Will changing my wordpress permalinks add SEO value?
-
I'm considering changing my permalinks from:
http://www.musicliveuk.com/corporate-entertainment-1
http://www.musicliveuk.com/corporate-entertainment-2
to:
http://www.musicliveuk.com/corporate-entertainment-london etc...
(these are example pages and don't actually exist)
as I want to optimise pages for specific cities. This will create a load of 404 errors which I will have to 301 redirect (I presume that's the best way of doing it?). Does having the keyword in the url help and is the added SEO value (if their is any) worth it?
-
Based on the examples, I believe it would be well worth it. As indicated in several areas of SEOMoz, particularly the pro campaigns they list having the keyword in the url. I do believe that the 301's will pass on existing juice, but it will be more beneficial moving forward in the future.
On the campaign pages > On-Page Optimization> Moderate Importance Factors
<dt>Explanation</dt>
<dd>Keywords in the URL string help to add relevancy to the page for search engine rankings, assist searchers and users in identifying the page's content/topic when viewing the URL and provide value when used as the anchor text of referring links.</dd>
<dt>Recommendation</dt>
<dd>Employ the targeted keyword(s) in the URL string of the page. If you're targeting a 2+ word phrase, use hyphens to separate individual words.</dd>
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
-
Why is pagination SEO such a mystery in 2021?
Hi folks. I would like to discuss pagination. I use WordPress (Genesis, specifically). I ran my site through a site scan and it flagged an error which told me that my blog was producing duplicate meta descriptions because the blog is paginated - the same meta description from the blog page is being used on Page 2, Page 3 etc. I looked into this and the Internet is awash with many other people scratching around for a solution. My understanding is that using a canonical link on the first page is not a good idea, because it says to Google that only Page 1 of the blog is important. I also read an article that states Google no longer reads the Rel=Prev/Next code that could be used to tell Google to ignore the issue. So, what's the solution? Do I even need one? As a side-thought, it seems to me that pagination is, well, pretty useless. I mean, if my blog has 20 pages and I've worked hard to create content, who is going to click through to anywhere near page 20? Nobody. There has to be a smarter way for people on-site to access content. I would love your thoughts on all of this. Cheers.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nobody16165422281340 -
Job Board SEO
Hello community, Should I be using canonical tags on every job posted on my job board and also every job category page? I currently use no canonicals on my job board but I still rank well organically.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SO_UK1 -
Does Google Read URL's if they include a # tag? Re: SEO Value of Clean Url's
An ECWID rep stated in regards to an inquiry about how the ECWID url's are not customizable, that "an important thing is that it doesn't matter what these URLs look like, because search engines don't read anything after that # in URLs. " Example http://www.runningboards4less.com/general-motors#!/Classic-Pro-Series-Extruded-2/p/28043025/category=6593891 Basically all of this: #!/Classic-Pro-Series-Extruded-2/p/28043025/category=6593891 That is a snippet out of a conversation where ECWID said that dirty urls don't matter beyond a hashtag... Is that true? I haven't found any rule that Google or other search engines (Google is really the most important) don't index, read, or place value on the part of the url after a # tag.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Atlanta-SMO0 -
Recommendation for Small Business SEO
I'm trying to find a company that can provide SEO services for our small business. We have a limited budget, $500 a month or less. We have staff that can do much of the work in terms of correcting content issues, changing content, etc. However, I'm not an SEO expert and we need someone to help us by understanding where we are now and providing ongoing guidance on what we should be doing to improve and also in helping with execution where possible and/or necessary. Can anyone recommend a company that might be able to help us with this within our budget constraints?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Careerbags0 -
Retaining SEO value when changing the shopping cart software
I am looking into purchasing an existing ecommerce site with high SEO rankings. However, the site is old and beyond outdated. The shopping cart would need to be updated (say, to Magento). However, an updated shopping cart will force a change in the URLs (from example.com/category.asp to example.com/category). Will the SEO value be lost? Does anyone have any experience with this issue? There is a significant amount of money for me at stake so I would really appreciate to hear your experiences in this matter.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Ywsw0 -
Region specific SEO
I am doing SEO for a client in Canada. A few of his keywords are: palliative care
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | KS__
home health care
home care
respite care
senior care He wants to attract vistors only from Calgary specifically, not Canada wide. What should I do to optimize his website only for Calgary region? Should I add the word 'Calgary' to all his keywords?0 -
Should I change site link structure? Will that make things worse?
I've got an Exact Match Domain that has just started to do well in Google for say the past year. I've always received good rankings from Bing and Yahoo but I love the traffic levels that Google sends. Long story short on the 25th according to webmaster tools, my impressions on their search engine have been destroyed. No problems, not de-indexed, just not showing my site anymore. I like this site and have been careful, built some links and the anchor text is suspect but also not suspect because its the same as the domain. What I feel the problem may be is the site structure. I set it up a long time ago like this: Exact-Match-keyword. com/ Exact-match-keyword.php/state I thought it looked kinda spammy at the time but also thought it may help. Now I'm wondering if I shorten all the page titles to the state name and 301 the old links if I will regain rankings, or if I may lose some from other search engines. I used to think Penguins were cute......
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TEGS1 -
Are free WordPress templates bad for SEO?
Hello, I often build sites using WordPress. The other day I read an article in which the author stated that the sites built using the free WordPress template are not SEO-friendly. Could someone please confirm this statement? Does this mean that I need to develop themes myself or buy WordPress templates? Thank you for your help.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | salvyy0