Is it OK to have a site that has some URLs with hyphens and other, older, legacy URLs that use underscores?
-
I'm working with a VERY large site that has recently been redesigned/recategorized. They kept only about 20% of the URLs from the legacy site, the URLs that had revenue tied to them, and these URLs use underscores. Whereas the new URLs created for the site use hyphens.
I don't think that this would be an issue for Google, as long as the pages are of quality, but I wanted to get everyone's opinion on this. Will it hurt me to have two different sets of URLs, those with using hyphens and those using underscores?
-
Search engines handle underscores in different ways, so it's best to make them uniform and use hyphens, all being equal - This appears to be best practice in Google's eyes.
I wouldn't worry about it too much thought and I would take vitalscom's advice if you were thinking about moving them over.
-
Absolutely not an issue, hyphens are just a little bit more SEO friendly. A lot of sites choose to leave legacy URLs when there is a chance at losing revenue by changing them. 301 redirects do lose a little bit of PR, so it makes sense to be apprehensive. It just looks less uniform.
I would suggest moving a small handful of them over and run a specific ranking report on just those URLs to monitor any loss of rank instead of moving them all in one shot and risking loss of revenue.
-
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
-
How do I treat URLs with bookmarks when migrating a site?
I'm migrating an old website into a new one, and have several pages that have bookmarks on them. Do I need to redirect those? or how should they be treated? For example, both https://www.tnscanada.ca/our-expertise.html and https://www.tnscanada.ca/our-expertise.html#auto resolve .
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | NatalieB_Kantar0 -
How important is it to add hyphens between words in URL Permalink Structure?
We have an issue with our URL Permalink Structures for dynamically generated pages on our website. As we generated hundreds of pages, it does not automatically Space the Words in the Permalink Structure . For example, if we have a product name Under Armour Fire Basketball Shoe , it will show up in the url as: "mywebsite.com/underarmourfire-basketballshoe" vs "mywebsite.com/under-armour-fire-basketball-shoe" How important is it that the URL includes these spaces between each word in the permalink?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | NJ-Keith0 -
Redirecting Ecommerce Site
Hi I'm working on a big site migration I'm setting up redirects for all the old categories to point to the new ones. I'm doing this based on relevancy, the categories don't match up exactly but I've tried to redirect to the most relevant alternative. Would this be the right approach?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BeckyKey1 -
Changing URLS: from a short well optimised URL to a longer one – What's the traffic risk
I'm working with a client who has a website that is relatively well optimised, thought it has a pretty flat structure and a lot of top level pages. They've invested in their content over the years and managed to rank well for key search terms. They're currently in the process of changing CMS and as a result of new folder structuring in the CMS the URLs for some pages look to have significantly changed. E.g Existing URL is: website.com/grampians-luxury-accommodation which ranked quite well for luxury accommodation grampians New URL when site is launched on new CMS would be website.com/destinations/victoria/grampians My feeling is that the client is going to lose out on a bit of traffic as a result of this. I'm looking for information or ways or case studies to demonstrate the degree of risk, and to help make a recommendation to mitigate risk.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | moge0 -
When the site's entire URL structure changed, should we update the inbound links built pointing to the old URLs?
We're changing our website's URL structures, this means all our site URLs will be changed. After this is done, do we need to update the old inbound external links to point to the new URLs? Yes the old URLs will be 301 redirected to the new URLs too. Many thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Jade1 -
Old site penalised, we moved: Shall we cut loose from the old site. It's curently 301 to new site.
