2 Question about URL structure
-
Hello guys
1 - I have a question about the best structure for URLs from the point of view of SEO:
Is it OK to use the URL as
mywebsite.com.br/long-tail-article
Or is better this
mywebsite.com.br/category/long-tail-article
2 - When part of my keyword is already in my "category", for example:
mywebsite.com.br/digital-marketing/digital-marketing-is-good
I leave it as it is, or in the following way:
mywebsite.com.br/digital-marketing-is-good
NOTE: Do not take into account that this URL would be different from other URLs in this category
-
'a user may remember a number easier than a url which is descriptive' - true. Tho, if you look at it from a search engine angle, CTR is a crucial factor - and even if the title of a page itself is a good discriminator, many people still do look at URLs.
Imagine a page title like 'We give away gold for free' and a URL path saying 'this-is-just-a-scam.html' . While this is an extreme example the analogy should hold up. And while 12345 probably does not mean anything negative to anyone (or only to very, very, very few people) it is not really meaningful.
Thus I don't agree with your premise and I'm with Heather when she's saying that your user should be the prime focus and her implication that Google's interest is in the user and will do what it takes to make them happy - and that's not just for commercial reasons.
I however completely am with you on your 'this depends on the size and nature of your site' comment!
General rule:
- keyword duplication is BAD: mywebsite.com.br/digital-marketing/digital-marketing-is-good would very likely be considered as SPAM
- short title are preferred (as per early 2012 and I've not heard anything else about that since then) - as Michael said before
- targeted landing pages are GOOD. I'd say that if you plan to have the category in the URL just for the URL's purpose - leave it be. But if you plan on making e.g. - digital-marketing/index.html a targeted landing page with additional content (i.e. not just a plain listing of the articles) the you can gain real value
- try to make all pages reachable from the homepage within 4 clicks or less. Category offer you a perfect way to do this - on top of providing good landing pages
What I'd do:
1.) Check if you and/or your team has got the time to provide and maintain bespoke content for category pages, e.g. digital-marketing. If not, then I'd tend not to bother with changing the URLs
2.) If you decide you have the time - GO FOR IT. Check how many duplications you'd really have for each of your designated categories. Might be best to manually change the title and/or have a script check your database for such duplications.Cheers,
Charly -
Yep... I agree... we get thousands of visitors every day through category pages.
-
not really my point - my point is categorisation on large sites is helpful to search engines and users. WP does this very well and I utilise it a whole bunch on my sites that use WP
-
It would not be a problem because I use Wordpress
-
This is exactly my fear, be regarded as SPAM.
-
thats not always the case, consider a user may remember a number easier than a url which is descriptive (eg .com/12345 vs .com/this-is-a-blog-post-title-and-url ) however the numbers aren't descriptive and so hold no real seo value
- this said regardless of what option is choosen Google could always decide to prefer another mechanism in ranking for urls - or totally ignore them
-
I think you should structure your URL from the point of view of the reader rather than Google - that way you future proof yourself against any Google updates.
-
this depends on the size and nature of your site. For instance if you've lots of posts about a topic within your site (say "social media" or "email marketing") it is best to have them as a category and your post title to follow. Otherwise you could have issues in that you end up needing to put "email-marketing" in each post url ... which isn't pretty to do manually
-
I'd be inclined to go shorter. I don't believe you're going to see any additional ranking benefits from having the keyword in the URL twice (might be different if the keyword was in the domain AND the URL, but even then...).
I'd be a little concerned that having the keyword in there twice might look spammy to Google, too.
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
-
Question about Homepage Title
Hi there, I recently made a change to the title URL for my site, and it changed how Google displayed my sitemap. Before it showed the most common sites, and now it simply links to 4 of them below the domain URL without descriptions. I have attached images below which shows my problem. I hope this is the right section for this question. Thanks! 5ypdnY2 4u2HAia
On-Page Optimization | | One20 -
.htaccess Question and Ranking
I have some basic rules set up in my .htaccess file and just curious as to the implications of them as I seem to have a website ranking very low on Search indexes for no particular reason that I can fathom. My question is a follows I have a htaccess rules set up in my application application that first strips the file suffix and then adds a closing brace for example Rule 1: http://www.domain.com/my_page.php becomes http://www.domain.com/my_page
On-Page Optimization | | ecrmeuro
Rule 2: http://www.domain.com/my_page becomes http://www.domain.com/my_page/ Will this rule expecially Rule 2 effect ranking or will these rule have no adverse affect on the website as my MOZ reports still seem to have pages listed win the Top Pages by PA section without the www? Below is an example of the htacess file. RewriteEngine On Redirect Trailing Slashes... RewriteRule ^(.*)/$ /$1 [L,R=301] RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} /+[^.]+$
RewriteRule ^(.+[^/])$ %{REQUEST_URI}/ [R=301,L] Redirect non-WWW to WWW... RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^contractor-accounts.co.uk [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.contractor-accounts.co.uk/$1 [L,R=301] Handle Front Controller... RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteRule ^ index.php [L]0 -
Keyword in URL: Ranking Factor?
