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
-
Redirect chains error on the home page URL
Hello Everyone, I'm getting redirect chains error on the home page URL:
On-Page Optimization | | Nikhil_Falcon
http://ebitdacatalyst.com in Wordpress. I've checked my redirection list in the plugin, and haven't found any redirections on http://ebitdacatalyst.com. Can anyone please help me in solving this issue? I don't know where from it's coming.0 -
Does a / at the end of a URL create a duplicate page?
Hello, I have just used (the amazing) Screaming Frog to check my site and it is listing the two following pages as having duplicate titles, making me think it is seeing them as duplicate pages. http://zenplugs.com/zenplugs-molded-earphones/ http://zenplugs.com/zenplugs-molded-earphones Do I need to redirect one of these? Thanks in advance! Toby
On-Page Optimization | | T0BY0 -
To redirect or not to redirect...That is the question
We have old product data that is being updated (approx 30k sku's). Most of the old pages have been indexed and drive the majority of our online sales. But, the updated products have different titles, H1's, etc and have been re-formatted for the better in terms of usability. So, should we redirect thousands of pages to the new pages? Will Google be ok with that?...or should we reformat the current url's with the new data? And, if we reformat current url's with new data...the fear is that the on-page elements that the pages are being pick up for will get wiped out, (be it the H1 in some cases or the title or alt tag for another, etc) because it's simply too much to retain them during the import. Please share
On-Page Optimization | | nisvision0 -
The value of changing URL structure
Dear Moz members, There have been many questions on this forum on this topic but I cannot find one that completely answers my question. We launched our new website about 7 months ago and the website contains around 3.000 product pages. The average page authority of the product pages is quite still quite low (12). The URL structure is built like this: www.website.com/catalog/ID/productname/ (with right keywords in the product name). So e.g the current URL is Our competitors rank higher on certain keywords while page authority (and DA) are significantly lower. Their URL structure is set up like this: www.website.com/productname/. Our most import keyword is "grafmonumenten" and the link we would like to rank on is: https://www.denhollandsche.nl/grafmonumenten/ My question now is:
On-Page Optimization | | stepsstones
1: how important is the length/depth of the URL structure?
2: is it beneficial for us to change the structure (www.website.com/productname/) use permanent redirects? My expierence is that changing the 'page url' can cause a short term drop in the serps, but can have positive effects on the longer term. Thanks for helping me out!0 -
Url structure
Hi Guys, Wondering what is better for url structure say for example a key word "slow cooker" example.com/slowcooker or example.com/slow-cooker ? Thank you 🙂
On-Page Optimization | | GetApp0 -
Which URL Structure is best for New Website?
Hello All, I have one client and he want to develop his website but the he want the URL structure for his website page like below: http://www.example.com/category/xxproduct.html But I have suggest him below URL Structure http://www.example.com/category/xx-product.html So Can you people please suggest me that from above which URL structure is better from SEO side as well as from Visual side..? Is using - is better to separate the words in URL?
On-Page Optimization | | jemindesai0 -
Document structure (Headings)
Hi, Is it a "no go" to put text before H1 on a site? We got some courses where the user puts in the name of the course in a H1 Then we make a H2 with the name of the course and keywords (6 weeks course in XXX) So on the page it appears H1 "XXX Course" H2 "6 weeks course in XXX" **Description of the course ** Would it be logical to remove the H1 from the top and put it where the H2 currently is, leaving the top text with no heading?
On-Page Optimization | | Mickelp0 -
Absolute vs Relative URLs
What are the pros and cons of these two types of URLs and what type of weight does this hold. It doesn't seem to be a big issue in regards to ranking. Any qualified clarity would help.
On-Page Optimization | | Romancing0