Is there any concrete proof about how "clean" URLs result in higher SERPs or more indexed pages? I'm building a new site and have been making it so I can have nice mod_rewritten URLs, but in some cases it's a big hassle and I'm wondering if it's even worth it.
Here's a sample: "Clean" URL: http://www.some-site.com/store/item/12345/kids_backpack.html "Standard" URL: http://www.some-site.com/store.php?item=12345&description=kids_backpack Code (markup):
IMO, in this case you are loosing your time with mod_rewrite. The "standard" url you use in your example is fully crawlable and will be followed by any robot I know. Google has some problems with "id=" parameter, but everything alse is quite OK, just check the urls of amazon, they are 7 times longer and much more shady than yours "standards" and Amazon has no problems with them neither do the SEs. ---------------------------------------------------- BTW, your listedwrong.com (if it yours) is a good idea!
What you have listed as a standard URL doesn't look bad but a mod rewrite doesn't take that long to do and if it gives you even a slight edge I would use it. Most of the mod rewrites I have been involved in have URLs that VERY long and full of parameters. Your URL is fine, but the cleaner the better if you have the time to do the rewrite.
Yeah, I know what you're talking about... what I posted was just an example off the top of my head. The URLs can get very long with lots of parameters along with them, and using mod_rewrite can make them shorter and prettier. However, I'm not entirely convinced that shorter and prettier makes them search engine friendlier. I think some time ago (a year or two, maybe) the SE spiders had issues with crawling dynamic URLs but by now all of the major SE's should be able to deal with them. But then again, I see some people posting in other forums about how the spiders still don't deal with dynamic URLs properly.