Would you shorten this url, and if so how?
-
I designed the structure of my website way before I even thought about SEO. I run a website that requires me to categorize articles is somewhat deep nested categories so an example url would be as follows
Would you shorten the url to somethign like this?
http://www.yakangler.com/a/n/np/b/item/1442-jackson-kayak-launches-the-big-tuna
If so how would you manage the redirects I'm unsure how to add a 301 redirect in my .htaccess file that wouldn't require me to add one for every single article. Could I do it with a rule that recognizes only the middle part of the url and redirect it accordingly?
Thanks for any advice you might have!
-
I agree one hundred percent with Irving and Joseph. I would also ask you how your site is ranking and how old is the site and these URLs. You loose the age aspect of the URLs when you change them. You do gain the advantage and that's what you have to measure, the risk vs reward. Also, do you have inbound links / deep links to these pages ? And I am pretty sure you have the 301s in mind, I thought I'll mention, just in case.
I hope this helps.
-
Thanks for the good info Irving and Joseph, I wish I would have thought about SEO when initially building the site! I guess I'm going to look into a component to handle the redirects.
-
Great answer Irving,
I agree,
You don't want to go too many categories deep...
www.your-site.com/category-keyword1/category-keyword2/main-content-article-here
Try to naturally fit your keywords in the URL.
I find helps with ranking potential.
Because of seo best practices i like to keep my URL lengths within Seomoz recommendations of below 115 characters.
-
nope, you are still too many folder deep and your example is worse because the folder names are now meaningless.
this is slightly better:
http://www.yakangler.com/articles/products/boats/1442-jackson-kayak-launches-the-big-tuna
this is even better if you can swing it
http://www.yakangler.com/boats/1442-jackson-kayak-launches-the-big-tuna-boat
a) articles is not needed
b) new products won't always be new
c) boats is a legit category
d) item is not needed
e) get "boat" in your filename if you are trying to rank for that term
You can handle redirects through automation if you are using a cms like wordpress
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
-
Doubts about the technical URL structure
Hello, first we had this structure Categorie: https://www.stoneart-design.de/armaturen/ Subcategory: https://www.stoneart-design.de/armaturen/waschtischarmaturen/ Oft i see this https://www.xxxxxxxx.de/badewelt/badmoebel/ But i have heard it has something to do with layers so google can index it better, is that true ? "Badewelt" is an extra layer ? So i thought maybe we can better change this to: https://www.stoneart-design.de/badewelt/armaturen/ https://www.stoneart-design.de/badewelt/armaturen/waschtischarmaturen/ and after seeing that i thought we can do it also like this so the keyword is on the left, and make instead "badewelt" just a "c" and put it on the back https://www.stoneart-design.de/armaturen/c/ https://www.stoneart-design.de/armaturen/waschtischarmaturen/c/ I dont understand it anymomre which is the best one, to me its seems to be the last one The reason was about this: this looks to me keyword stuffing: Attached picture Google indexed not the same time the same url, so i thougt with this we can solve it Also we can use only the word "whirlpools" in de main category and the subs only the type without "whirlpools" in text thanks Regards, Marcel SC9vi60
Technical SEO | | HolgerL0 -
Google is indexing bad URLS
Hi All, The site I am working on is built on Wordpress. The plugin Revolution Slider was downloaded. While no longer utilized, it still remained on the site for some time. This plugin began creating hundreds of URLs containing nothing but code on the page. I noticed these URLs were being indexed by Google. The URLs follow the structure: www.mysite.com/wp-content/uploads/revslider/templates/this-part-changes/ I have done the following to prevent these URLs from being created & indexed: 1. Added a directive in my Htaccess to 404 all of these URLs 2. Blocked /wp-content/uploads/revslider/ in my robots.txt 3. Manually de-inedex each URL using the GSC tool 4. Deleted the plugin However, new URLs still appear in Google's index, despite being blocked by robots.txt and resolving to a 404. Can anyone suggest any next steps? I Thanks!
