Menu Structure
-
I'm working on a site where there is a top level menu with a dropdown off a couple of the main headings and subsequent dropdown from one or two of those dropdowns. Usual stuff.
The main problem we are having is the ranking of one of the main menu pages, some of which is historical stuff we have cleaned up and waiting for Penguin.
My question is whether the following is a prudent step. The main menu option/page and keyword is something like "Green Widgets" but this activates a dropdown where there is a link to 'Types of Green Widget', then again there is a dropdown with several pages to different types of Green widget. The two menu items "Green Widgets" and "Types of Green Widgets" both link to the "Green Widget" page.
As the "Types of Green Widgets" link is sitewide and not really in the right flavour for the "Green Widget" page would it be prudent to remove the link element of that menu item or set it to /#
-
You could always test the link to see if it is really being used from the secondary navigation more so (or at all) than the main navigation link. Create a parameter and track it over a few months in analytics. That way you don't over-optimize in the interim but 3 months from now (or less, or more, really that's up to you) you can definitively say whether it is better to remove it or if leaving it alone was the correct move.
-
yep, without giving the site it's difficult to exactly describe. No it's not breadcrumbs, or on-page links. It's a secondary menu option to the same page they have historically had problems with. That I understand as there are valid ways to lead to the same page and arguably show importance to that page. But in this case it seems to be a secondary menu link to the same page just for the sake of another sitewide menu link that isn't really helpful to the visitor. But I might have a little "anti-over-optimising fever"!
-
I can't really visualize that well how the links are laid out from your description. Its been a long day, so that might be it.
So it really depends on how it links back to those pages. e.g. If they're site navigation breadcrumbs then I don't see the problem as it potentially establishes relevancy for the topic and facilitates movement through the site for both users and bots. If its just an internal link for the sake of a link in the body of the page, maybe not so much. But if its a completely relevant link and you see in analytics that people who enter on the one page are regularly going to the other, and vice versa, then obviously it is of use to the customer/visitor. If its an issue of pages being link heavy and you're worried that its diluting link equity or creating a user experience issue and you want to clean up the page and/or make it easier/more intuitive to use, then a heat map tool like Crazy Egg might be useful for helping you determine which links to keep and which are flak.
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
-
Best structure for a news website including main menu nav
Just looking for thoughts and opinions on the best way to set up the main nav on a news website that covers a specific professional services sector. There are news items, archived news, blog, events, but also main menu links to the numerous news categories that go to a page listing the news articles under that category (as created in Wordpress when publishing the article). I'm thinking that having these off the main nav is diluting the juice to the more important pages including the events and the news page? Just thinking about how to rearrange and consolidate. Any thoughts on how people would structure something like this?
On-Page Optimization | | sam_legmark0 -
Pyramid link structure - how to noindex, nofollow
I'm talking about this article: https://moz.com/learn/seo/internal-link Take this sample: HOME --> Shirts --> Plain shirt --> shirt#1 Product page: noindex, follow all links except 1 from breadcrumbs to nearest category (plain shirts). SubCategory page (plain shirts): noindex, follow all links except 1 link from breadcrumbs to nearest category (shirts) and all products belonging to current subcategory. Category page (shirts): noindex, follow all links except 1 link from breadcrumbs to front page (site.com) and links to own subcategories. Front page: noindex, follow all links except 12 links to main categories (shirts, pants etc.) Is it correct? If I noindex some parts of website, will it be harmful?
On-Page Optimization | | SilverStar10 -
Using Google structured Data for SEO benefit
Hi there I run www.isacleanse.com.au and I've set up some Structured data using Google Webmaster Tools which says it will be picked up during the next Google update (has been set up over 4 weeks ago), however I dont seem to see any of the structured data for the products/reviews/ratings etc coming through in search results. Question at hand: Is there additional things I need to do in the code of the website or should this be sufficient? (see attached screenshot) szpFUpX
On-Page Optimization | | IsaCleanse1 -
Optimal URL structure for location-specific pages
I'm in the middle of revamping a website for a restaurant that has multiple locations and am trying to decide what the best URL/internal link structure would be. Right now, each restaurant has a single location page, but we are going to add additional pages for catering. Sitewide-linked pages exist for /catering and /locationname. The way I see it, we have two basic options: Option #1: Catering page - /locationname/catering/ Option #2: Catering page - /catering/locationname/ In both cases, there would be links from the /locationname an /catering pages to the location-specific catering pages. Is either option preferable to the other?
On-Page Optimization | | mblair0 -
Url structure with dash or slash
Hi There We have a content website. We don't rank well category image related searches but we get quite good traffic for those keywords. Those keywords are mostly like "category images". We want to change our url structure and we have 2 options now. 1- domain.com/category/category-images 2-domain.com/category/images option 1 repeats the category name so it looks spammy option 2 doesn't really have the keyword. any ideas which one tho choose? Thanks! ps: we don't want to use domain.com/category-images (too many root link)
On-Page Optimization | | muminaydin0 -
Directory Structure
Hi, We are creating a new content directory for online courses hosted on our site. Like a typical directory, we have high level categories and then more granular subcategories. A course will typically only be in one high level category and then multiple subcategories. What would be the best URL structure for an individual course? Should we force users to pick one 'master' subcategory that gets included in their URL? Or should we just not include the subcategory at all in the URL? Right now we've been thinking about: OurUrl.com/upper-category/sub-category/course-title or OurUrl.com/upper-category/course-title
On-Page Optimization | | mindflash0 -
PageRank: Links on menu and footer to the same page, does it get counted twice?
Hello all. If I have 10 links on a menu linking to 10 different pages, and 10 links on the footer linking to the same pages, does PageRank get divided by 10 or 20?
On-Page Optimization | | MiamiWebCompany0