Does a page's url have any weight in Google rankings?
-
I'm sure this question must have been asked before but I can't find it.
I'm assuming that the title tag is far more important than the page's url. Is that correct? Does the url have any relevance to Google?
-
both are important for SEO - the filename in the URL should match up with your title tag. all filenames should be unique. for example
www.coolsite.com/kids-toys/blue-schwinn-bike
not
www.coolsite.com/kids-toys/blue-schwinn-bike/index.php
this latter example would cause you to wind up with Google seeing every page with the same filename index.php
-
both are important for SEO - the filename in the URL should match up with your title tag. all filenames should be unique. for example
www.coolsite.com/kids-toys/blue-schwinn-bike
not
www.coolsite.com/kids-toys/blue-schwinn-bike/index.php
this latter example would cause you to wind up with Google seeing every page with the same filename index.php
-
Thanks for your help Wayne.
Best,
Richard
-
Thanks, Rachel. That's what I thought, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to check with some Pros.
Best,
Richard -
Richard, here is a document I would check out: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/11-best-practices-for-urls. It's from the man (Rand) himself and much of what is stated holds true today.
-
Your URL example is fine, it's the gobble-de-gook URLs that are a problem
-
Thanks Wayne,
I'm okay with our domain name, but the urls of some of our pages have long navigation paths (e.g. http://www.lifeinsure.com/education-center/life-insurance-videos/how-much-life-insurance-should-i-have). A lot of our pages have urls like this.
Do you see any problem with a url this long and does Google put more weight on the title tag than on the url?
Best,
R
-
Hi Richard,
The short answer is, yes, domain names and URL structure are certainly key to positive ranking for particular keywords. Some would argue that domain names carry too much weight (I personally think so!), but it's a fact, so be careful when picking your domain name and also be sure you are properly formatting your URLs.
If you have specific questions regarding either, I'm happy to try and help.
Best,
W
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
-
URL Structure Category Pages -Current Moz Friday-
Hello,
On-Page Optimization | | _Heiko_
regarding #15 of the last moz friday I have a question: http://moz.com/blog/15-seo-best-practices-for-structuring-urls What would you prefer if the lenght of the URL will be still under 60 characters and you have an example like this: Let's call it a specific page in a category. As I like the old shoe examples: You have a page about red shoes in your shoe category. Which URL would you prefer: a) www.mydomain.com/shoes/red-shoe b) www.mydomain.com/shoes/red Personally I would prefer a) or would you already consider this as spammy? My real example is not that trivial like the shoe example and the categories will be in plural and the specific pages always in singular (like in the example shoes vs shoe). c) would be to put it independently from the side structure on www.mydomain.com/red-shoe - but personally I have the experience that a) or b) will help the rankings of the category page if you have the specific pages in the same subfolder. What's your opinion on this?1 -
Do deep pages issues affect homepage chances of ranking?
Hello community, I have a general question: let's say you have some issues in deep pages, like duplicate pages without a canonical tag, or missing description or missing titles, etc.. Will these issues affect the chances of the homepage ranking if the homepage is optimized (no duplicates, canonical, good keywords volume, alt text, etc.) and has none of the issues present in deep pages within the site? Gracias.
On-Page Optimization | | EduardoRuiz0 -
Google ranking is HORRIBLE. Following SEOMoz suggestions and just can't climb.
First of all, the URL is stores.dhsequipment.com. In January, this online store switched from Homestead to Big Commerce. Since the store updated, we decided now is the time to update our product descriptions, URL's, title tags and meta descriptions. (For the first time, we had the ability to customize our URL's.) Product Description: I went through 2,500 products and updated the product description. I added an H1 & H2 to each description, and included pertinent information such as part numbers. Each product also received a new page title, meta description (which is usually the first line of the product description, don't know if this is bad or not) and a new URL, (which did redirect). Once I would complete a section, I would submit a new sitemap to Webmaster Tools. After a month and nothing happening, I started using SEOMoz which helped me rebuild some of my more important pages, such as the home page and main category pages such as: http://stores.dhsequipmentparts.com/stihl-ts420-parts/
On-Page Optimization | | pearldesign
http://stores.dhsequipmentparts.com/stihl-ts700-parts-stihl-ts800-parts/ I fetched these pages in Webmaster Tools after completion. However, it's been several weeks since and I'm still on page 4 or 5 in the SERPs. Just a little history on the store; this store has been in operation for more than 6 years. Previously, we ranked on page one for 75%+ of our products. My belief is because our URL's had history, probably more so than our competitors. I'm not sure what I should do. Business is super slow and we can't afford to wait much longer.0 -
Any idea how Google is doing this? Is it schematic? http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/28/google-adds-full-restaurant-menus-to-its-search-results-pages/
Google is now showing menus on select searches. Any idea how they are getting this information? I would like to make sure my clients get visibility this way.
On-Page Optimization | | Ron_McCabe0 -
Does google treat all urls equal?
Sorry for the lame title, i couldn't think of a better one. I want to know if google treats this: http://www.domain.com/products/some-product-name the same as it would treat: http://www.domain.com/?products=some-product-name if not, could you tell me the differences?
On-Page Optimization | | adriandg0 -
What's the Best Way to Hide Redirects from Search Engines?
Hey everybody, I like to use php redirects for affiliate links so they look better. I keep them all in the same directory. I read recently that these may hurt SEO. A couple quick questions: Is this the best way to redirect affiliate links? Should I simply block the directory in robots.txt? Any other suggestions from you SEO guyses and galz? Thanks! Jared
On-Page Optimization | | JaredB0