E Commerce Product URL SEO
-
Hi, first question here.
In response to Paddy's wonderful article and Rand's related article from 09 I've found myself asking this question.
"www.home.co.uk/product" or "www.home.co.uk/category/product"
As I'm currently reviewing the structure for so many of our e com sites the article comes at a great time.
I'm going for home/category/product so I can optimise for a category, as category based searches are quite high and competitive.
Yes some products can appear in 2 categories but I'm combating it with 301's or image based links.
What are your thoughts.
-
I would go for the nice product URL's with (sub)categories in it. That way users and search engines will understand your website better imho. You should of course think well about your website structure before you launch. If you do that well and you're quite sure you're doing the right thing you should be good.
I'm very interested in why David chose the /product system. Did that give your better results in the SERPS?
-
breadcrumbs was exactly what I was going to say
-
Thats down to a inherent limitation of our CMS, and a massive pai i the backside.
if I had a choice it would be /Category/Product. Other sites which I have worked on over the years I've always used Category/product to great effect
-
There seems to be a whole load of information floating around the web about canonical and redirects but all only give suggestions of where each can be used apposed to a definitive best practice answer.
If anyone has tested the effectiveness of each it would be great to see some examples.
-
Hanger world is currently using /home/product/product ID
As apposed to home/category/product.
-
Think usability, if Im browsing the category, /Buttons/BlueButtonsadBuckles and I get redirected to /Buckles/BlueButtonandBuckles, all of a sudden I'm not where I am and I didnt ask to be moved.
See my point?
-
Thanks for the reply.
I can see on your site your using redirects to the home/product.
It seems a great way to go, Id assume that optimising a category with 301 links to products will pass on the "juice".
The shorter url is favored by search engines anyway I suppose.
-
Thanks for the reply.
I would agree for usability the category/product options is better, but could be tackled using breadcrumbs?
Is using canonical when category produces duplicate content not just a lazy alternative to 301's?
Shouldn't 301 redirects be used when a product appears in more than one category?
Would having home/product with canonical and 301's from /category/product not be the best option?
-
Don't think SEO, think User Experience...
My personal preference is for /category/product for the simple reason that the URL looks better and a visitor can establish their position within the site just by glancing at the URL.
get round the dupe product issue by being able to specify which Category is to be the primary category for a product and then set a canonical tag to reflect this.
Info on canonicals here http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/canonicalization
Regards
Aran
-
I would stick with /product to be honest. that way in the future when you decide to move products around and combine categories etc you will not have as much work to do with 301 redirects.
I have tried both, after 12 months I decided to move to the /product system, it was a massive overhaul but it was worth the effort in the end.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
We use bigcommerce platform and want to access the bigcommerce server to change the way our product images display
Hi We use bigcommerce and want to chage the way we display multiple images for our products. At the moment in bigcommerce you switch between images by clicking the next image, we want the images to change when we hover the curser over the image. Does anyone know how to do this ? Regards Adrienne
Web Design | | CostumeD0 -
Can anyone help me detect some SEO improvements onpage please...
Can anyone help me detect some SEO improvements onpage please... I have shortened the website URl so its not easily found when searched via search engines.. http://goo.gl/GlfMRl Please have a look and give me some tips. Thanks
Web Design | | Nettv0 -
Will keyword optimization for a landing page impact SEO for subsequent pages?
For example, if I optimize keyword “pleurx” really well on our landing page, I'd like to know if subsequent
Web Design | | Todd_Kendrick
pages linking back to that landing page will rank higher than before for “pleurx”
even if “pleurx” wasn't optimized on the subsequent pages. Thanks! -Andrew0 -
Would iFrames From a Beta3 Help the SEO Value of Domain?
What I understand as of now: Google does crawl iframes, but attributes the SEO value of the content within them to their original site. (Let me know if I'm mistaken.) What I need to know: If I were to iframe a section of a beta3.domainname.com site into a domainname.com site, does this beta3 attribute any SEO value to the domainname.com site? Essentially - Does good content on a from a beta3.domainname.com (which is mainly just a naked piece of content) bring any benefit to the domainname.com version of the site when it is iframed into the domainname.com site?
Web Design | | SmokewagonKen0 -
Magento URL Structure
I'm about to migrate to Magento and wanted to ask about the optimal URL structure for the following page: Knowledge Centre |-Videos |-Customer Testimonials |-Customer X Would it be better to use: Domain/knowledge-centre/videos/customer-testimonials/customer-x or Domain/customer-x Thanks in advance for any replies.
Web Design | | ssoneil0 -
301 Redirect ! Joomla Pages, Already ranking. ( just wanted to change the url
hey guys hope everyone had a new year. I am ranking for a page on my site that i want to ( not specifically move ), but just change the url name: It is too long i think and i want to move it from one portion of my architecture to another menu. I have never physically done a 301 redirect myself, always had someone do it for me. I wanted some pointers. Since it is a fairly new site 4 months old! What are my options. Do i need to 301 redirect the page, if i am changing the Structure and AI of my site, or can i just change the url as is and it will still get ranked? How do i keep that url put delete the page and redirect it ? Sorry its very simple but i wanted to get the communities help to continue on ! Best Wishes HAmpig
Web Design | | BizDetox0 -
What can this charity site do to improve SEO?
Hello wise ones, We have been working with the charity Volunteers of America to create a new site for their car donation program at carshelpingpeople.org They are a national charity with extensive local programs run by regional affiliates, so the site is divided into a small national section linked to Regional Affiliate sections. You get to the regional sections either by entering your zip code or clicking on your state in the bottom nav of the national pages. Right now we have developed regional sections for Michigan, Nevada, Maryland, Washington D.C., New Jersey, Delaware and the Philadelphia area. The site is about 2 1/2 months old, and while our conversion rate is pretty good (7%) our organic search ranking isn't improving as quickly as we'd like to see. Car donation is a very competitive space, and we would appreciate any advice on how to improve the SEO of the site. Thanks so much.
Web Design | | Phibnax0 -
Do you have an SEO 'plugin' recommendation for SharePoint 2007?
I'm not a programmer and our 200+ person company isn't going to change their CMS just because I asked them nicely. Do you know of any SEO plugin I can use on SharePoint 2007? I just don't want to have to keep going into each of 110 websites time after time.
Web Design | | DaveGerecht0