Preferred URL structure for directory pages?
-
Hi Moz-Mind,
We've got a bunch of duplicate content issues in our directory of trucking-related businesses, caused by search terms that can appear in any order, (classic mistake). We're taking advantage of this our work on URLs to try to improve our URL structure, and I'm not sure which way I want to go.
These are the options we're considering. What does the Moz-mind think of each of them?
- example.com/location-name/service-name
- example.com/service-name/location-name
- example.com/service-name-near-location-name
For the moment location-name would be a city & state abbreviation, like atlanta-ga, (unless it's better to use something else).
Since these are search URLs, it's also possible to add a distance restriction, and a keyword, to the search criteria. How do you suggest adding the distance restriction?
- example.com/service-name/location-name/50-miles
- example.com/service-name/within-50-miles/location-name
- example.com/service-name-within-50-miles-of-location-name
And the keyword?
- example.com/service-name/location-name/keyword
- example.com/service-name/location-name/keyword/{actual-keyword}
- example.com/service-name-near-location-name/keyword
Something else?
I was leaning toward example.com/service-name/location-name/within-50-miles, but I thought of the /service-name-near-location-name/ and /service-name/within-50-miles-of/location-name options today and really like how they make sense both to computers and to people, not unlike example.com/GA/atlanta/service-name/50
I'm looking forward to hearing what the community thinks. There must be an established best practice for directories, but if it's kind of ugly I'd like to find an even better way, if possible.
Thanks,
John
-
Thanks for the insight - it does make sense to go with /location-name/service-name because people might want to look at all services in a location, but all locations for a service doesn't make much sense, (unless someone's scraping my site, and I don't want to make life easy for those people!).
Things like /within-50-miles will be canonicalized to the base location as you suggest. You're right that there isn't much difference between that and simply /service-a/location-a
I want everything to be bookmarkable, so keyword search will be either a parameter or another path, (like /keyword-{urlencoded keyword content} ), and I may or may not canonicalize that to just the location/service combo, or simply noindex it, or leave it as-is and see what happens. The /location-a/ part of the URL can accept a lot of formats, and some, like GPS coordinates, will have to be noindexed to avoid duplicate content, (I guess I could rel=canonical them to the closest town or something, I can save that as an experiment for later).
Thanks again for the insight. It makes sense to me.
-
There are a lot of different ways that you can go with this, some of which will be pretty much equal in value. I would recommend going /service-name/location-name, or /location-name/service-name, depending on which of these is more important to be viewed by itself (so ask yourself: are there times when someone would be looking at the service without looking at the location, or vice versa?). The main important thing, as you point out, is that it's one or the other, not both.
I would recommend making location its own folder /within-50-miles, and adding it to the end of the URLs, rather than creating a whole different hierarchy for distance restriction.
With the keywords, how would you add in the actual keyword? Would it be with a URL parameter?
Even without the use of URL parameters, you should carefully consider which of these pages will be the canonical version. /service-a/location-a and /service-a/location-a/50-miles won't be that different in content, I imagine. It would probably be a good idea to use the canonical tag to point the distance-restricted pages back to the location pages, and let users drill down from there, rather than trying to make every permutation of factors its own landing page. Does that make sense?
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
-
Which one of these URL's will rank the best?
Hello! Curious on the community's thoughts on linking best practices for the following hypothetical scenario: I own a site called landscaping.com and want to rank for the term "landscapers houston". I have a link on the top title bar linking to landscaping.com/landscapers-near-me with an interactive map with clickable links leading to different metro areas. What should be my link from that page to the Houston page? 1. landscaping.com/landscapers-near-me/landscapers-houston 2. landscaping.com/landscapers-near-me/houston 3. landscaping.com/landscapers-houston 4. landscaping.com/houston The main question is whether to include the parent page or not. i have 2 conflicting thoughts. 1. short URL's are better so dont include it 2. include it because that is the page that links out to it and it helps Google understand the site flow. Thanks, Ryan
Local Listings | | RyanMeighan0 -
Should I "no follow" some of my references to suppliers on my contact page?
We have a new website where we are selling a gate brace and the contact page has a number of links to possible suppliers. 3 of the 4 have our product locally. There are also 2 image links that go to trade shows we have been at. Should I "no follow" these links? Or is it not a big deal? Brad
Local Listings | | SuperNovi0 -
Does Google Analytics automatically desseminate Maps/Places traffic from Organic traffic? Do webmasters still have to apply UTM parameter tracking to URLS in their GMB profile listings?
It was recommended a few years to apply UTM parameters to local URLs to get more accurate referral/source tracking in Google Analytics. Here is an old Moz post about this process https://moz.com/blog/tracking-traffic-from-google-places-in-google-analytics However does GA automatically separate this traffic out nowadays? Is there a method to identify the traffic coming from Maps/Places without UTM parameters? Is UTM tagging still necessary if we want to see these traffic reports?
Local Listings | | RosemaryB0 -
Google My Business URL Choice
Hi guys, we have a national chain hardware store hardware store as a client. We built them a new website, and now they want us to do local SEO to help them rank better. We are debating for GMB whether to promote our new website URL or use the location page on the national hardware site. Most similar stores seem to promote the location page on the national site, but the client just spent money on having us build them a new website. What gives our client the best chance of ranking better?
Local Listings | | JohnWeb120 -
Same Back Links To All 20 Pages On My Site?
Hi All I have researched 20 plumber blogs and citation sources all have page rank 1-8 and good trust and domain age. Would it be wise to have a backlink to each of my 20 web pages from these 20 different blogs? plumber blog a backlink to all 20 pages on my plumbing site plumbing blog a backlink to all 20 pages on my plumbing site how to fix leaky tap blog a backlink to all 20 pages on my plumbing site how to pick the best gas boiler blog a backlink to all my 20 pages on my plumbing site and so on as my website is united kingdom and serve UK only, should i not use USA blogs & citation sources as this might not help increase my organic rankings? thanks
Local Listings | | nickowain0 -
Has anyone ever used a specific page (instead of home page) when building links in directories?
Instead of the home page, have you ever done (domain)/page-1 for the URL in directories? I figured this would be a good way to build some page authority up for deeper pages for small businesses that can't seem to garner any attention with content / links. BTW, these directories are not considered spam directories. Thanks, Cole
Local Listings | | ColeLusby0 -
Right page to place the Schema code for global business
I have two questions: 1. Schema code for Global business: As a company which works with clients across the globe, we like to create a well defined schema that doesn't limit and appear as a Local Business to Google. I assume "http://schema.org/LocalBusiness" means a local business to Google. If we use it, will be be affecting the ranking in global searches? 2. Page and location to keep the code What could be the best place to keep the schema code in a web page? - Homepage/ About us page / contact us page and Footer links are the options. I hope applying CSS on it too wouldn't be an issue. Looking forward to learning your thoughts.
Local Listings | | macronimous0 -
How do URL's influence Google Rankings?
Hi There, I have a new client who wishes to rank in Google UK for 'Antique Fireplaces London'. Currently they rank 49th. They do not know their logins for Google Local (where they have 40+ positive reviews). And have very mess social activity (which i am trying to sort out). The domain is around 8 years old - website has just been redone (drupal) where a lot of the former SEO errors were corrected) but they seem to be outranked by much newer websites that have much lower domain authority and less inbound links. My client also has much more recognition in online trade magazines and newspapers than most of their competitors. Would buying some additional domains with the keywords they wish to rank for help? Or will this look dodgy to google? Any other quick tips to give them a boost?
Local Listings | | skehoe0