Which is the better taxonomy?
-
Which of these is the better taxonomy?
-
Hi, keywords located in the file path or file name of a document will appear bolded in search results. This bolded appearance is what can affect your CTR. A higher CTR will provide higher authority which is a signal that affects organic rank. It also depends on the keyword you're targeting. If your keyword is "hr outsourcing solutions" and you are also targeting "hr outsourcing" then the latter makes more sense in terms of taxonomy. In a world of Penguin updates I would avoid the former in case your audience pulls in the URL as your anchor text frequently. The double use of your target phrase in the URL would then also "over optimize" your anchor text signals and may get a Penguin penalty.
-
Irving:
Is there anything wrong with www.mysite.com/hr-outsourcing/hr-outsourcing-solutions from a ranking perspective?
From my point of view, it's easier to keep things organized.
And Mysite.com/hr-outsourcing and mysite.com.hr-outsourcing/hr-outsourcing-solutions are separate pages with the long-tail reinforcing the parent in the Silo.
-
a lot of people aren't aware of that. yea
www.mysite.com/hr-outsourcing-solutions is better than www.mysite.com/hr-outsourcing because it includes longtail, could be two separate pages even, with long tail versions pointing to the main www.mysite.com/hr-outsourcing parent page to make it stronger
by filename i mean whatever is the page name, www.mysite.com/page-name
but yes it applies to image files as well for instance
www.mysite.com/zombie-pics/image-123.jpg no SEO benefit for the image
www.mysite.com/zombie-pics/walking-dead-zombie-girl.jpg good for SEO (use in conjunctiomn with alt tags)
-
Irving,
When you refer to "filenames", are you talking about .jpg .png .pdf or could it be the last /whatever of the url?
Thanks for the information!
-
Wow! I did not know that folders don't push rank. So if my keyword is "hr outsourcing", does www.mysite.com/hr-outsourcing-solutions push rank?Can I assume that it does?
-
what is your keyword phrase for this page? if it is "hr outsourcing solutions" then neither example is best. this is best:
www.mysite.com/anything-can-go-here/hr-outsourcing-solutions
keywords in folder names DO NOT push rank, keywords in filenames do
good luck - Irving
-
Hey CsmBill,
I would say the 2nd option is better because it is easier for visitors. Even if your keyword was "hr outsourcing solutions" the SEO impact of your url have been decreasing, to my knowledge. Especially when the url starts getting longer and longer because of it.
Remember, Google wants things easier for searchers and if the url structure is something easy and makes sense structure-wise, then it will look favorable.
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
-
Of the two examples of markup (microdata, schema) code below, which of the two is better designed for its purpose of Q&A, and what might be suggested to improve upon these lines of code (context: questions and answers within article content.
ANSWER SEEN 'WITHIN THE QUESTION' BRACKET So you ask, why is the sky blue?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RedFrog
Well, the answer is not so simple; In the day-time, when it's clear and cloudless,
the sky is blue because molecules in the air scatter blue light from the sun more than they scatter red light.
When we look towards the sun at sunset, we see red and orange colours because the blue light has been scattered out and away from the line of sight. See Structured Data Testing Results 'QUESTION' AND 'ANSWER' IN 2 SEPARATE BRACKETS Why Is The Sky Blue? Well, the answer is not so simple; In the day-time, when it's clear and cloudless,
the sky is blue because molecules in the air scatter blue light from the sun more than they scatter red light.
When we look towards the sun at sunset, we see red and orange colours because the blue light has been scattered out and away from the line of sight. See Structured Data Testing Results Thanks, Mark0 -
Adding hreflang tags - better on each page, or the site map?
Hello, I am wondering if there seems to be a preference for adding hreflang tags (from this article). My client just changed their site from gTLDs to ccTLDs, and a few sites have taken a pretty big traffic hit. One issue is definitely the amount of redirects to the page, but I am also going to work with the developer to add hreflang tags. My question is - is it better to add them to the header of each page, or the site map, or both, or something else? Any other thoughts are appreciated. Our Australia site, which was at least findable using Australia Google before this relaunch, is not showing up, even when you search the company name directly. Thanks!Lauryn
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | john_marketade0 -
HTML5: Changing 'section' content to be 'main' for better SEO relevance?
We received an HTML5 recommendation that we should change onpage text copy contained in 'section" to be listed in 'main' instead, because this is supposedly better for SEO. We're questioning the need to ask developers spend time on this purely for a perceived SEO benefit. Sure, maybe content in 'footer' may be seen as less relevant, but calling out 'section' as having less relevance than 'main'? Yes, it's true that engines evaluate where onpage content is located, but this level of granular focus seems unnecessary. That being said, more than happy to be corrected if there is actually a benefit. On a side note, 'main' isn't supported by older versions of IE and could cause browser incompatibilities (http://caniuse.com/#feat=html5semantic). Would love to hear others' feedback about this - thanks! 🙂
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mirabile0 -
Ranking better in different countries than in the UK
My URL is: www.geckonewmedia.comMy friend's site is being ranked in the top 10 in Google in countries such as Norway, Poland, Spain, Germany and France for the term "web design Edinburgh"The site is UK based and it's ranking on page 3 over here. I went into the webmaster tools and changed the location setting to UK on Monday this week as I thought that might be the issue. So far there's been no change.Can anyone help me out with the reason why it might be ranking so well abroad but not in the UK?Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | geckonm0 -
Can I add NOFOLLOW or NOINDEX attribute for better organic ranking?
I am working on online retail store which is highly dedicated to Patio Umbrellas. My website is on 2nd page of Google web search for Patio Umbrellas keyword. I have one another internal page with Patio Umbrellas text link. http://www.vistapatioumbrellas.com/21/patio-umbrellas.html I assume that, Google have confusion to give rank for my keyword during Patio Umbrellas keyword. I want to set NOFOLLOW attribute or NOINDEX FOLLOW meta for this page. Will it help me to rank high for Patio Umbrellas keyword. My ultimate goal is to reduce confusion for Patio Umbrellas keyword.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CommercePundit0 -
Local Searches done from outside of local area better than searches from within local area
Here's a strange one: I am working on a site for a local business and targeting local searches. The names have been changed to protect the innocent. Various keyword position tools show the site ranking very well for searches like "Anytown Widget Store". Doing the same Google search from a browser in Anytown, the site shows up much lower. So I tried changing the location in Google to other cities, using a variety of browsers and it comes up much higher out of town than in town. I have seen plenty of geographic discrepancies before, but usually they went the other way - searches from the actual local area did slightly better than the same searches done elsewhere, which would make sense. Any thoughts on why this would happen?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nick_Ker0 -
Why do I have better results with absolute search
Hi, I completed the optimization of my website, and while my rankings have improved, i seem to have consistently better resultats with absolute search terms: ex: i'm better ranked on "word1 word2" than just word1 word2 without the guillemets. Do you have any idea why? As most people perform search without guillemets, i would like to improve my rankings with these searches too. thanks, cedric
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | smartgrains0 -
Does many unique pages mean better SERP position?
My site has about 50 pages. All of them are unique 500-700 word articles. Almost every page is on its keyword at the 4-8 position in google/yahoo/bing. I can add a lot of relative unique pages on my site, about 100-200 word content per page. They all will be unique, with unique description and title. I can make about 1000+ pages. Would you suggest me to do this? Will this action boost my SERP position. Do more pages mean better SERP position?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nycdwellers1