Is it a problem if a URL has too many backslashes in its address?
-
The ecommerce platform of the site that I am working on generates URLs that contain ID Codes for each different product category, color variations, styles, etc.
An example of a URL for a specific product includes:
www.example.com/women/denim-jeans/py/c/109/np/108/p/3834.html
Is it a problem for search engine crawlers if the URL address has so many backslashes in its address?
Appreciate your feedback.
-
Thank you for all of your feedback.
Unfortunately, this website is a on a old propitiatory platform that requires to have these long URL strings, but thankfully there are no separate pages for each of the backslash categories.
For now, I have to accept having these long URLs and just make sure all the correct pages are submitted in sitemap.
Thank you again for you all of your feedback. This was very helpful!
-
To be clear, what type of cart system does the site use? VirtueMart? Magento?
I agree with the posts above, in that sometimes it doesn't hurt, but at the same time, you aren't doing the product pages any favors. Two ways to look at this would be:
1. Having the URL structure set up like you example will still get the pages indexed, if they are included in a sitemap, and submitted correctly, furthermore if the content on those pages is a good match.
2. Having the pages set up that way will limit the ranking potential of those pages, by having a long URL, without relevant keywords in place. Let me explain:
In your example:
www.example.com/women/denim-jeans/py/c/109/np/108/p/3834.htmlYou have the opportunity to potentially rank for "womens denim jeans" using that url. This somewhat limits the ranking potential of the items, as they are all tied into one specific category, that being "womens denim jeans". Lets look at another example:
www.example.com/women/denim-jeans/faded-wash/indigo-dye-item-details3834.html
In the above URL, you are much more specific in the style and type of jean it is, and a user will know (and a search engine) what the page is specifically about. Style, color, keyword, category, etc. Since you most likely have a large catalog of product types, why limit your item details to a bunch of unnecessary numbers and slashes?
I would also look at a way of using product markup to make the items stand out further in search results. Google likes to see "the complete package". Using clean specific URL's and schema product markup tells a much clearer pricture than /py/c/109/np/108/p/3834.html. Depending on the CMS used, there may be a component or plugin that takes care of the product markup for you, from the item description and details.
Hope this helps!
-
Hi there,
Ryan is correct - high numbers of subfolders like this aren't ideal. That takes into account real and virtual subfolders (i.e. "subfolders" that have no content on them but are generated by a CMS versus subfolders that contain landing pages).
Ideally, these would be rewritten to www.example.com/women/denim/product1.html, etc. You will need to check with the developers why the CMS creates these subfolders and what can be done about it.
Google is much better at indexing / ranking URLs like this than it was a few years ago, and it's not exactly a deathblow if you're told that this can't be changed. It's still not ideal though, so check whether it can be simplified.
-
I would want to have as few as possible. You have to ask yourself whether or not all those folders are actually needed. As far as indexing, it's more about the hops than the number of backslashes. For instance if a crawler has to go to /denim-jeans then to /py then /c then /c109 then /np then /108 then /p then /3834.html it will likely have some indexing issues, but if the next hop after /denim-jeans is from a link that goes to /py/c/109/np/108/p/3834.html then it likely wouldn't cause any issues for the crawler, but again it's a nasty structure and you have to ask yourself if it is all really necessary.
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
-
What to do with parameter urls?
We have a ton of ugly parameter urls that are coming up in google, in semrush, etc. What do we do with them? I know they can cause issues. EX https://www.hibbshomes.com/wp-content/themes/highstand/assets/js/cubeportfolio/js/jquery.cubeportfolio.min.js?ver=6.3
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | stldanni0 -
Changing URL to a subdomain?
Hi there, I had a website www.footballshirtcollective.com that has been live since July. It contains both content and eCommerce. I am now separating out the content so that; 1. The master domain is www.footballshirtcollective.com (content) pointing to a new site 2. Subdomain is store.footballshirtcollective.com (ecommerce) - pointing to the existing site. What do you advise I can do to minimise the impact on my search? Many thanks Mike
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mjmaxwell0 -
Website Re-Launch - New URLS / Old URL WMT
Hello... We recently re-launched website with a new CMS (Magento). We kept the same domain name, however most of the structure changed. We were diligent about inputting the 301 redirects. The domain is over 15 years old and has tons of link equity and history. Today marks 27 days since launch...And Google Webmaster Tools showed me a recently detected (dated two days ago) URL from the old structure. Our natural search traffic has take a slow dive since launch...Any thoughts? Some background info: The old site did not have a sitemap.xml. The relaunched site does. Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | 19prince0 -
Does having a ? on the end of your URL affect your SEO?
I have some redirects that were done with at "?" at the end of the URL to include google coding (i.e. you click on an adwords link and the google coding follows the redirected link). When there is not coding to follow the link just appears as "filename.html?". Will that affect us negatively SEO-wise? Thank you.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RoxBrock1 -
Local language for folders in URLs?
Hi, We're working on a e-commerce project that will be launched in several countries. My question is this: Are there any advantages to name the URL-folders in the local language? Ie. International site: www.domain.com/product/adidas-model-x www.domain.com/category/adidas Norwegian site: www.domain.no/produkt/adidas-model-x www.domain.no/kategori/adidas As i like things tidy, I guess that would also mean we would have to rename the cart URLs and so on. ie. International site: www.domain.com/checkout Norwegian site: www.domain.no/kasse
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | rtora0 -
How canonical url harm our website???
Even though my website has no similar/copied content, i used rel=canonical for all my website pages. Is Google or yahoo make any harm to my SERP's?? EX: http://www.seomoz.org is my site, in that i used canonical as rel="<a class="attribute-value">canonical</a>" href="http://www.seomoz.org" to my home page like that similar to all pages, i created rel=canonical. Is search engine harm my website???
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MadhukarSV0 -
URL stucture like Zappos?
Hi, My site structure looks like this. domainname.com/nl/holidayhouses/villa-costa
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | remcozwaan
domainname.com/nl/apartments/apartment-caifem ect. I just went to zappos to research the site and het notice me that zappos.com has no directories. If i implement this my structure looks like this. domainname.com/nl/holidayhouse-villa-costa
domainname.com/nl/apartments-apartment-caifem Is this a better approach? Ciao, Remco0 -
2 Language Versions on Same URL
A site we are working on is a large gift retailer in Canada. They have a language option for French, but the page URLs are the same. If you click 'French' in the header, a cookie is set and then all pages are dynamically served the French content (and all nav/site elements of course change to French). The URLs then are exactly the same as it's the cookie that determines the language option to serve. e.g. www.site.ca/index.php?category=7&product=99.... would be the same regardless of if I'm set for English or French. Question: Does this setup have a negative impact on any SEO factors? The site has several thousand pages.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BMGSEO0