Potential new URL structure for my ecommerce site
-
At the moment my site suffers from a flat product category structure where over 600 items fall into one category alone. This category is then filtered using a faceted search which appends query strings to the category URL and changes the products displayed on the page.
At the moment our product category URL is as follows, www.domain.com/category/greeting-cards and this holds all cards including occasions such as anniversary, birthdays etc and also themes such as animal cards, contemporary cards etc
I have proposed changes to my developer to change this structure to include subcategories. I can now go two subcategories deep. For example, "greeting cards > occasions > birthday cards" or "greeting cards > themes > animals". This is reflected in the new URL structure, which has been proposed, www.domain.com/greeting-cards/occasions/birthday-cards. In this URL do I need "occasions" in the URL as I don't think it adds much value to the user? Would I be better of having www.domain.com/greeting-cards/birthday-cards. If a user searches for "birthday cards" then I think this would be more relevant?
-
Q: The example I gave earlier "www.domain.com/greeting-cards/occasions/birthday-cards/" would this be considered keyword stuffing if I am targetting the keyword "birthday cards"?
A: Absolutely not. If you saw a real keyword stuffed URL you'd probably laugh out loud at the fact that people are still writing URLs like www.bluewidgets.com/widgets/blue-widgets/best-blue-widgets/top_blue_widget.html . Your example is just a clear URL representation of the structure of your site.
Q: Keeping in mind this taxonomy would it be better for my URLs to follow this pattern instead? www.domain.com/greeting-cards, www.domain.com/occasions, www.domain.com/birthday-cards?
A: That depends. Are birthday cards a form of greeting cards? Are occasions just a way to categorize greeting cards by occasion? If so, they should probably go under the /greeting-cards/ directory.
Q?: All of our product pages have URLs formatted as follows /product/product-name.
A: Good. I'd keep them like that. You don't need category folders in the product URL.
-
Thanks for your response Everett.
I don't have too much control I have to ask the developers to make the changes but we are going through a restructure at the moment and want to try and get things right.
The example I gave earlier "www.domain.com/greeting-cards/occasions/birthday-cards/" would this be considered keyword stuffing if I am targetting the keyword "birthday cards"?
Keeping in mind this taxonomy would it be better for my URLs to follow this pattern instead? www.domain.com/greeting-cards, www.domain.com/occasions, www.domain.com/birthday-cards?
All of our product pages have URLs formatted as follows /product/product-name.
-
If you have control over how all of this works I recommend keeping things consistent. So if the taxonomy is "greeting cards > occasions > birthday cards" and the breadcrumb is "greeting cards > occasions > birthday cards" then the URL path should be "/greeting-cards/occasions/birthday-cards/".
This one is debatable, but my personal preference is also to have /product/ in that url path to differentiate product pages from category URLs, blog posts and other types of pages.
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
-
Disadvantages of Migrating Website to New URL
Hi There, I am currently struggling with the ranking of my website. No matter how many initiatives I try (backlinking, blog commenting, social posting, etc.) I can't seem to make any progression in Google Search. I've done competitive metrics through Open Site Explorer and can't seem to really find the reason why my site is not ranking as well as my competitors. The only one possible glaring element I've thought about is my website URL. This company is in the heating and cooling industry and majority of my competitors have either "heating" or "cooling" or both in their website URL's but mine does not. Does anyone have any thoughts or recommendations on if changing my URL and then redirecting my current URL would be a step in the right direction help me to climb the rankings in Google Search? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | MainstreamMktg0 -
URL structure of the page: Does this one need to contain the most important keyword for better SEO?
Hi everyone, I’m trying to get "air-conditioner-repair.html" to rank higher for the keyword "air conditioner los angeles". I am wondering whether or not I should change URL to "air-conditioner-los-angeles-repair.html" to get better results? Will be thankful very much for any advise you can offer!
On-Page Optimization | | kirupa0 -
Home page keyword in url
I have been looking into SEO for a few weeks now trying to perfect a homepage. Going through various sources on MOZ, and other examples out there on the internet, I keep seeing that you should have your keyword in the URL of the page. The homepage is the page most people want to rank the highest in google searches, however, you cannot put the keyword in the URL as most home page URLs are simply /. Should I actually make the home like this: www.example.com/key-word-example? I would imagine this would not be the normal for many users and would seem like it's not the home page.
On-Page Optimization | | Matthew_smart0 -
SEO Ecommerce Consulting Firm
We are currently designing and developing our new ecommerce website. Due to the complexity involving in duplicate contents as well as the structure of ecommerce websites, we are looking for a firm who can help us on this. We have a team of 15 people here developing our site and need guidance for URL structure and general flow of the website (Site optimization) that is SEO friendly. This would enable us to build links effectively. Anyone can recommend us some strategic consulting firm for this work? We have seen moz recommended lists and still waiting for their reply. Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | WayneRooney0 -
Redirecting to new domain
Hi, I switched my ecommerce site to a new domain, how can I get my new site indexed aneast art building links when my oils site is still indexed?
On-Page Optimization | | GTCarter11870 -
Question about URLs
Hello! I have a client that wants to upload an URL like this: www.example.com/keyword/page-name.html The main problem is that www.example.com/keyword/ doesn't exist and gives a 404 error so I'd prefer not doing that...... What do you think about this? And if the client wants to go ahead, is there any solution? A 301 to the final page would help? Thank you in advance!
On-Page Optimization | | Juandbbam0 -
Numbers above actual site content
Most pages on my website contain many numbers above the actual text on the page. This is useful for users and looks good on an actual view of the page. However, when a bot reads the page it appears as rows of numbers with a few sentences at the bottom of the page. Does having these number have a negative SEO effect? If so, should I change them to something such as an image so they aren't readable by search engines?
On-Page Optimization | | theLotter0 -
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