I've got a site about a specific topic, which we'll call "themes" for the sake of this discussion. I personally like to keep the url structure short and clean (for usability purposes, but mainly because I'm a perfectionist and a minimalist). I feel that adding "themes" to the url structure is a bit redundant. However, nearly every keyword phrase that my site should rank for includes the word "themes." So I'm wondering how much I'm handicapping myself by not including the keyword "themes" in the url? The domain name itself sort of includes the keyword . . . although it's in Italian (I chose the domain for it's brand-ability, not for the keyword). A quick example: My Url Structure: www.themo.com/topic/abc My Competitor's Url Structure: www.sitesample.com/themes/topic/abc For many of the keywords, the competitors with the keyword in the url rank highest. But, I'm not sure how much emphasis to place on this, because from my understanding Google doesn't pay as much attention to url keywords anymore . . . and those sites might just be ranking high because they've been around for so long (which also happens to be the reason why they coincidentally also include the keyword in the url, because they started the site when that was a high ranking factor). Thoughts? Should I just trash my perfectionism and add the keyword to the url structure? (By the way, the site is only a couple months old and doesn't have any significant backlinks to inner pages yet, so changing the url structure wouldn't be a big deal if I decided to do that).
On-Page Optimization | | JABacchetta0 -
How do I remove a Canonical URL Tag?
Some of my report cards say I have too many canonical URL tags. However, there is no information no how to delete one. Can someone give me a link or explain? Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | dealblogger0 -
Long URLs
Many URLs of my site are long due to long navigation paths. Here is an example: http://tinyurl.com/6qc4syb. My question is, if I shorten the urls (which I probably should do), does it matter that they no longer follow the navigation path?
On-Page Optimization | | rdreich490 -
Long URL in listing job portal
Hello I have job portal and I am listing job offers by: regions, position, sector, language skill For example, when user searchs job in Bratislava, Programmer, information technology, english. My URL is www.presbium.sk/bratislava/pragrammer/information-technology/english Title:Job in Bratislava, Programmer, Information technology, english I know, that URL is too long and no good for SEO. Is it solution? When user chooses max. 2 items for example: www.presbium.sk/bratislava/programmer/ than I put in every next links atribute nofollow and google will index only pages with max. 2 items: www.presbium.sk/bratislava/ or www.presbium.sk/programmer/ or www.presbium.sk/bratislava/programmer/ but not www.presbium.sk/bratislava/protrammer/english/, because english link has atribut nofollow. And I want to ask, what is the best solution for SEO when I am listing job offers by regions, position, sector, language skill and I have than long URL and Title www.presbium.sk/bratislava/pragrammer/information-technology/english Title:Job in Bratislava, Programmer, Information technology, english
On-Page Optimization | | PeterSEO0 -
Best URL Structure For Products That Are The Same
I know that the url structure is very important for seo preferably using the keyword. But is it okay to have the same url with the product number at the end ? Each of our products have a name with a product number. Or will this cause to many similar urls? or if the folder is the name of the product that needs to be optimized, can the page just be called the product number? Example: Say you have a 20 different product lines and they are all catagorized in the appropriate folders, and need to be optimized for the actual product name. XXX (folder name ) WWW-PR-123 WWW-PR-1234 WWW-PR-12345 WWW-PR-123456 what would be the best url structure? Can they have the same begining? The product name? something like: www.example.com/xxx/www-pr-123.php www.example.com/xxx/www-pr-1234.php or www.example.com/xxx/pr-123.php www.example.com/xxx/pr-1234.php
On-Page Optimization | | hfranz0 -
Product Title Formating Question
The majority of the products I sell require lengthy product titles, I have 600+ items that have titles over 70+ characters. In the interest of reducing the character count (Product Feeds) I'm trying to eliminate unnecessary "stop words" in the titles, such as "and", "with" etc.. I've listed an example of a current product listing below, followed by two different formats to reduce the character count. Which one if any is better for SEO or should I leave my titles alone and stick with my original format? Current Listing Example: DeWalt Dual Comfort Safety Glasses with Black Frame and Clear Anti-Fog Lens Suggested Listing Example: DeWalt Dual Comfort Safety Glasses-Black Frame-Clear Anti-Fog Lens DeWalt Dual Comfort Safety Glasses/Black Frame/Clear Anti-Fog Lens
On-Page Optimization | | MEldridge0