Custom URL's with Bigcommerce Issue (Is it worth it?)
-
We're building out a store in Bigcommerce, who for all intensive purposes is perfect for SEO besides the fact that you can not change the URL's to be custom. My question is, does this kill the SEO value of bigcommerce, despite everything else being great?
So for example the URL's for a category page would be something like this www.mysite.com/categories/keyword and the product URL's are pulled in by product name, so product URL's could be something like www.mysite.com/products/Product-Description-Long-223.html (notice the words will be capitalized and their is no way to remove the trailing .html)
I could go with Interspire (the liscenced version of Bigcommerce) or Magento so I can custom edit this stuff. But then its a lot more work for my employee's on the buildout.
-
Thanks, yea I can use canonicals with bigcommerce. I just wasn't sure how much the URL structure really influences the rankings of the page. Like if everything else is perfect, but there is one variable in there that isn't (ie having /categories/ in the URL) how much that would actually effect the results.
-
The question that matters is what does SEO need from URLs?
-
That they be static.
-
That they feature your keywords.
What does Big Commerce do?
-
Provide static URLs (at least, based on what you've shown; I'm not a salesman or anything and have no affiliation)
-
Features product name (which presumably you control, and can thus include long tail KWs).
Granted, it's slightly less easy to type out the product page URLs for anyone wanting to link (they need to remember the caps and .html) but that's the least of your issues. I'd imagine you can just set up a 301 to make the urls typed in redirect if they get the casing wrong.
Lastly, regarding custom URLs, consider scalability. If the store succeeds ... are you really going to give each product page a custom URL manually? Not likely... So it's not that important.
-
-
My company has been working with eCommerce storefronts for close to 7 years and this would be a deal killer for me. Out of all the shopping carts on the Market, Magneto is HANDS DOWN the greatest and offers the most scalability for clients bar none! It is more complicated to setup than most but once you have the hang of it you can get a store built out really quick and in the end its just so much better.
I personally, have worked with infopia, zencart, yahoo stores, volution, channel advisor (crooks), 3Dcarts, pinnicle cart and more.
Bottom line, URL Structure in eCommerce is as crucial as Title and Meta Descriptions.
-
I think you have answered your question already. This comes down to price over SEO value. Sure, the perfect pretty URL's would add something to the product and category listings pages, but depending on the competition in your market and the ongoing budget for Link Building this may not be an issue if you're on top of it all.
If you'd rather outlay a little more cost upfront, then it might be an idea to get it 100% from day 1
Hope this helps!!
Aaron
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
-
Are slides how's etc the new Splash Pages?
I just did SEO audits of approx 50 websites in the tourism sector. Nearly all had poor Google Pagespeed ratings, partly down to that, among other factors. I also feel that slideshows,, large images and videos in headers are poor for usability. I say get the content people need to engage with in front of them asap Are there any stats or studies that can provide insight on this? I've been telling those with these designs to keep an eye on bounce rates and let that guide them
Web Design | | anndonnelly0 -
Second Store URL
Our store has been up and running for about 18 months and has been more successful than expected. Unfortunately we have run into a few minor issues with customers wanting to pick up in store but much of the online parts we sell are drop ship. We have made the decision to open a second store. One will support our brand (using current URL)and reflect products and pricing we offer at our B&M locations. The second will continue down the path we have been going but under a completely different brand (and URL) in no way tied to our B&M stores. My question is this: Would it be smarter to re brand the store we have now and change the URL.?We would then create the second site as our corporate branded site. Or do we adjust the currently site and then create a second site with the new brand. The only real hold up is that the re branded store will generate far more revenue and the current site is optimized very well. However if i change the URL the optimization will go out the window .
Web Design | | Rillik0 -
How does Google's AJAX Announcement Impact the likes of AngularJS?
Google's announcement last month about depreciating their AJAX crawl directive and Distilled's recent article have got me thinking a lot about how this change impacts frameworks like AngularJS. For those of you that use or are considering using frameworks like AngularJS, does this change impact you? Has it changed your mind about services like Prerender etc? All discussions relating to AJAX crawling welcome. Some resources to get started: https://prerender.io/js-seo/angularjs-seo-get-your-site-indexed-and-to-the-top-of-the-search-results/ https://www.distilled.net/resources/prerender-and-you-a-case-study-in-ajax-crawlability/
Web Design | | ecommercebc1 -
Duplicate Content Issue: Mobile vs. Desktop View
Setting aside my personal issue with Google's favoritism for Responsive websites, which I believe doesn't always provide the best user experience, I have a question regarding duplicate content... I created a section of a Wordpress web page (using Visual Composer) that shows differently on mobile than it does on desktop view. This section has the same content for both views, but is formatted differently to give a better user experience on mobile devices. I did this by creating two different text elements, formatted differently, but containing the same content. The problem is that both sections appear in the source code of the page. According to Google, does that mean I have duplicate content on this page?
Web Design | | Dino640 -
URL Help
Will the following urls will be considered as two different urls? 1. www.example.com/key=value1& key2=value2 2. www.example.com/key2=value2 & key=value1
Web Design | | prsntsnh0 -
Is it necessary to Remove 301 redirects from Wordpress after removing the 404 url from Google Webmaster?
There were many 404 urls in my site found by Google Webmaster. I've redirected these urls to the relevant urls with 301 redirect in wordpress. After that I removed these 404 urls from Google Index through Webmaster. "Should I cleanup these 301 redirects from Wordpress or not? ". Help Needed.
Web Design | | SangeetaC0 -
Breadcrumbs show for some section and dont come for some. What could be the issue
Hello, We have implemented breadcrumbs - which comes up nicely for Blog and Forum in Google Search However, when we look at our 2 other section - New Car Product and Latest News - it does not comes up, is there any issue which can foresee Sample URL of New Car - http://www.mycarhelpline.com/index.php?option=com_newcar&view=product&Itemid=2&id=8&vid=188 Sample URL of News - http://www.mycarhelpline.com/index.php?option=com_latestnews&view=detail&n_id=474&Itemid=10 Its been over 1 month - since breadcrumbs been introduced in both New Car and News. is there any issue like in them as why is is not showing in search. Any recommendations Many Thanks !!
Web Design | | Modi0 -
How do I learn how to build custom wordpress websites?
Is wordpress a good platform to build websites with? If so, what are some good resources to learn how to build custom websites using wordpress?
Web Design | | Lael0