If you're like me, there are times when writing blog posts can be daunting; thinking about the subject of your post from every angle, addressing every conceivable concern, and offering every possible piece of advice or insight. We do this to write the best, most complete, highest value content for our readers.
What if I told you that an incomplete blog post could actually be better than a post that covers every conceivable detail?
Don't sweat the details so much. I'm not talking about neglecting pertinent information, or bad spelling or grammar, but more about the absolute completeness of your content. Rather than slaving over a post to ensure you've covered your chosen topic from every angle, get your point across, provide some insight, context, statistics, or whatever it might be that supports what you're writing about, and leave it at that.
You can actually increase engagement and utility by intentionally leaving your post incomplete.
In fact, if you leave something out, it might even strengthen the performance of your post from an engagement standpoint. Undeniably, a great thing about blogging is the conversation that can be generated with your readers. If your post covers every angle of whatever it is you're writing about, it will limit your readers' ability to add to your content via comments, and you may end up being sospecific that you isolate a percentage of your readers.
When you're writing a blog post, feel good about the value you are providing, not the details you might be leaving out.
Further to isolating readers and diminishing engagement, many people can also suffer writing paralysis by getting too wrapped up in every little detail. Again, while details, insight and context are important, don't let the lingering feeling that there should be just one more support point, or one more angle covered, keep you from creating and publishing what is probably great content even without those points.
I am not recommending that you intentionally leave out critical information from your blog posts that your readers are going to find valuable, but making your point without going to great lengths to provide every last detail can actually be positive.
If you have any thoughts you'd like to add, it would be great to hear from you in the comments.