Best URL-structure for ecommerce store?
-
What structure will recommend to the product pages?
Lets make an example with the keyword "Luxim FZ200"
With category in url:
www.myelectronicshop.com/digital-cameras/luxim-FZ200.htmlWith /product prefix:
www.myelectronicshop.com/product/luxim-FZ200.htmlWithout category in url:
www.myelectronicshop.com/luxim-FZ200.htmlI have read in a blog post that Paddy Moogan recommend /lluxim-FZ200.html - i think i prefer this version too.
But I can see that many of the bigger ecommerce stores are using a /product prefix before the product name. What is the reason for this? and what is best practice?
-
I Have an ecommerce site hosted on volusion and they make the structure /category/product (Specifically www.example.com/shortnameurl/productcode"). I figure with 10000+ sites they have found that this structure is best. They want the best results for their clients so they retain & gain new busines.
I recently tried to duplicate(ish) the product name like /black-luxium-camera/luxiumfz200 ... and google killed me.
My suggestion, stick with /categoryORbrand/product, NOT .com/product/ as there is more opportunity to stand out when people search.
-
I guess if you could host all your products at root level then this would be better....it just may be difficult to manage house keeping wise.
-
Why would you go for example.com/product/luxim-FZ200.html instead of example.com/luxim-FZ200.html ?
-
Duplicate content is not at problem - there will of course always be a default category.
-
To avoid duplicate content I would specify that you don't have the same product page sitting in different categories.
Instead the product page should be the same URL even if it lives in multiple categories.e.g. www.example/product/luxim-FZ200.html
So if you click on the product link in Panasonic you go to the product page. You then go to the same page if you click on the product page from the "digital camera" category. The page is then unique and doesn't live in any category in particular.
You can then set the canonical link at product page level.
-
Hey Jesper,
The decision of URL structure can be affected by multiple stuff, that your Content Management System supports or not.
I prefer the 3rd version (the one without category in the link) to avoid duplicate content coming from different URL patterns to the same page (now I know you could place canonical links, but what happens when you have 50000 products and at least 10000 categories and child categories?).
If you do not have too many categories and subcategories, and you are able to insert canonical links into your system, then I would go for URL structure with category name included (it is more descriptive).
Just an example for your case:
A. Website with a lot of categories and subcategories
www.example.com/panasonic/lumix/lumix-FZ200.html
www.example.com/digital-cameras/panasonic/lumx-FZ200.html
www.example/product/luxim-FZ200.html
and so on...
Could leave to duplicate content if you cannot point out which version of the URL is the "Real" version.
B. Website would have the same product under the same categories, but then the product URL would look like:
www.example/luxim-FZ200.html
I hope that helps you take a decision.
Gr.,
Istvan
-
I believe the reason many ecommerce stores use a /product prefix in the URL is because their ecommerce provider / program does it by default.
I'd typically go with the first (with category, but without product) as you have a sort of breadcrumbing in your URL structure, which can also be applied on page.However, I don't usually have products in more than one category - if you do then Paddy's suggestion is the way to go, because, as he says, if you have the category in the URL in that scenario it can lead to duplicate content issues.
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
-
What is the best tool for getting a SiteMap url for a website with over 4k pages?
I have just migrated my website from HUGO to Wordpress and I want to submit the sitemap to Google Search Console (because I haven't done so in a couple years). It looks like there are many tools for getting a sitemap file built. But I think they probably vary in quality. Especially considering the size of my site.
Technical SEO | | DanKellyCockroach2 -
Vanity URLs are being indexed in Google
We are currently using vanity URLs to track offline marketing, the vanity URL is structured as www.clientdomain.com/publication, this URL then is 302 redirected to the actual URL on the website not a custom landing page. The resulting redirected URL looks like: www.clientdomain.com/xyzpage?utm_source=print&utm_medium=print&utm_campaign=printcampaign. We have started to notice that some of the vanity URLs are being indexed in Google search. To prevent this from happening should we be using a 301 redirect instead of a 302 and will the Google index ignore the utm parameters in the URL that is being 301 redirect to? If not, any suggestions on how to handle? Thanks,
Technical SEO | | seogirl221 -
Keywords, when are you overdoing it in the URL?
