How important is it to add hyphens between words in URL Permalink Structure?
-
We have an issue with our URL Permalink Structures for dynamically generated pages on our website. As we generated hundreds of pages, it does not automatically Space the Words in the Permalink Structure .
For example, if we have a product name Under Armour Fire Basketball Shoe , it will show up in the url as:
"mywebsite.com/underarmourfire-basketballshoe"
vs
"mywebsite.com/under-armour-fire-basketball-shoe"
How important is it that the URL includes these spaces between each word in the permalink?
-
Hi Aspirant. these hyphens assume a significant job with regards to rank that particular watchword prefers in the event that you do it as such 'nderarmourfire-basketball shoe' google will search for basketball shoe catchphrase to rank rather than basketball shoes. Much the same as you see here best boxing gloves kept all the permalinks with hyphens and they are positioning. SO I will propose you to do something very similar to your site in the event that you need to up your positioning.
On the off chance that you need further recommendations, you are welcome!
-
Hello Aspirant. these hyphens play a very important role when it comes to rank that specific keyword like if you do it this way 'nderarmourfire-basketballshoe' google will look for basketballshoe keyword to rank instead of basketballshoes. Just like you see here best boxing gloves kept all the permalinks with hyphens and they are ranking. SO I will suggest you to do the same thing with your site if you want to up your ranking.
If you need any more suggestions, you are welcome!
-
It is best practice to separate all words with dashes but it's not going to make or break your rankings.
The search engines are smart enough now to decipher that underarmourfire-basketballshoe is really "under armour fire basketball shoes". Just type in the former into Google and you'll see that Google asks if you meant the latter.
Also, you can find hundreds of examples of "messy" URLs that rank top ten proving that that one factor alone isn't going to make or break your success.
If it's a simple fix for a programmer to make it so your URL's use dashes between all words then I'd say fix the problem. But if it's a big deal that would take a lot of time/resources, the argument could easily be made to pass on this issue for the time being to knock out other more important items.
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
-
Status Codes - Deleted URLs
Hi I have a dev team 'cleaning' their database and from what I can tell deleting old URL's - which they say are not in use. I don't have much visibility on how our URLs are managed in the back end of the site, but my concern is these URLs should never be deleted, they should have a 301, 404 or 410. This includes product pages no longer available and category pages - my concern is losing authority. Am I worrying over nothing or is this a big issue?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BeckyKey0 -
URL Changes Twice in the Same Year
I've got a new client with a great site, great off-page optimization and some scars and a hangover from a bad developer relationship. I'd be so grateful for your thoughts on this situation: Some time in the not-too-distant-past, the website is established and new content is posted. We'll call this Alpha. In April 2015, the client migrates to WordPress, implementing 301 redirects on every content page because of the capitalization issues of the old CMS. That means Alpha URLs are redirecting to Betas. Problem is, the new Beta WordPress URLs are the the permalink structure: /%year%/%monthnum%/%postname%/ and update by default when the page content is updated meaning that any updates to existing content cause another 301. It's my belief that for evergreen content, dates in the URL do nothing to help you and might even hurt from a user-experience standpoint, if not a search engine one. So, naturally, I'd like to move to the simple/%postname%/ structure, which would be Gamma. So, here's how I think we should fix it. Step 1: Update the sitemap and navigation and make the desired URL (Gamma) structure the default and the canonical. Step 2: Change the Alpha -> Beta redirects to Alpha -> Gamma Step 3: Add Beta -> Gamma redirects Anyone done this in the past? Anyone have any problems with it?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | LindsayDayton0 -
Duplicate Content with URL Parameters
Moz is picking up a large quantity of duplicate content, consists mainly of URL parameters like ,pricehigh & ,pricelow etc (for page sorting). Google has indexed a large number of the pages (not sure how many), not sure how many of them are ranking for search terms we need. I have added the parameters into Google Webmaster tools And set to 'let google decide', However Google still sees it as duplicate content. Is it a problem that we need to address? Or could it do more harm than good in trying to fix it? Has anyone had any experience? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoman100 -
Canonical URL availability
Hi We have a website selling cellphones. They are available in different colors and with various data capacity, which slightly changes the URL. For instance: Black iphone, 16GB: www.site.com/iphone(black,16,000000000010204783).html White iphone, 16GB: www.site.com/iphone(white,16,000000000010204783).html White iphone, 24GB: www.site.com/iphone(white,24,000000000010204783).html Now, the canonical URL indicates a standard URL: But this URL is never physically available. Instead, a user gets 301 redirected to one of the above URLs. Is this a problem? Does a URL have to be "physically" available if it is indicated as canonical?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | zeepartner0 -
Attack of the dummy urls -- what to do?
It occurs to me that a malicious program could set up thousands of links to dummy pages on a website: www.mysite.com/dynamicpage/dummy123 www.mysite.com/dynamicpage/dummy456 etc.. How is this normally handled? Does a developer have to look at all the parameters to see if they are valid and if not, automatically create a 301 redirect or 404 not found? This requires a table lookup of acceptable url parameters for all new visitors. I was thinking that bad url names would be rare so it would be ok to just stop the program with a message, until I realized someone could intentionally set up links to non existent pages on a site.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | friendoffood1 -
Mixing static.htm urls and dynamic urls on a Windows IIS Server?
Hi all, We've had a website originally built using static html with .htm extensions ranking well in Google hence we want to keep those pages/urls. We are on a dedicated sever (Windows IIS). However our developer has custom made a new DYNAMIC section for the site which shows new added products dynamically and allows them to be booked online via shopping cart. We are having problems displaying them both on the same domain even if we put the dynamic section withing its own subfolder and keep the static htms in the root. Is it possible to have both function on IIS (even if they may have to function a little separately)? Does anyone have previous experience of this kind of issue or a way of making both work? What setup do we need to do on the dedicated server.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | emerald0 -
Changing URLS - wondering about implications
We are in the process of changing our URLs from dynamic to more SEO friendly. The website is ciee.org and I'm specifically talking about ciee.org/study. While we work with the business to get approval for ciee.org/study-abroad, we are going with ciee.org/study/abroad. Can anyone foresee any difficulties or negative implications that could come if we change from study/abroad to study-abroad all within 6 months? Thank you in advance!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CIEEwebTeam0 -
Service Keyword in URL - too much?
We're working on revamping the URL structure for a site from the ground up. This firm provides a service and has a library of case studies to back up their work. Here's some options on URL structure: 1. /cases/[industry keyword]-[service keyword] (for instance: /cases/retail-pest-control) There is some search traffic for the industry/service combination, so that would be the benefit of using both in URL. But we'd end up with about 70 pages with the same service keyword at the end. 2. /cases/[industry keyword] (/cases/retail) Shorter, less spam potential, but have to optimize for the service keyword -- the primary -- in another way. 3. /cases/clientname (/cases/wehaveants) No real keyword potential but better usability. We also want the service keyword to rank on its own on another page (so, a separate "pest control" page). So don't want to dilute that page's value even after we chase some of the long tail traffic. Any thoughts on the best course of action? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kdcomms1