Should I change Permalinks?
-
I have a site that is doing well in rankings, and its also been accepted in to Google news.
I have around 800 article live on the site.
My current permalink structure is - /%year%/%monthnum%/%postname%/
What I am wondering, would it be better to change it to - /%postname%/
The reason I ask is that most of the well ranking sites and sites built by SEO companies all seem to have the /%postname%/
Will I get a benefit from changing this? I know that I could republish content have the /%postname%/ permalinks.
Are there any other benefits?
If the is a benefit, I'd perefr to change it as soon as possible before the site grows even more
Thanks in advance for anyone who can help
-
I have just done a test with another wordpress site I run.
I changed the permalinks and the old URLs got redirected to the new URLs.
I checked if the redirect was a 301 and it was.
I dont have the redirection plugin installed.
It appears as though wordpress does this automatically.
-
Ok great. I hope so lol.
I will be moving hosting from a shared one to a VPS and use CDN so we can really speed up the site.
I am guessing that the best time to do the permalink change will be when we move servers.
Anything you suggest I should watch out for?
-
Hi John,
There is a plugin that allows you to edit permalinks for single posts, so you can decide what kind of permalink structure you want for each post from now. Here you have the link:
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/permalink-editor/
However, as Marcus says, if your redirects are well done (and redirect plugin lets you do it), you don't have to worry about it.
Sergio
-
To be honest, I'm scared to change the permalinks now!
Terrified the the site will take a beating and drop rankings
The wordpress site is built using Genesis framework and Ive got Yoast SEO plugin installed.
I cant see it as simply just change the permalinks in wordpress and everythng works lol I wish it was that simple.
Does the redirection pluggin automatically create 301's?
I am sure that wordpress has that built in if I am correct. I recall changing permalinks in past wordpress sites and redrects happened
-
Hey, that is not possible with the default settings although there may be a plugin that could extend the functionality.
You would not see any problem from making a change in your permalink structure with the redirection plugin in place and whilst you may have a small bump whilst things switch over, if your URLs are getting crazy long then any slashes and characters you can remove is going to work in your favour.
Your best bet is likely to go one way or the other and personally, if you feel the date elements bring nothing to the table then I would make the change in the spirit of moving forwards.
_* I did come across an old plugin called Advanced Permalinks but lots of folks seem to have problems with it. _
-
Wow, great thanks Sergio. I have not seen the quoted info.
I understand totally, we always try to look at it from the users point of view.
We do not use the date archives on the site, so having the content in date folders I cant see adding any benefit.
I think the site can do a great deal better with the rankings certainly, but it is on the way up
We get a few interactions, but not many. Would like a lot more
Some of the URLs are getting very long also, so that another reason we would like to change the permalinks
I have also noticed that some of the older posts are dropping down the rankings. It appears a little faster then normal. This may not be anything to do with the permalinks, but its a thought i have had
It would be great if we could just somehow start all the posts from now onwards using the /%postname%/ structure. And all the past articles staying the same URL.
I dont see why we would have to change the already existing URL's of the past articles.
Is that possible do you know on a wordpress site?
-
Hi John,
If you look at SEOmoz PRO Dashboard On-page Resports, one issue they consider as Low Importance Factor is 'Minimal Subfolders in the URL'. They explain it as follows:
<dt style="color: #5e5e5e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">Explanation</dt>
<dd style="color: #5e5e5e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
The quantity of subfolders in a URL appears to correlate to rankings. URLs with fewer trailing slashes perform better than those with more. Additionally, search engine representatives have recommended that excessive, subfolders in a URL string may be a signal that the page is very deep in a site's structure and may be less valuable/worthwhile to crawl, index and rank.
</dd>
<dt style="color: #5e5e5e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">Recommendation</dt>
<dd style="color: #5e5e5e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
Rewrite the URL to include no more than 3 subfolder levels (4 trailing slashes following the domain name)
</dd>
However, I agree with Marcus. Think about your users and your website needs. Forget about Google and its way of crawling, indexing an so on. If you see a good performance from your users, what is bad?
Consider the following:
- Is your traffic good for your expectations?
- Is your traffic increasing through time?
- Do your users interact?
- Is your website well considered by your users?
If all your answers are YES, then keep on going. You´re doing very well.
If not, consider if minimizing subfolders could improve your website's experience (at all stages).
Hope it helps.
Sergio
-
Hi Marcus,
Thanks for your reply.
I noticed that some other big news sites dont use the date in the URL's, but the posts show the date.
My concern is that Google may lower the rankings over time as it knows these pages are time sensitive.
Thanks for the redirection plugin link. We currently use that on the site.
-
I don't really think this is an SEO question as such and lots of well ranked sites have the year and month in the URL.
Really, it all depends on what works best for you and your users.
- Are the pages and stories date specific?
- Will having just the page names make for better looking URLs?
Try to think about this outside of the SEO mindset and do whatever is best for the content and your users as you are not going to get any kind of noticeable SEO boost from removing the date from the URLs.
But, if you do decide to do this, and assuming this is WordPress from the terminology, then if you install the redirection plugin it will create automatic 301 redirections for any page names you change so it could save you a whole load of work.
Obviously, this is not a specific answer, only you can provide that, but think of it not as an SEO fix but think of your users and how this would effect them in a positive way.
Hope that helps!
MarcusReferences:
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
-
After blog URL structure change, should you wait to optimize old posts?
