Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
How important are clean URLs?
-
Just wanting to understand the importance of clean URLs in regards to SEO effectiveness.
Currently, we have URLs for a site that reads as follows: http://www.interhampers.com.au/c/90/Corporate Gift Hampers
Should we look into modifying this so that the URL does not have % or figures?
-
What if you have a client with a LOT of ugly URLs that need to be cleaned up?
The plan is to create 301 redirects for every page that we change. But, let's say we're talking about 50+ product pages.
In your opinion, is it a problem to make that many changes at once?
Would you paste them out?
If so, how many at a time?
Also, is it a problem to have that many 301's on your website?Thank you!
-
Yes! As Suresh and Shakur said, that it is preferred by people and search engines. People have hard time reading the urls with special characters and a hyphen is recommended.
Regards
-
Hi there!
Clean URLs are preferred by people, and it just so happens that search engines prefer them as well. Keywords in URLs are, more often than not, used to identify the relevance of a page when a search for a particular keyword is performed. However, it is not generally recommended to stuff keywords in your URLs for SEO purposes. The idea is to deliver enhanced usability to help users remember and share your URLs more easily. At the same time, clean URLs also facilitate a search engine’s ability to identify the relevance of page content to a particular search query, in order to choose what to display in search results.
So yes, it´s better if you modify all of them and make it clean.
Good luck
-
Definitely you should look into modifying the url structure. % represents blank spaces in the url. You can replace the blank spaces with "-". Google recommends hyphenated url's rather than blank spaces and underscores. The url's should be clean with every word seperated by "-" and the url size can be anywhere around 80 to 90 characters in length.
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
-
How to remove subdomains in a clean way?
Hello, I have a main domain example.com where I have my main content and then I created 3 subdomains one.example.com, two.example.com and three.example.com I think the low ranking of my subdomains is affecting the ranking of my main domain, the one I care the most. So, I decided to get rid of the subdomains. The thing is that only for one.example.com I could transfer the content to my main domain and create 301 redirects. For the other two subdomains I cannot integrate the content in my main domain as it doesn't make sense. Whats the cleanest way to make them dissapear? (just put a redirect to my main domain even if the content is not the same) or just change the robots to "noindex" and put a 404 page in the index of each subdomain. I want to use the way that will harm the least the performance with Google. Regards!
On-Page Optimization | | Gaolga0 -
Is using hyphens in a URL to separate words good practice?
Hi guys, I have a client who wants to use a hyphen to separate two words in the URL to make each work stand out. Is is good or bad practice to use a hyphen in a URL and will it affect rankings? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | StoryScout0 -
Google is indexing urls with parameters despite canonical
Hello Moz, Google is indexing lots of urls despite the canonical in my site. Those urls are linked all over the site with parameters like ?, and looks like Google is indexing them despite de canonical. Is Google deciding to index those urls because they are linked all over the site? The canonical tag is well implemented.
On-Page Optimization | | Red_educativa0 -
Correct .htaccess settings for canonical url?
I want to forward all urls to http:www.mysite.com but am a little confuse because I am getting duplicate content error: Pages with Duplicate Page Content as of Jan 15http://titanappliancerepair.com/ 1 duplicatehttp://titanappliancerepair.com 1 duplicatehttp://titanappliancerepair.com/index.html 1 duplicate*****************************************************************What should I put ion htaccess file so I can forwardhttp://titanappliancerepair.com/index.htmlhttp://titanappliancerepair.comhttp://titanappliancerepair.com/to http://www.titanappliancerepair.comor what is the correct way to do it?I'm confused because when I enter http://titanappliancerepair.com/ in browser it showshttp://titanappliancerepair.com so how can it be considered duplicate content?.Can someone help?I have godaddy and they have gave me this code to put RewriteEngine on
On-Page Optimization | | webbutler13
rewritecond %{http_host} ^coolexample.com [nc]
rewriterule ^(.)$ http://www.coolexample.com/$1 [r=301,nc]What is correct?0 -
How important are image file names
Hi, How important do you think the image file names are for image search?
On-Page Optimization | | jjtech
I know it used to be the best practice a while ago but is it still important? Thanks in advance, JJ0 -
How to exclude URL filter searches in robots.txt
When I look through my MOZ reports I can see it's included 'pages' which it shouldn't have included i.e. adding filtering rules such as this one http://www.mydomain.com/brands?color=364&manufacturer=505 How can I exclude all of these filters in the robots.txt? I think it'll be: Disallow: /*?color=$ Is that the correct syntax with the $ sign in it? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | neenor0 -
Which is Best Practice for creating URLs for subdomain?
My website is related to education. We have created sub domains for all major colleges, universities & Entrance exams like Gre, Toefl ETC. for eg: amityuniversity.abc.com (Amity is Name of University ) Now if have to mention city name in URL as well (college is located in multiple locations) amityuniversity-delhi.abc.com
On-Page Optimization | | rohanarora536
amityuniversitydelhi.abc.com Now my Q is can we use hyphens in sub domains if we have to add city name or shall we create without using any hyphens. In Directory structure we can always separate words with hyphens, can we follow same practice in subdomain as well Which is a best URL for subdomain amity-university-delhi.abc.com
amityuniversity-delhi.abc.com
or amityuniversitydelhi.abc.com0 -
How to Define Best URL Structure for Product Pages?
I am working on my website to edit structure with help of Google's search engine optimization starter guide. There is really good instruction to define URL structure which help us to perform well over Google's organic search. I have resolved issues regarding category pages but, I have confusion to define best URL structure for product pages. My website's product page URL structure is as follow. http://www.vistastores.com/marketumbrellas-californiaumbrella-slpt758-f13-red.html http://www.vistastores.com/homefurniture-winsomewood-93630.html URL structure is constructed with following terms. 1. Root Category Name (Market Umbrellas or Home Furniture or ....) 2. Brand Name 3. Manufacturer Part Number I am not happy with this structure and also not performing well over Google's organic search. I am thinking to include product name or title tag in URL after root domain. But, it may create very long URL and create issues in organic search display. Does it really matter to perform well over Google's organic search? How can I define best URL structure for product pages?
On-Page Optimization | | CommercePundit0
