URL strategy mobile website
-
Hello everyone,
We are facing a challenging decision about where our website (Flash Gaming website) is going.
We are in the process of creating html5 games in the same theme of the flash games that we provide to our users.
Now our main concern is to decide how to show this new content to the user?
Shall we create brand new set of urls such as :
http://www.mydomain.com/games/mobile/kids/
Or shall we adapt the main desktop url :
http://www.mydomain.com/games/kids/
and show the users two different versions of the page depending on whether they are using a mobile device (so they see a mobile version) or a pc/laptop (so they a see desktop version).
Or even redirect people to a sub-domain :
The main idea we had is to keep the same url structure, as it seems that google is giving the same search results if you are using a mobile device or not. And creating a new set of urls or even a sub-domain, may involve a lot of work to get those new links to the same PA as the desktop URL that is here and know since a while now.
Also the desktop page game should not be accessible to the mobile devices, so should this be redirected (301?) to the mobile homepage of the site?
But how google will look at the fact that one url is giving 2 different contents, CSS etc, and also all those redirects might look strange... we are worried that doing so will hurt the page authority and its ranking ... but we are trying to find the best way to combine SEO and user experience.
Any input on this will be really appreciated.
Cheers,
-
Jason,
Thanks for your answer, yeah the issue that we have is that the site is a flash gaming site, and as you know flash is not running on Apple and really slow on other mobile devices, so the solution is to give access to only html5 games to our users rather than having huge bounce rates on flash based games.
This said now, if my page /games list all the games for desktop, do you think it will be wise to keep this page and only show the html5 one to the mobile user, but this will give 2 different version of the page to google, or will it be better to create /games/mobile and don't let users that use mobile device see /games that should only be accessible if you are not using a mobile device.
I am like you it will be better to keep everything under one domain rather than going for the subdomain route.
Cheers,
-
Googles recommended approach is to have the same URL for mobile and desktop optimized pages:
https://developers.google.com/webmasters/smartphone-sites/details
This is obviously the safest way to insure your SEO value is aggregated between mobile and desktop visitors.
I also favor universal URL's because so many users now use multiple devices. How often will a user hear about your service, when they are out and about and look at your site on their mobile device, and then bookmark it or e-mail it to themselves, to review at more depth on their laptop at home. Do you really want them to see the mobile optimized version of your site on their laptop?
Note, if you feel that users visiting your site on a mobile device are trying to perform very different user tasks than desktop users, and so the functionality of the pages is widely different, then I would recommend using a separate URL scheme.
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
-
Website cache has removed
Hi Team, I am facing an issue with cache of the website, despite various r&d I couldn't able to find the solution as code seems to be ok to me. Can any one of you check and let me know why home page and some of the product pages removed from the caching. See here: https://bit.ly/2Kna3PD Appreciate a quick response! Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Devtechexpert0 -
Google is not indexing an updated website
We just relaunched a website that has 5 years old, we maintain all the old URLs and articles but for some reason google is not picking up the new website https://www.navisyachts.com. In Google Webmaster Tools we can see the sitemap with over 1000 pages submitted but shows nothing as indexed. The site is loosing traffic rapidly and positions, from the SEO side all looks fine for me. What can be wrong? I’ll appreciate any help. The new website is built over Joomla 3.4, we have it here at MOZ and other than some minor details it doesn't show that something can be wrong with the website. Thank you.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | FWC_SEO0 -
Attack of the dummy urls -- what to do?
It occurs to me that a malicious program could set up thousands of links to dummy pages on a website: www.mysite.com/dynamicpage/dummy123 www.mysite.com/dynamicpage/dummy456 etc.. How is this normally handled? Does a developer have to look at all the parameters to see if they are valid and if not, automatically create a 301 redirect or 404 not found? This requires a table lookup of acceptable url parameters for all new visitors. I was thinking that bad url names would be rare so it would be ok to just stop the program with a message, until I realized someone could intentionally set up links to non existent pages on a site.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | friendoffood1 -
Redesigned Website
Hi, I have redesigned my website in html whereas it was in .asp earlier. I have resubmitted my google sitemap but it still showing me old site pages in search except home page. My question is how i can immediately change my web presence. How i can get the benefit of my .asp page ranks? In addition my website still alive with .asp. What should be the strategy, should i remove this websites or have to redirect all pages to new. If i make 301 redirection then will it cause any issue in SEO, ranking etc ? Thx
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | 1akal0 -
Website Migration and SEO
Recently I migrated three websites from www.product.com to www.brandname.com/product. Two of these site are performing as normal when it comes to SEO but one of them lost half of its traffic and dropped in rankings significantly. All pages have been properly redirected, onsite SEO is intact and optimized, and all pages are indexed by Search engines. Has anyone had experience with this type of migration that could give some input on what a possible solution could be? Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AlexVelazquez0 -
Dates in the URLs for a "hot" content website (tipping service)
Hi, I'm planning to build a website that will present games previews for different sports. I think that the date should be included in the URL as the content will be valuable until the kick off f the game. So first i want to know if this is the right approach and second the URL structure i have imagined is /tips/sport/competition/year/month/day Ex : /tips/football/premier_league/2013/11/05 Is this a good structure ? Guillaume.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | betadvisor0 -
What Should I Do With My URL Names?
I release property on my blog each week, and it has come to the point we will get property in the same area as we have had in the past. So, I name my URL /blah-blah-blah-[area of property]/ for the first property in that area right. Now I get a different property in that same area and the URL will have to be named /blah-blah-blah-[area of property]-2/. Now I'm not sure if this is a major issue or not, but I'm sure there must be a better way than this, and I don't really want to take down our past properties - unless you can give me good reason too, of course? So before I start getting URLs like this: /blah-blah-blah-[area of property]-2334343534654/ (well, ok, maybe not that bad! But you get my point) I wanted to see what everyones opinion on it is 🙂 Thanks in advance!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JonathanRolande0 -
Should I shorten my urls?
For my informational site I have a lot of urls that are way too long. When I first created the site, I wrote a script that takes out the common words of a post and fashions a url. So, for example, if the first few words of a question were: Hi there, I have a question about back pain. I'm wondering what drugs would be good for relief and how I can get some help? then my url may be: www.mydomain.com/question?id=123-question-back-pain-wondering-drugs-good-relief-how-get-some-help Once I got learning about seo I realized that these urls were too long but I never did anything about them. Should I be shortening these, or is my time best spent doing something else?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MarieHaynes2