Hi guys, I'm auditing a site covering compensation for cancer. Keywords could include: Undiagnosed cancer 20 cancer compensation 10 undiagnosed cancer symptoms 10 cancer misdiagnosis claims 20 cancer claims 10 misdiagnosis of cancer 50 cancer misdiagnosis 70 So, when structuring the URL for the category, this was previously selected: www.site.co.uk/medical-negligence/cancer-misdiagnosis Although sub-pages appear like this: www.site.co.uk/medical-negligence/cancer-misdiagnosis/breast-cancer-misdiagnosis-claim/ 'Cancer misdiagnosis' as a keyword attracts the most traffic, but if we're using it on sub-pages - is there a need to include it twice on all sub-page URLs? With that in mind, would it be better to follow the following format? www.site.co.uk/medical-negligence/cancer-compensation www.site.co.uk/medical-negligence/cancer-compensation/breast-cancer-misdiagnosis-claim/ Or is there a better way to structure this? Thanks in advance guys!
Technical SEO | | Muhammad-Isap0 -
Regarding Structured Data
I was wondering if you have any insight as to why my star ratings are yet to show up in google SERPs. I've set up a test (months ago) just to test the formatting, my code looks like this: <span typeof="<a class="attribute-value">v:Review-aggregate</a>" xmlns:v="<a class="attribute-value">http://rdf.data-vocabulary.org/#</a>">There are currently <span property="<a class="attribute-value">v:count</a>">15span> reviews for <span property="<a class="attribute-value">v:itemreviewed</a>">Ford Mustang brakesspan> with an average rating of <span rel="<a class="attribute-value">v:rating</a>"><span typeof="<a class="attribute-value">v:Rating</a>"><span property="<a class="attribute-value">v:average</a>">4.50span> out of <span property="<a class="attribute-value">v:best</a>">5span> stars.span>span>span> Any ideas why it hasn't show up yet?
Technical SEO | | andrewv0 -
Term for how content or data is structured
There is a term for how data or content is structured and for the life of me I can't figure it out. The following is the best I know of how to explain it: magnolia is of Seattle. Seattle is of Washington. Washington is of the US. US is of North America. North America is of Earth. etc etc etc etc. Any help is much appreciated. I'm trying to use the term to communicate It's application to SEO in that Google analyze how information is structured to understand the breadth and depth of your sites content...
Technical SEO | | BonsaiMediaGroup0 -
Changing all urls
A client of mine has a wordpress website that is installed in a directory, called "site". So when you go to www.domain.com you are redirected to www.domain.com/site. We all know how bad it is to have a redirect fron your subdomain to another page. In this case I measured a loss of 5 points of page authority. The question is: what is the best practice to remove the "site" from the address and changing all the urls? Should I use the webmaster tool to tell to Google that the site is moving? It's not 100% true, cause the site is just moving one level up. Should I install a copy of the website under www.domain.com and just redirect 301 every old page to its new url? This way I think the site would be deindexet for 2/3 months. Any suggestions or tips welcome! Thanks DoMiSol
Technical SEO | | DoMiSoL0 -
Duplicate pages, overly dynamic URL’s and long URL’s in Magento
Hi there, I’ve just completed the first crawl of my Magento site and SEOMOZ has picked up 1,000’s of duplicate pages, overly dynamic URL’s and long URL’s due to the sort function which appends URL’s with variables when sorting products (e.g. www.example.com?dir=asc&order=duration). I’m not particularly concerned that this will affect our rankings as Google has stated that they are familiar with the structure of popular CMS’s and Magento is pretty popular. However it completely dominates my crawl diagnostics so I can’t see if there are any real underlying issues. Does anyone know a way of preventing this? Cheers,
Technical SEO | | WendyWuTours
Al.1 -
/$1 URL Showing Up
Whenever I crawl my site with any kind of bot or a sitemap generator over my site. it comes up with /$1 version of my URLs. For example: It gives me hdiconference.com & hdiconference.com/$1 and hdiconference.com/purchases & hdiconference.com/purchases/$1 Then I get warnings saying that it's duplicate content. Here's the problem: I can't find these /$1 URLs anywhere. Even when I type them in, I get a 404 error. I don't know what they are, where they came from, and I can't find them when I scour my code. So, I'm trying to figure out where the crawlers are picking this up. Where are these things? If sitemap generators and other site crawlers are seeing them, I have to assume that Googlebot is seeing them as well. Any help? My developers are at a loss as well.
Technical SEO | | HDI0