Similar URLs
-
I'm making a site of LSAT explanations. The content is very meaningful for LSAT students. I'm less sure the urls and headings are meaningful for Google.
I'll give you an example. Here are two URLs and heading for two separate pages:
- http://lsathacks.com/explanations/lsat-69/logical-reasoning-1/q-10/ - LSAT 69, Logical Reasoning I, Q 10
- http://lsathacks.com/explanations/lsat-69/logical-reasoning-2/q10/ - LSAT 69, Logical Reasoning II, Q10
There are two logical reasoning sections on LSAT 69. For the first url is for question 10 from section 1, the second URL is for question 10 from the second LR section.
I noticed that google.com only displays 23 urls when I search "site:http://lsathacks.com". A couple of days ago it displayed over 120 (i.e. the entire site).
1. Am I hurting myself with this structure, even if it makes sense for users?
2. What could I do to avoid it? I'll eventually have thousands of pages of explanations. They'll all be very similar in terms of how I would categorize them to a human, e.g. "LSAT 52, logic games question 12"
I should note that the content of each page is very different. But url, title and h1 is similar.
Edit: I could, for example, add a random keyword to differentiate titles and urls (but not H1). For example:
http://lsathacks.com/explanations/lsat-69/logical-reasoning-2/q10-car-efficiency/
LSAT 69, Logical Reasoning I, Q 10, Car efficiency
But the url is already fairly long as is. Would that be a good idea?
-
This would be normal behavior for a brand new site--things will shuffle around for a good while and yes, even single-character difference in the URLs is enough differentiation.
-
Hope you don't mind me following up again. Search results by past month or year now show nothing, or just one link. If I do a straight site search, I just see four urls.
Is this normal search index behavior at this point, or is there any action I should take? Thanks.
I was also wondering if, based on my current setup, Google will eventually get skilled enough to distinguish results by small differences like "LSAT 68 game 2" vs "LSAT 65 game 2".
-
Those URLs won't inhibit your indexation or your rankings.
-
Thanks! That's a big relief.
Do you think the URL structure is ok as is? Anything I could do to differentiate them for google would, I think, make the site a bit worse for humans.
I do plan to differentiate the title tags more, as soon as I figure out how to make custom h1 tags on Wordpress.
-
Graeme,
Things are just working themselves out as far as indexation. You'll notice that all your pages are showing in the index if you use google's search tools/date feature and search for results from the past month or year:
New sites can take a month or two before showing consistent site:domain searches. BTW, you can leave off the "http://" part of your site:domian search.
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
-
Google Treating these URL's as diff, but they are same. please help
Google is treating, below URL's as two different URL's when they are same. How to solve this. Please help. Case 1:/2570/Venture-Capital-and-Capital-Markets/2570/venture-capital-and-capital-marketsCase 2: /xxx/Java-Programming//xxx/Java-ProgrammingPlease help, how to solve this. Thanks in advance
On-Page Optimization | | AnkammaRao0 -
Two URL's for the same page
Hi, on our site we have two separate URL's for a page that has the same content. So, for example - 'www.domain.co.uk/stuff' and 'www.domain.co.uk/things/stuff' both have the same content on the page. We currently rank high in search for 'www.domain.co.uk/things/stuff' for our targeted keyword, but there are numerous links on the site to www.domain.co.uk/stuff and also potentially inbound links to this page. Ideally we want just the www.domain.co.uk/things/stuff URL to be present on the site, what would be the best course of action to take? Would a simple Canonical tag from the '/stuff' URL which points to the '/things/stuff' page be wise? If we were to scrap the '/stuff' URL totally and redirect it to the 'things/stuff' URL and change all our on site links, would this be beneficial and not harm our current ranking for '/things/stuff'? We only want 1 URL for this page for numerous reasons (i.e, easier to track in Analytics), but I'm a bit cautious that changing the page that doesn't rank may have an affect on the page that does rank! Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | Jaybeamer2 -
How do I cure 'overly dynamic' url's on an e-commerce website?
I've just launched an e-commerce website selling hosiery and have received aa report from SEO Moz regarding overly dynamic URL's. How do I resolve this issue - in words of one syllable please, I'm new to SEO! Here are three exapmles of over 120: http://www.yosassy.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=1&page=2 http://www.yosassy.com/index.php?route=product/product&filter_tag=&page=1&product_id=57 http://www.yosassy.com/index.php?route=product/product&filter_tag=&page=1&product_id=64 Thank you.
On-Page Optimization | | lindsayjhopkins0 -
URL length... is >115 now >255?
I've been having detailed discussions with a CMS provider on behalf of a client. Long URLs are the least of their problems however, the developer is arguing that Google has amended their algorithm and will now read URLs that are up to 255 characters long. I have stated that as far as I am aware, Google will still not read URLs over 115 characters... Before I stamp my feet, can someone confirm what is actually happening? SEOmoz still classes URLs >115 characters long as an amber issue. Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | Switch_Digital0 -
Is it worth changing urls with underscores?
A few pages on one of my sites have underscores linking keywords rather than hyphens (keywords_and_keyword rather than keyword-and-keyword). Possibly from a time before I knew hyphens were preferred... One of the pages ranks well, and drives a good amount of traffic. The others do not do so well, but are still within the top 10 landing pages for the site. Is it worth me changing the underscores to hyphens (setting up 301 redirects first of course) or doesn't it make that much difference?
On-Page Optimization | | Jingo010 -
Include the company/domain name in page titles and urls?
I know this isn't something that I would use site-wide but I'm wondering if it helps or hurts me to use my company name (also my domain name) in pages below the homepage. As an example, let's say I'm Home Depot. In the category pages off the homepage should I use Page names and urls like Home and Garden Supplies or Home and Garden Supplies at Home Depot? Or does it hurt me to reuse my company/domain name on multiple pages?
On-Page Optimization | | kdieruf0 -
URL with two forward slashes //
We have a potential client with a URL structure in this fashion: http://www.site-url.com//cpage/page.html pretty strange, right? my question is: How bad are the 2 forward slashes // for SEO? How bad is it to have that extra layer of /cpage in the URL? this doesn't appear to serve any other purpose than making the URL longer than necessary.
On-Page Optimization | | Motava0 -
Would it be bad to change the canonical URL to the most recent page that has duplicate content, or should we just 301 redirect to the new page?
Is it bad to change the canonical URL in the tag, meaning does it lose it's stats? If we add a new page that may have duplicate content, but we want that page to be indexed over the older pages, should we just change the canonical page or redirect from the original canonical page? Thanks so much! -Amy
On-Page Optimization | | MeghanPrudencio0