Hi all, I'm changing the URL structure on my site's blog (getting rid of dates) soon, but I'm also working on updating/optimizing a bunch of old posts. Some of these old posts have a good amount of traffic, which I don't want to lose when I redirect the old URLs to the new URLs after restructure. I know that you are more likely to maintain your rank and traffic after a redirect if you keep the page content the exact same. So my question is -- should I leave the old posts alone (not making any changes) for a couple of weeks after the URL restructure/redirects for Google to index the new URLs and see that the content is the exact same so the pages don't lose any traffic, OR does it not really matter because I am optimizing these posts, meaning that the content will be better and hopefully get ranked higher? I haven't been able to find a consensus on this, so I'd really appreciate the advice! Many thanks, Rebecca
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | rwhite10 -
Change post with date to page without date
what to do with posts that should be pages. One of our clients is a nation wide company with different local pages, targeting city+business. This week we found out that every page has a publishing date in the search results. So the pages are not pages but posts? the publishing dates are a some time ago and we think they hurt the rankings. We want to make those post/ pages, but does this bring any risk? example: plumbing.com/chigaco to the same url? and just change code? the website is build in something called "send".
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | remkoallertz0 -
Keywords Ranking Varies When Search changes Location/City (Not Google Places)
We have a client that are ranking well on most Australian cities for competitive keywords except Google Sydney. If you toggled the cities on the search field when you search for a keyword, their places are almost exactly the same except for Sydney on which they can't be found at all in the Top 100 results. The keywords are not city specific, they are general commonly searched keywords about health. This is not a Google Places issue. The search result shows the right landing pages of the site for their respective keywords. Any ideas or experience on this kind of situation. Much appreciated Louie
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | louieramos0 -
Looking into the future! Changing SEO for the trends.
Hi Mozzers, How is it going? I run a website called Orange Octopus that offers videogame tips from the best pro gamers in the world. We get plenty of long tail traffic but the keyword that is most important to the business is "FIFA 14 tips". Using Moz as a template, I tried to model my site's category pages after Moz. (http://moz.com/ugc/category/link-building) and OrangeOctop.us (orangeoctop.us/fifa14-tips/) With the new FIFA 15 videogame a few months away from being released, I wanted to start preparing for the keyword "FIFA 15 tips" and "FIFA 15 guide". Being proactive and aggressive with rankings for when the game first comes out. Would you recommend starting a new category? Or changing FIFA 14 tips to FIFA 15 tips by just changing the url and title of the category page? Really need some expert help. Play hard! Joey
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | orangeoctop.us0 -
CHange insite Urls structure
Hello Guys! I have a situation with a website and I need some opinions. Today, the structured of my site is: (I have had this site architecture since many years) Main country home (www.mysite.com.tld) o Product_1 Home (www.mysite.com.tld/product1/) § Product_1 articles www.mysite.com.tld/product1/product1_art1 www.mysite.com.tld/product1/product1_art2 www.mysite.com.tld/product1/product1_artx o Product_2 Home (www.mysite.com.tld/product2/) § Product_2 articles www.mysite.com.tld/product1/product2_art1 www.mysite.com.tld/product1/product2_art2 www.mysite.com.tld/product1/product2_artx I have several TLDs with their main and their products. We are thinking in modify this structure and begin to use subdomains for each product (The IT guys need this approach because is simpler to distribute the servers load). I not very friendly with subdomains and big changes like this always can produce some problem (although the SEO migration would be ok, problems could appear, like ranking drops), But, the solution (the reasons are technical stuff), requires the mix of directories and subdomains in each product, leaving the structured in this way: Main country home (www.mysite.com.tld) o Product_1 Home (www.mysite.com.tld/product1/) § Product_1 articles product1.mysite.com.tld/product1_art1 product1.mysite.com.tld/product1_art2 product1.mysite.com.tld/product1_artx o Product_2 Home (www.mysite.com.tld/product2/) § Product_2 articles product2.mysite.com.tld/product1_art1 product2.mysite.com.tld/product1_art2 product2.mysite.com.tld/product1_artx So, the product home will be in a directory buy the pages of the articles of this product will be in a subdomain. What do you think about this solution? Beyond that the SEO migration would be fine, 301s, etc, can bring us difficulties in the rankings or the change can be done without any consideration? Thanks very much! Agustin
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | SEOTeamDespegar0 -
Time for Google to change the emphasis?
Why doesn't Google recommend that links are nofollow as standard, via HTML5, etc., with follow being added if the link is on a quality site (defined by PR, or whatever.) and adds value. Wouldn't this save alot of time? Then they could whack all the sites with coding that doesn't comply, couldn't they? Also, instead of enabling negative SEO, why doesn't Google simply focus on wiping out the sites developed simply to pass on PR. I'm sure we could all send them a few thousand suggestions!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | McTaggart0 -
Should I change my product titles from singular to plural to satisfy optimisation?
At present most of our products are listed in the singular form. http://www.towelsrus.co.uk/towels-bath-towels/aztex/turkish-cotton-bath-towel_ct473bd182pd2744.htm However we are optimising for the plural form after carrying out keyword research The question is should I update the product title to reflect this change? This would then change the URL of the page, H1 tag, H2 tag (both auto generated from the product title) My concern here is that these pages will then become "new pages" and will need to index and rank, albeit they don't rank well as they have never been optimised until now. I could put 301 re-directs in place on the old URL's or i could just let the return a 404. What do people think?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Towelsrus0 -
I have 4,100 302 redirects; How can I change so many to 301s
hi, i have way to many 302 redirects, how can i bulk change these to 301 i have started in cpanel but i could be old by the time i finsih
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | freedomelectronics1