Should me URLs be uppercase or lowercase
-
I'm in the middle of doing a bunch of 301 redirects for me site. Should I make them Lowercase, uppercase, or does it matter? Also, do I want to be using hyphens (-), or underscores (_)?
Any other tips?
EX:
http://www.stupid.com/golf-slippers.html
OR
-
Are you serving the same page for both /MBA and /mba? You should set up a 301 redirect from one to the other.
In Analytics, you can set a custom filter to make your URLs case insensitive, but I don't believe that'll fix the data currently in your account, it'll only fix them going forward. That process is outlined here: http://support.google.com/googleanalytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=90397.
My URLs are all lowercased so I can't actually find an example in my account to test, but when I do an advenced filter and select Include Page with the match type of "Matching RegExp" and try URLs with uppercase characters, Analytics appears to be making the query case insensitive. So you can try that as well.
If the prior paragraph didn't work for you, you can do this on a URL by URL basis, by doing an advanced search by regular expression and substituting in "[M|m][B|b][A|a]" for "mba".
-
John and Team,
Suppose I have a site with 8000 pages and a small percentage of them in google analytics are showing up twice because the pages are linked through upper and lowercase links. So in Google analytics (GA) there would be two rows:
http:///www.blah.com/MBA
Is there a type of query I can run in GA to allow me to find all pages where the url is the same except for the upper and lower casing? I want to go into GA at Standard Reporting -> Content -> all pages and do an advanced search.
-
Is the Short Title a redirect or the actual URL? If it's a redirect then it shouldn't be a problem. You can also use canonical if you want to use the lowercase and host the other page. But that's is a sloppy solution.
-
I agree with this completely. Lowercase with hyphens is my preference. Some E-commerce companies (let's use Volusion as an example), give you the choice to use hyphens or underscores in a product's URL. This is nice and they even offer you the ability to write what the URL will be under the "Short TItle" option. However, this "Short Title" option is what will show in your URL AND the link text for a "Related Product" listing on the site. So if I want the link text to look normal when someone sees a Related Product link, I have to capitalize the text I put for the "Short Title" which will then cause the URL to be in Caps as well. This is a pretty significant flaw in their system and I have alerted them to the problem numerous times. Hopefully they will get it fixed soon.
-
I agree. Lowercase in the example above. For ease of direct typing.
But when advertising just a website URL in print offline, caps. www.BulwarkPestControl.com is easier to read than www.bulwarkpestcontrol.com.
-
The fact a Caps create a 404 error on LAMP site is a pet peeve of mine - so is the fact Google thinks mix cases on IIS are separate (thus duplicate) URLs.
Too arbitrary to be picky about and cause user frustration.
Thanks goodness at lease DoMaInS can be what ever.
-
I like lowercase because when I type URLs by hand, I don't think to capitalize things. If you capitalize things, you have to get the casing right to make the URL valid (unless you're setting up all sorts of fancy redirects), otherwise you a 404 and are left scratching your head. Also, I agree with Dan that it looks better.
Hyphens vs. underscores is a classic question; Matt Cutts says to go with hyphens: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3SFVfDIS5k. I like that better too.
-
Justin
I personally prefer lowercase because to me it looks better. And I prefer hyphens for the same reason, and it seems like these days everyone from WordPress right to the SEOmoz site does it that way.
-Dan
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
-
Can you help by advising how to stop a URL from referring to another URL on my website please?
Stopping a redirect from one URL to another due to a 404 error? Referred URL which is (https://webwritinglab.com/know-exactly-what-your-ideal-clients-want-in-8-easy-steps/%5Bnull%20id=43484%5D) Referring URL (https://webwritinglab.com/know-exactly-what-your-ideal-clients-want-in-8-easy-steps/)
Technical SEO | | Nichole.wynter20200 -
I'm struggling to understand (and fix) why I'm getting a 404 error. The URL includes this "%5Bnull%20id=43484%5D" but I cannot find that anywhere in the referring URL. Does anyone know why please? Thanks
Can you help with how to fix this 404 error please? It appears that I have a redirect from one page to the other, although the referring page URL works, but it appears to be linking to another URL with this code at the end of the the URL - %5Bnull%20id=43484%5D that I'm struggling to find and fix. Thanks
Technical SEO | | Nichole.wynter20200 -
Urls Too Long - Should I shorten?
On the crawl of our website we have had a warning that 157 have urls that are too long. When I look at the urls they are generally from 2016 or earlier. Should I just leave them as they are or shorten the urls and redirect to new url? Thanks
Technical SEO | | DaleZon4 -
Getting a Vanity (Clean) URL indexed
Hello, I have a vanity (clean looking) URL that 302 redirects to the ugly version. So in other words http://www.site.com/url 302 >>> http://www.site.com/directory/directory/url.aspx What I'm trying to do is get the clean version to show up in search. However, for some reason Google only indexes the ugly version. cache:http://www.site.com/directory/directory/url.aspx is showing the ugly URL as cached and cache:http://www.site.com/url is showing not cached at all. Is there some way to force Google to index the clean version? Fetch as Google for the clean URL only returns a redirect status and canonicalizing the ugly to the clean would seem to send a strange message because of the redirect back to the ugly. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you,
Technical SEO | | Digi12340 -
URL Understanding -
Hello everyone! Can anyone help me understanding this url? Product.asp?PID=1236 cheers
Technical SEO | | PremioOscar0 -
What are the SEO implications of URLs that use a # in them?
I have several clients who have begun to ask questions about sites that are designed to look like a single page. When you click on a link, the URL changes but it uses a # before (i.e. http://www.kelloggs.com/teamusa**/#**/teamusa/athletes/kerri-walsh.html. What are the SEO implications of having a page set up this way? I noticed that Google has indexed this page but the indexed URL does not include a #. Is Google indexing a separate version of this page? Any insights would be really helpful! Thanks
Technical SEO | | VMLYRDiscoverability0 -
MozBar picking up iFrame source as URL
Running a WordPress site with a custom theme. Using a standard wp_head or wp_footer hook to insert the standard code for a Facebook Like, Twitter count / Google Plus count into the site - basically that hook just places the code, programmatically, into the HEAD (where applicable) or right before the BODY closes. For some reason, MozBar is picking up the URL of the iFrame that gets inserted with this code as the URL of the site. I don't have it live right now due to the issues, but I can turn it "on" for anyone who wants a look. Anyone else have this issue? I'm using the code directly from developers.facebook.com for the Like box, and the Google Plus button, Twitter too. Nothing fancy here.
Technical SEO | | joechicago0 -
Subdomain CMS or unique URL
I own a company for teams Ex myteams.com . A team registers and they get a site at team1.myteams.com. Content on each sub team site is mostly unique and I have several back links on each to the main site myteams.com. I also provide them with a unique URl team1.com will show team1.myteams.com. So couple questions As far as SEO should i be pushing the team1.com url or team1.myteams.com url? Is a link from team1.com or team1.myteams.com better for my site, their site or both How many back links should the sub sites have? Thanks
Technical SEO | | MichaelRyan220