Should URL Follow Navigation Of A Site?

[Discountvc]

Following an SEOMoz webinar the other day, where the presenter made a case of eliminating folders in URLs, as these could confuse a bot when crawling a site.

I love the idea. However, there are still a lot of Best Practices and guidelines out there that will suggest there should be a logic in the URL, just as there should be in your Navigation.

My question in that regard is whether or not there is any value for a bot to crawl a website URL that follows the navigation by "stuffing" the URL with folders, identical to the navigation present on the site, and even a secondary navigation present on all pages?

Example: the navigation of a site goes [Domain > Folder > Sub folder > Sub-sub folder > product]. What is the benefit of using a URL such as [www.domain.com/folder/sub-folder/sub-sub-folder/product] vs [www.domain.com/product]

Thank you guys for your insights!

PS this is a WP site we are talking about.

[Discountvc]

Thanks Mike, for your interesting views on other issues that come with a short URL. So true!

I agree on the domain/DX600 and the domain/NX600. This is a WP site, so it should be fairly easy to go with example: [**www.**domain.com/nikon-DSLR-camera-NX600]

Not that my personal opinion matters here, but there is a value for a visitor to see that short URL, rather than the [www.domain.com/cameras/compact/all-in-one/DSLR/20mp/2013/Nikon/NX600], right? As logical as those folders and sub folders may be, it is a blur for a visitor and can very well be confusing for a search bot with all those folders it now has to verify.

The question is purely about the bot: would a bot find it better to have the folders or would it not matter to the bot.

[Mike.Goracke]

Depending on the size of your site I would think from a usability standpoint that may be confusing, but you could implement breadcrumbs to remedy the confusion.

From an SEO point of view, I would think that it would be a lot easier for Google to see the differences between two products. For instance, if you have two products DX600 and NX600...

/cameras/point-and-shoot/sony/DX600

/cameras/point-and-shoot/nikon/NX600

would be pretty easy for a crawler and/or user to figure out what the page is about.

If it were just /DX600 and /NX600 that might be a little more complex for users and crawlers - is it a camera, computer, coffee maker, napkin dispenser???

And depending on your site, CMS, and industry, you may have to get creative with your URLs so you do not create duplicates and it may even be difficult to manage if you do not know exactly where to find a page is that you need to edit.

That is just my personal opinion on the subject. I would be interested in viewing the webinar you are talking about - if you have time, please post a link.

Again, I am not saying this is a bad idea by any means, but I think it definitely could make for some interesting issues if not planned out well beforehand.

Mike