Technical SEO | | Tom3_150 -
Bulk URL Removal in Webmaster Tools
One of Wordpress sites was hacked (for about 10 hours), and Google picked up 4000+ urls in the index. The site is fixed, but I'm stuck with all those urls in the index. All the urls of of the form: walkerorthodontics.com/index.php?online-payday-cash-loan.htmloncewe The only bulk removal option I could find was to remove an entire folder, but I can't do that, as it would only leave the homepage and kill off everything else. For some crazy reason, the removal tools doesn't support wildcards, so that obvious solution is right out. So, how do it get rid of 4000 results? And no, waiting around for them to 404 out of the index isn't an option.
Technical SEO | | MichaelGregory0 -
Some URLs in the sitemap not indexed
Our company site has hundreds of thousands of pages. Yet no matter how big or small the total page count, I have found that the "URLs Indexed" in GWMT has never matched "URLS in Sitemap". When we were small and now that we have a LOT more pages, there is always a discrepancy of ~10% or so missing from the index. It's difficult to know which pages are not indexed, but I have found some that I can verify are in the Sitemap.xml file but not at all in the index. When I go to GWMT I can "Fetch and Render" missing pages fine - it's not as though it's blocked or inaccessible. Any ideas on why this is? Is this type of discrepancy typical?
Technical SEO | | Mase0 -
SEO url best practices
We're revamping our site architecture and making several services pages that are accessible from one overarching service page. An example would be as follows: Services Student Services Essay editing Essay revision Author Services Book editing Manuscript critique We'll also be putting breadcrumbs throughout the site for easy navigation, however, is it imperative that we build the URLs that deep? For example, could we simply have www.site.com/essay-editing rather than www.site.com/services/students/essay-editing? I prefer the simplicity of the former, but I feel the latter may be more "search robot friendly" and better for SEO. Any advice on this is much appreciated.
Technical SEO | | Kibin0 -
URLs Case Sensitive Serving Duplications
At PakWheels.com we have URLs being generated in upper and lower cases. For example following URLs serve pages: http://www.pakwheels.com/used-cars/search/-/mk_Toyota/ http://www.pakwheels.com/used-cars/search/-/mk_toyota/ Both show same content. Similarly in following four cases: http://www.pakwheels.com/used-cars/search/-/mk_Toyota/md_corolla/ http://www.pakwheels.com/used-cars/search/-/mk_Toyota/md_Corolla/ http://www.pakwheels.com/used-cars/search/-/mk_toyota/md_Corolla/ http://www.pakwheels.com/used-cars/search/-/mk_toyota/md_corolla/ all of these 4 URLs serve page with same content. What is the best practice for this issue, is it generating duplication? Please advise
Technical SEO | | razasaeed0 -
URL Structure: When to insert keywords?
I read the SEOmoz beginers guide and it said that it's beneficial to place keywords in the URL as long as you don't overdo it. However, this seems awkward for common pages, such as "Home", "About", "Contact" etc.... I've currently targeted a specific keyword for each page on my site, as follows: Home: "Green Screen" Work: "Greenscreen" About: "Event Photography" Pricing: "Green Screen Photography" Should I rename the URLs as: Home: ...com/green-screen-home.html Work: ...com/greenscreen-work.html About:...com/about-event-photography.html Pricing:...com/green-screen-photography-pricing.html
Technical SEO | | pharcydeabc0 -
301 an old URL with a ? in the URL?
I am redoing a site and the URL's are changing structure. The client's site was in magento and in the store they would get two URLs, for example: /store/categoryname/productname and /store/categoryname/productname?SID=dslkajsfdoiu947598whouieht983hg98 Do I have to 301 redirect both of these URL's to their new counterpart? Both go to the same content but magento seemed to add these SIDs into the navigation and Google has both versions in the index.
Technical SEO | | DanDeceuster0