Hi, We had a site with many bad links pointing to it (.co.uk). It was knocked from the SERPS. We tried to manually ask webmasters to remove links.Then submitted a Disavow and a recon request. We have since moved the site to a new URL (.com) about a year ago. As the company needed it's customer to find them still. We 301 redirected the .co.uk to the .com There are still lots of bad links pointing to the .co.uk. The questions are: #1 Do we stop the 301 redirect from .co.uk to .com now? The .co.uk is not showing in the rankings. We could have a basic holding page on the .co.uk with 'we have moved' (No link). Or just switch it off. #2 If we keep the .co.uk 301 to the .com, shall we upload disavow to .com webmasters tools or .co.uk webmasters tools. I ask this because someone else had uploaded the .co.uk's disavow list of spam links to the .com webmasters tools. Is this bad? Thanks in advance for any advise or insight!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SolveWebMedia0 -
URL Question and Advice on Site Architecture
Good morning one and all, i have a specific question pertaining to my Domain Migration Website URL structure. I have a computer repair business that I am re branding and my question at this point is centrally focused on how to best handle my URL naming structure that will best suite my needs for my the Search Engines and also my customers UX while not looking SPAMMY I am a web developer and SEO and I am building a SILO Site Architecture in WordPress using Pages (not Posts) so no discussion is need on the Permalink structure. I am attaching several Images below of Screen Shots of the new site that I have designed so that you may look at them and see the Silo Architecture Layout in action for the most part. OK, here we go. Looking at the Silo Mast Head, we can see that the following Main Menu items each represent a specific Silo Theme Silo Theme # 1 - COMPUTER REPAIR Silo Theme # 2 - VIRUS REMOVAL Silo Theme # 3 - PHONE REPAIR Silo Theme # 4 - NETWORKING Silo Theme # 5 - DATA RECOVERY My specific question is, if /computer-repair/ is a main silo theme (WP -Parent Page) and /laptop-repair/ is a (Child Page) of Computer Repair is the following example below (the actual URL string) going to 'trigger' a SPAM signal to either the user or GOOGLE or both?? URL String: http://www.pcmedicsoncall.com/computer-repair/laptop-repair/ Here's another example with the VIRUS REMOVAL SILO http://www.pcmedicsoncall.com/virus-removal/malware-removal/ Seeing how computer repair is the main silo theme that cannot be changed in the URL Structure (it can) but I wont change it seeing how COMPUTER REPAIR is the single largest keyword phrase used by individuals when they are looking for computer repair. Secondly, - LAPTOP REPAIR is also a Keyword Phrase that that has HIGH search queries that I am trying to rank for and that too (ideally) should also not changed! How do I deal with this situation? Or, am I seeing this in a overly paranoid way? I currently have the site allowing only my IP Address so I am afraid that the screen shots below is all that I can do on this in lieu of actually visiting the Site Currently, I have my URL Structure where Wilmington NC immediately follows the targeted keyword phrase for the Silo Theme like below http://www.pcmedicsoncall.com/virus-removal-wilmington-nc/malware-removal/ The example above, - including the location after the keyword phrase does look much more attractive and breaks it up so it does not read SPAMMY and it will help with SEO but yet another problem exists using the location after the keyword phrase which I explain in detail Below. On top of doing a complete re-branding Domain Change I am actually going to be relocating myself and my business to Charlotte, NC at the end of the summer so I have serious doubts if using Wilmington NC within the URL structure would be a wise idea considering that I will be relocating and an internal 301 Redirect on a Newly Migrated site 2-3 months after the initial site migration and site setup may have some negative impact and confuse Google and compound the situation thus much further despite the fact that it would immediately help me bounce back up with my rankings after the migration process. Thoughts a suggestions on both explained scenarios please? I have asked this specif question once already but obviously people do not read my very detailed and well thought out questions. This can also be viewed here>http://www.seomoz.org/q/need-very-urgent-advice-on-wedsite-migration-questions-please#reply_150847> Thank you Sincerely, Marshall Thompson SEOMOZ-PC-MEDICS-ON-CALL-1.jpg SEOMOZ-PC-MEDICS-ON-CALL1.jpg
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MarshallThompson310 -
Question regarding error url while checking in open-site explorer tool
Hello friends, My website home url & inner page url shows error while checking the open-site site explorer tool from SEOMoz, for a website** eg.www.abc.com website as**
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | zco_seo
**"Oh Hey! It looks like that URL redirects to www.abc.com/error.aspx?aspxerrorpath=/default.aspx. Would you like to see data for that URL instead?"**May I know the reason, why this url showing this result while checking back link report from the tool?**May I know on what basis this tool is evaluating the website url as well?****May I know, Will this affect the Google SERPs for this website?**Thanks0