Include placename in URL, or not?
-
Hi Mozzers,
I'm wondering whether to put placename in URL or not. This is for a hotel so it's very focused on the county.
I have loads of sub pages along the lines of www.hotelname.com/short-breaks-somerset www.hotelname.com/eat-out-somerset and so on but I was wondering whether that placename element would help or hinder.
For example, may want to rank for short breaks in other searches (not just those seeking short breaks in Somerset) and was wondering whether the somerset bit may actually hinder this in the future.
Also noticed Somerset is mentioned in nearly all of the page urls through the site. Perhaps this is a bit spammy and just not neccesary. I can include the address of the hotel on every page anyway.
What do you think? Thanks in advance for your help Luke
-
Thanks Tom - thanks for nudging me in the right direction and Somerset is just brilliant. Haven't actually been there before but... wow. Drinking a nice glass of organic Somerset Cider as I type (slurp!).
-
Hey Luke
I say promote Somerset more and more, it's lovely there!
I think from an SEO perspective having Somerset in your place name is unlikely to have a negative effect. It's not really stuffing a keyword in there, it's more being descriptive, so I wouldn't worry there.
Now for other non-Somerset terms, it could be having a slight SEO effect. There's a slight correlation between URLs with keywords in them and higher rankings, so one could argue that if Google is able to associate your hotel/breaks with Somerset, it might disassociate them with hotel breaks in say Blackpool. The URL may not serve the user intent (although I'd say your on-page content would dictate this far more).
What I do think would be a greater problem, however, is the click-through and conversion rate of users looking for breaks but not in the somerset area. If they see your site in the search engines and see Somerset in the URL, it might discourage them for clicking. Similarly, if they're on your site and see it, they might not think it's relevant and leave.
More so for the user experience rather than the SEO ramifications, I'd consider changing the URL, if this is relevant.
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
-
Do we lose Backlinks and Domain Authority of URL when we change domain Name?
Have 1 performing domain (Monthly - 4M visitor ) now we want to change domain name ( Brand name like SEOMOZ to Moz ). I have general knowledge about domain changing prevention tips like 301 redirection and other thing. My concern is about backlinks and DA. How can I prevent any lose from SEO Point of view. (backlink lose) Do I need to change all backlink form source or redirection is enough to get all reference traffic from that backlinks?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | HuptechWebseo0 -
Deleting 301 Redirect URLs from the CMS
Hi Everyone, Would there be a negative SEO effect from deleting pages with 301 redirects in your CMS? Does anyone know of an average time of authority transfer from a redirect? Thanks,
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | JMSCC
Jon0 -
Google URL Shortener- Should I use one or multiple???
I have a client with a number of YouTube videos. I'm using Google URL Shortner to allow the link to show in the YouTube text (as its a long URL). Many of these links go to the same page ex .com/services-page Should I use a single short URL for each video linking to the .com/services-page or should they be unique each time? If unique, would Google possibly think I'm trying to manipulate results? Thanks in advance. I'm just not sure on this one and hope someone knows best practice on this. Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mgordon1 -
Best URL structure for SEO for Malaysian/Singapore site on .com.au domain
Hi there I know ideally i need a .my or .sg domain, however i dont have time to do this in the interim so what would be the best way to host Malaysian content on a www.domainname.com.au website? www.domainname.com.au/en-MY
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | IsaCleanse
www.domainname.com.au/MY
domainname.com.au/malaysia
malaysia.domainname.com.au
my.domainname.com.au Im assuming this cant make the .com.au site look spammy but thought I'd ask just to be safe? Thanks in advance! 🙂0 -
Why have bots (including googlebot) categorized my website as adult?
How do bots decide whether a website is adult? For example, I have a gifting portal, but strangely here, it is categorized as 'Adult'. Also, my google adsense application to run ads on my site got rejected - I have a feeling this is because googlebot categorized my site as adult. And there are good chances that other bots also consider it an adult website, rather than a gifting website. Can anyone please go through the site and tell me why this is happening? Thanks in advance.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | rahulkan0 -
Starting fresh on a new url after serious Penguin update down rank
Hi friends My site www.acupunctureclinicvictoriabc.com was recently hit by the penguin update and i dropped to page 5 of local searchs for my key words. A while back I had some bad link building done and now paying for it:( I thought the disavow tool (used 4 months ago) would deal with this issue but apparently not The current url is feeling like a lost cause. My question is if I start fresh on a new url, can I use my old content (or even clone the site and move it to a new url) without being punished for duplicate content on the new site? Any recommendations for starting fresh? I really appreciate any thoughts on this matter, as I am feeling a bit lost and bummed about this issue thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Silasrose0 -
Google Bombing For A Specific URL
The term "Beruk" which means "Ape or Monkey" in english brings up this page of wikipedia amongst the first page result: URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khairy_Jamaluddin The page does not contain the word "Beruk". External links to the page do not contact the anchor-text "Beruk" Given the above scenario, how is the page still ranking on first page for this keyword?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | rajeevbala0