Siloing and navigation menu linking
-
Still trying to understand siloing and how it relates to displaying links in the navigation menu. I'm working on optimizing a site for a lawyer friend. His site consists of 4 top level pages - index, attorney profile, practice areas, and contact. Then, there are 2 folders that contain all the 2nd-level pages for his 2 practice areas - personal injury and business litigation. The website in question is www(dot)comitzlaw(dot)com.
From what I read about siloing before taking the 30-day SEOMoz trial (which I really like so far, by the way), I set the main (left hand) menu up as follows:
The 4 top level pages only display the "collapsed" navigation menu, which only links to the index pages for personal injury and business litigation. Go anywhere in personal injury, and all pages link to the "expanded" personal injury navigation (links to auto accidents page, wrongful death, motorcycle accidents, etc.) but the "collapsed" business litigation section and vice versa for business litigation's links to personal injury. I did this because, as I understand, it keeps the practice area links on topic (like in a car sales example where you want a Ford section linking to Ford pages and Chevy pages linking to Chevy pages).
Just wondering if anyone thinks I have this set up right. Wondering if the home page should display the "expanded" navigation menu instead or if all top level pages should show the expanded?
Appreciate any thoughts on this. Thanks.
-
I would suggest the expanded menu as a static menu bar on all of your pages, but at least the top level pages. The homepage is by far the most important for the reasons stated above- it looks like your deeper pages are getting indexed, so that's not an issue.
Then it looks like it's time to start link-building!
-
Thanks for the response. I will give this a try. Would you suggest the expanded menu for the other 3 top level pages or just the home page? Do you agree on collapsing (example) the business litigation menu when in the personal injury section?
PR will be easy to measure since all pages show as 0 for me now.
-
SEO and user experience would benefit from an expanded list on the homepage. People like to see their options laid out in front of them. It also will help PR on those individual pages that are only visible when the menu is expanded.
Measure your page rank on those second level pages, edit the homepage to display the expanded menu, wait 3 weeks and measure your rank again. SEOMoz has a handy keyword tracking tool that would help here.
This strategy is starting to be widely adopted because it is very effective (even on large ecommerce sites with many times more category links than you have). There is a reason that books start off with a table of content
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
-
Can I safely asume that links between subsites on a subdirectories based multisite will be treated as internal links within a single site by Google?
I am building a multisite network based in subdirectories (of the mainsite.com/site1 kind) where the main site is like a company site, and subsites are focused on brands or projects of that company. There will be links back and forth from the main site and the subsites, as if subsites were just categories or pages within the main site (they are hosted in subfolders of the main domain, after all). Now, Google's John Mueller has said: <<as far="" as="" their="" url="" structure="" is concerned,="" subdirectories="" are="" no="" different="" from="" pages="" and="" subpages="" on="" your="" main="" site.="" google="" will="" do="" its="" best="" to="" identify="" where="" sites="" separate="" using="" but="" the="" is="" same="" for="" a="" single="" site,="" you="" should="" assume="" that="" seo="" purposes,="" network="" be="" treated="" one="">></as> This sounds fine to me, except for the part "Google will do its best to identify where sites are separate", because then, if Google establishes that my multisite structure is actually a collection of different sites, links between subsites and mainsite would be considered backlinks between my own sites, which could be therefore considered a link wheel, that is, a kind of linking structure Google doesn't like. How can I make sure that Google understand my multisite as a unique site? P.S. - The reason I chose this multisite structure, instead of hosting brands in categories of the main site, is that if I use the subdirectories based multisite feature I will be able to map a TLD domain to any of my brands (subsites) whenever I'd choose to give that brand a more distinct profile, as if it really was a different website.
Web Design | | PabloCulebras0 -
Can we link back from help documents to product or features pages on website?
Hi, We have all our help documents on subdirectory linked for all the features or products we provide. Like we linked website.com/help/seo-guide from website.com/services/seo-product as that is relevant guide. Do we need to link back from all help guide pages to product pages? Thanks
Web Design | | vtmoz0 -
Can external links in a menu attract a penalty?
We have some instances of external links (i.e. pointing to another domain) in site menus. Although there are legitimate reasons (e.g. linking to a news archive kept on a separate domain) I understand this can be considered bad from a usability perspective. This begs the question - is this bad for SEO? With the recent panda changes we've seen certain issues which were previously "only" about usability attract SEO penalties, but I can't find any references to this example. Anyone have thoughts / experience?
Web Design | | SOS_Children0 -
CSS vs Javascript vs JQuery drop down navigation
For a user / seo perspective, what is the best way to code a drop down menu nav bar? Is it best to use css, javascript or a scripting library like jquery? I am thinking about overall best practice that will not have a negative impact on serps. I am also thinking about what will work best on all types of devices i.e. desk tops, lap tops, smart phones and tablets. What are the Pro's & Cons of Using CSS for Drop Down Menus. What are the Pro's & cons of using Javascript for drop down menus. And the same question for jquery. Thank you all in advance for your ideas.
Web Design | | bronxpad0 -
Are links from main page to inner pages will affect on ranking?
About 3 weeks ago I converted index.html to index.php. Both are 301 redirect to main url. Also I have about 70 links on main page pointing to internal pages. The Website is about 11 years old,and was on active link building . Is this conversion from html to php and also 70 links pointing to inner pages will affect on ranking?Since all links are passing juice to inner pages.
Web Design | | LosAngelesLimo0 -
Homepage Menu Change
For the site I work on we would like to make a change on the homepage from having categories on the left nav to a meta menu on the top nav. The reason we are doing this is an attempt to both make finding products better for the customer and we feel it is more aesthetically pleasing. Could this negatively affect our SEO and ranking even if we use the exact same links? Are there any other negative repercussions you feel could come from this? Thanks for any help!
Web Design | | ClaytonKendall0 -
Does on page links have an effect on SERP rankings with PANDA
I have been doing some competitive analysis basing my company on others and have noticed a pattern. Very high ranking sites seem to have limited the internal and external on page links on their subdomains to under 100. my site has a lot of links but all are relevant and lead to unique content. I am interested to know if anyone else has noticed this pattern in changes in the SERP results. bIs google now penalizing pages with to many on site nav links? And if a full site restructure is needed to allow google to index and rank these pages or if a it is a non issue and does not need to be addressed. Panda confuses me!!!!! HELP!
Web Design | | Brother220 -
Footer Links for Design Shops - Do They Help or Hurt?
I work on SEO for a number of clients at our agency, including our in-house SEO for our own website. I use Open Site Explorer all the time to analyze my competition in the SERPs and try to gain links from this insight. However, I've noticed a number of agencies and design shops that place a link in the footer of websites they've designed and created. For example "Site design by ABC Agency (hyperlinked to the agency's home page). Or I've seen small logos or graphics that link to the designer's site and use the "alt tag" to get stronger anchor text. From a design perspective, I don't care for this, but as a SEO...I can see why. We've designed a number of websites and have more in the pipeline, but have not used this tactic before. It seems like an irrelevant link from a content/user standpoint, however, it seems to work for a lot of agencies and design shops. Any input from the SEOmoz community would be great. Is it a short-lived strategy? Does it help or hurt your link-building and "rapport" with Google, Bing, Yahoo? Thanks everyone.
Web Design | | PHDL0
