Thin content is not defined by word count. Google says outright that it has no preferred length and no minimum or maximum for ranking. A short page can be excellent if the question needs a short answer, and a long page can be thin if most of it is filler.
Thin means the page does not give the visitor enough to make progress.
A useful test for thin content
After reading the page, does the visitor understand enough to make progress, or do they need to go back to Google for better information?
That is close to a question Google itself asks in its guidance on assessing your own content. It is one of several, but it is the most useful one to start with.
Notice what it does not mention. Length, keyword density, how many headings you have, or what your competitor did.
So if you have been told your pages need to be over a certain length, put that aside. It produces padded pages that still fail the test above.
Three ways content goes thin
1. Adjectives instead of information
You have read a version of this sentence many times:
“We provide high quality, professional, customised solutions tailored to your individual requirements.”
Now ask what you learned. What material do they use? How long does the work take? Who is it suitable for? What does it cost? What can go wrong? What happens after you contact them?
Nothing. The sentence is grammatically fine and completely empty.
2. The same template across every service page
Take the aluminium windows page, change every instance of aluminium to PVC, and most of the page still reads correctly.
If most of the page still works after swapping the service name, the two pages probably do not contain enough information specific to each service.
3. The three paragraph service page
Introduction. Benefits. Contact us.
Three paragraphs is not automatically too short. The problem is what those three paragraphs are: a warm up, a list of adjectives, and a call to action. The questions a customer actually has were never addressed.
The opposite problem, more words and no more information
Advice about thin content can do damage here. Told that short is bad, the reader writes more and ends up with a longer page that still says nothing.
Padding is not a fix. It buries the useful part.
A real example from our own work. One of the main service pages on a client site started at roughly 2,900 words. We cut it to around 2,050.
Not to hit a target. Because several sections did not belong there. Glazing information, security classes, a regional grant scheme, the installation method and the general company argument were all repeated elsewhere on the site. They belonged on broader pages, with links from the service page to those.
The result is a shorter page that answers its own question better, and a site where each piece of information lives in one place instead of five.
So improving a page sometimes means adding words. Sometimes it means deleting them. Good content is not long. It is complete without being wasteful.
The AI question, answered honestly
Yes, AI is heavily involved in how we produce content. We are not going to use it quietly while pretending otherwise.
But we also reject the claim that AI content does not rank. Google does not say that. Its guidance treats AI as potentially useful for research and structure. What its spam policy targets is scaled content abuse, meaning large numbers of pages produced without adding value, and that applies regardless of how the content was made. A human can write worthless pages at scale too.
So what is the actual difference?
The AI does not decide what the business knows. Generic AI output does not know the inconvenient facts specific to your business unless those facts are supplied and checked.
What we feed in:
- Real business information. Products, services, limitations, processes, specifications, prices where the client will publish them, and the questions customers actually ask
- Search Console data, rather than a keyword list from a content tool
- A defined job for each page, decided before a word is written
- Actual research, where technical claims get checked and unsupported statements get deleted rather than softened
- The inconvenient answers, including where a product is not suitable
On one client site we removed a claim that something represented the majority of installations, because we had no data supporting it. Technical terms were corrected. Exaggerated claims were toned down. Unsupported statements were deleted.
None of that is AI versus human. It is AI used to mass produce text, versus AI used to help extract and organise what a business actually knows.
how content is handled in our website projects
A cautionary story from our own portfolio
We run our own sites, which means we have made this mistake with our own money.
One of them produced plenty of pages, plenty of words and substantial search impressions, largely at scale. It did not produce customers, and later its visibility weakened. We cannot prove AI caused that, and we are not going to claim it did.
The mistake was not using AI. It was believing that publishing more pages was the same thing as building better pages.
The hardest case, location pages
If you serve several towns or districts, you will be tempted to build a page for each.
The wrong version is a page per town with the same content underneath and the place name swapped. Google’s doorway policy specifically covers substantially similar pages targeting different cities or regions, where the purpose is to capture similar searches and funnel people onward.
The rule we use
A location page needs a reason to exist beyond the location keyword. That means splitting the information across two layers.
The service page owns what is true everywhere. Materials, technical performance, the process, options, warranties, what affects the price.
The location page owns genuine local information. Work completed there. The types of project common in that area. Questions local customers ask. Photographs from real jobs. Testimonials from that area. Coverage and travel.
And if you have none of that
Do not invent it.
A page does not become unique because AI rewrote we install windows in Namur into residents throughout Namur trust us for professional window installations. That is the same information wearing a different coat.
Here is the principle, and it came from doing exactly this work.
Do not rewrite duplicated information. Stop duplicating information that does not belong on the page.
When we found identical blocks across several material pages, we did not ask AI to paraphrase them into apparent uniqueness. We moved the shared information to the page where it belonged and linked to it.
Fewer useful location pages are better than creating a larger set whose only difference is the place name.
What a page that actually answers looks like
Five things, and none of them are about length.
1. Answer the main question immediately. If someone searches whether windows can be replaced without damaging the plaster, the page answers that near the top, then explains the conditions.
2. Let every section answer the next logical question. Not headings created because a tool said you need a certain number. Headings that follow the customer’s thought process: what is it, is it right for me, what does it cost, what could go wrong, what do I do next.
3. Use facts rather than adjectives. Instead of excellent acoustic performance, give a figure and the configuration it applies to. Instead of quick installation, say how long it typically takes and what changes that. Instead of premium materials, name the material.
4. Include the inconvenient answer. If a material is the wrong choice for a particular situation, say so. A page that admits limits is more useful and more believable. It can also help unsuitable customers recognise that the service is not right for them before they enquire.
5. Use evidence a generic writer could not produce. Numbers, photographs, real projects, measurements, specifications, processes, prices where the business will publish them, and actual customer questions. Google’s guidance asks whether content contains original information, first hand knowledge and substantial value beyond what other pages already offer.
Three things you can check on your own site tonight
1. What did you actually learn?
Open one of your main service pages and read it. Then write down the concrete facts you learned.
Not experienced, quality, reliable, professional. Facts.
If you struggle to identify concrete information you learned, look closely at what the page is actually contributing.
2. Compare two pages side by side
Open two service pages, or two location pages.
Could you swap the service name or the town name and leave most of the page unchanged?
If yes, you have not built two pages.
3. Write down the next questions
Read one page as if you were the customer. Then list what you would still need to know before contacting the company.
Those unanswered questions are the content you are missing. And if the visitor has to go back to Google to find them, they may not come back.
One more. If the page could have been produced without access to any business specific knowledge, ask what original information it actually contributes.
Why this is what we actually charge for
Here is the honest version, and it explains the price difference between us and a template shop better than anything else.
We do not charge more because we put more words on a website. We charge more because we have to understand enough about your business to know what deserves to be written in the first place. It is the same reason website quotes vary so much, see What Actually Drives Website Prices in Thailand.
Anyone can generate two thousand words in seconds now. That part has become nearly free. Working out which two thousand words matter has not.
