HELP - Site architecture of E-Commerce Mega Menu - Linkjuice flow

[bjs2010]

Hi everyone,

I hope you have a couple of mins to give me your opinion. Ecommerce site has around 2000 products, in english and spanish, and around only 70 hits per day if that.

We have done a lot of optimisation on the site - Page Titles, URL's, Content, H1's, etc.... Everything on page is pretty much under control, except I am starting to realise the site architecture could be harming our SEO efforts.

Once someone arrives on site they are language detected and do a 302 to either domain.com/EN or domain.com/ES depending on their preferred language.

Then on the homepage, we have the big MEGA MENU - and we have 
CAT 1
   SubCat 1
       SubsubCat 1
       SubsubCat 2
       SubsubCat 3

Overall, there are 145 "categories". Plus links to some CMS pages, like Home, Delivery terms, etc...

Each Main Category, contains the products of everything related to that category - so for example:
KITCHENWARE
     COOKWARE          BAKINWARE
        SAUCEPANS            BOWLS
        FRYING PANS

Kitchenware contains: ALL PRODUCTS OF SUBCATS BELOW, SO COOKWARE ITEMS, SAUCEPANS, FRYING PANS, BAKINGWARE, etc... plus links to those categories through breadcrumbs and a left hand nav in addition to the mega menu above.

So once the bots hit the site, immediately they have this structure to deal with.

Here is what stats look like:
Domain Authority: 18

www.domain.com/EN/
PA: 27
mR: 3.99
mT: 4.90

www.domain.com/EN/CAT 1
PA: 15
mR: 3.05
mT: 4.54

www.domain.com/EN/CAT 1/SUBCAT1
PA: 15
mR: 3.05
mT: 4.54

Product pages themselves - have a PA of 1 and no mR or mT.

I really need some other opinions here - I am thinking of:

1. Removing links in Nav menu so it only contains CAT1 and SUBCAT1 but DELETE SUBSUBCATS1 which represent around 80 links
2. Remove products within the CAT1 page - eg., the CAT 1 would "tile" graphical links to subcategories, but not display products themselves. So products are only available right at the lowest part of the chain (which will be shortened)

But I am willing to hear any other ideas please - maybe another alternative is to start building links to boost DA and linkjuice?

Thanks all,

Ben

[PaddyDisplays]

Your DA and PA are weak so if I were you I would be selective on what your target. Do some research on keywords you would like to rank for and see what the competition is like for that keyword in the serps and if you have a hope to rank ( you might want to start on mid-long term keywords).

You can also see what pages your currently rank for (page 2 or 3) and if a little improvement with the PA would it get to the front page, then you will know if it worth having a site wide link (via the Nav) to get the max PA to that page from your own site.

But don't for get the people have to use the site so it might not be possible to have every link on the nav to be a landing page.

[bjs2010]

Thanks.

Our landing pages are both - depending on google - we rank for some category pages and rank for products also - the content and keywords are sprinkled without overspamming in the content, so it should make semantic sense what our pages are about.

I think I really need to work on the nav - I think link juice aint flowing.

[bjs2010]

---  your product descriptions are duplicated on other sites and your site has been hit by Panada or the age-old duplicate filter (YES, they are - We are writing new content that is not Manufacturer description copies - e.g., our own unique content - in the meantime, I am META NOINDEX, FOLLOW)

---  you are working on a nascent site that has no links and that nobody is tweeting, liking or citing (Partially correct - we are tweeting and liking it via various social network accounts of our own)

---  you have a bad link profile and have been hit by Panda
(I cant see any "bad links" from unreputable domains - Our link profile is pretty poor and we only have a couple of external references from other websites and nothing too spammy)

So, what do you say about the three items above?

Also, those 70 visitors.  What are their referring domains, or where are they coming from? We are getting exposure in Google, so mostly traffic coming from Google but not enough

If we were hit by a Google penalty, what would it look like?

[PaddyDisplays]

you have to think what your landing pages are related to the keyword, (are your products your landing page or are your categorys your landing pages)   the 145 links on the nav is really splitting your PA of you pages very thin.  eg the 27 pa of your homepage is being spread over those 145 pages.  Its better to reduce those site wide links to just your landing pages, with clearly always thinking of your users use the site and what works best for them.  Think of it like this is a menu with 145 really helping your users?

I'm currently doing the same think for our website, reducing a 222 link nav down is about 20

[EGOL]

You have certainly done a lot of analysis.

Before considering what you have posted my suspicions for a site that has 2000 products and 70 visits per day are....

---  your product descriptions are duplicated on other sites and your site has been hit by Panada or the age-old duplicate filter

---  you are working on a nascent site that has no links and that nobody is tweeting, liking or citing

---  you have a bad link profile and have been hit by Panda

So, what do you say about the three items above?

Also, those 70 visitors.  What are their referring domains, or where are they coming from?