were several sentences in between.
Even though some of those sentences were short and on a single line, like this one.
Even though those sentences were extremely easy to read.
You still read the bullet points first.
Why Are Bullet Points Good for Blog Posts?
When people read an entire post thoroughly, they’re more likely to think about it and comment on their reactions. If they see huge paragraphs, they might just skip whole sections or skip the post completely because it seems like too much effort to read it.
Bullet points make reading the post seem simpler.
- The whole point of other paragraphs is summed up in nice, neat bullets
- The bullets make it really easy to get the information fast
- You’ll finish the post feeling like you got something out of it with no effort
That last point is key. When people finish your posts and feel like they got something out of it, they’re more inclined to comment and pass it on, and commenting and passing on your posts to others increases your blog’s popularity.
All those good reasons to include bullet points are good for your readers. Why are they good for you?
Why Bullet Points Make Writing Simpler
If you can sum up the main point of your post in bullet points, you’ve done an excellent job of creating a concise, well-thought-out post. Allow me to demonstrate:
- Bullet points are still a powerful blogging tool after years because they are effective
- Bullet points are effective because they make the process of reading a post seem easier
- When people think reading a post is easier, they’re more likely to read and pass on your posts
- Commenting and passing on posts increases your blog’s popularity
- Bullet points are easy on you, the writer, because they organize your thoughts
Look at that. That’s my entire post, summed up in neat little bullet points. If you’re like most people, you skipped right to that – and in fact, you finished the post. I’m sure you have some opinions on what I’ve said, and you’d like to comment. Be my guest.
But after you do, go try some bullet points on your own blog. I think you’ll like the results.
James Chartrand is the Top Ten Blog pro writing great articles that teach you everything he knows about blogging. Check out his work over at Men with Pens, or be risqué and grab the Men with Pens RSS feed.
Excellent thoughts James. Way to get to the point!
Haha – Liked Brandon’s comment.
I would disagree that short posts and list posts are a dying fad. Do you have evidence of it? I would say list posts and short posts are my favourite sort of posts. List posts are generally posts I can reference for later if they’re quality and short posts are great if they get to the point and are valuable – Chris Brogan is a perfect example of this.
You are on the money though that bullet points are by far easier to read and I found myself really focusing on the bullet points in this article as opposed to the text that followed in your example.
An even greater idea would be to turn those bullet points into little red arrows sort of similar to what Darren Rowse does on problogger. They’re effective and may draw even more attention.
Sarge | BeginnerBlogger.com
@ Brandon – LOL, good one!
@ Sarge – I think the easiest way to find evidence of dying fads is to simply take a look around the internet. Unless you have weight as an authority blogger (like Chris Brogan, to use your example), there’s a darned good chance that short posts won’t grow your blog or get traffic and list posts don’t get read. People want more than that now, to be able to distinguish the thought-leaders and knowledgeable experts from the crap that’s out there.
Ah, but bullet points… Yes, those will always stay, simply because they make a post far easier to read and take in.
Good to hear that bullet posts are here to stay since I am such a big fan of them. They do make articles a lot easier to read, and are a good break after reading through walls of text. I find myself using them a lot as well when I am writing posts.
I do have to say though, I think list posts can still be effective if they are not over used. Thanks for a great article!