Big list of different ways I could use the htaccess rewrite to create a SEO url, but what is the best to use? Would a search engine view links in a /c/c/ as a sub of a sub directory? vs /c-c-c (tld link vs sub/sub link vs sub/link). Also, in the search results shown is it better to have just the first letter capital or each one capital or none of them capital? Also, dash vs underscore. Which is better to use and why? Would you prefer a dash in the search engine listing or a underscore as a devider? What would the search engine prefer to show? /Action/21/this_is_a_test_string.html /Action/21-this_is_a_test_string.html /Action-21-this_is_a_test_string.html /Action-21/this_is_a_test_string.html /Action/21/This_is_a_test_string.html /Action/21-This_is_a_test_string.html /Action-21-This_is_a_test_string.html /Action-21/This_is_a_test_string.html /Action/21/This_Is_A_Test_string.html /Action/21-This_Is_A_Test_string.html /Action-21-This_Is_A_Test_string.html /Action-21/This_Is_A_Test_string.html /Action/21/this-is-a-test-string.html /Action/21-this-is-a-test-string.html /Action-21-this-is-a-test-string.html /Action-21/this-is-a-test-string.html /Action/21/This-is-a-test-string.html /Action/21-This-is-a-test-string.html /Action-21-This-is-a-test-string.html /Action-21/This-is-a-test-string.html /Action/21/This-Is-A-Test-string.html /Action/21-This-Is-A-Test-string.html /Action-21-This-Is-A-Test-string.html /Action-21/This-Is-A-Test-string.html
/Action-21-this-is-a-test-string.html is better because an url must the nearest position to the main site url and - character is better to use
But if I have like 5k different links (arcade website). Wouldn't google think it is bad? My pick would be this one. /Action/21-This_Is_A_Test_String.html or /Action-21/This_Is_A_Test_String.html Because it is only 1 level deep and would break up the amount of links google thinks is on one level of the website. -- In the past I have had websites like the below. /Action/21/This-Is-A-Test-String.html and had good results too, but I think the - in it is killing the overall appeal of it in the SERP. I think a _ would look better. I like the non - in the name because i think a end user can read it better in the search results. /Action/21/This_Is_A_Test_String.html So, when google highlights apart of the url it would be readable? How does yahoo and msn differ when showing a websites url?
Go for this link /Action-21-this-is-a-test-string.html as it will cover action, 21 and this is a test string. u can use this to /Action-21/this-is-a-test-string.html but it will go one link deep which is not good. just for for rist option it will give maximum benefits.
You should choose an all lower case URL because some servers aren't configured to display this-page.html when This-Page.html is requested.
You know what, from a search engine's perspective, it really doesn't matter anymore. Not even in Google. (Google has now announced that the underscore character is - or will be soon - a keyword delimiter.) But I'd go with the dash over the underscore more for usability and accessibility purposes than SEO anyway. People may not realize the underscore is there when they type out the link, wonder why "your site is broken" and leave never to return. At least with the dash they'll know that the words are separate, and will bear that in mind when telling their friends about your site. One other thing - don't use upper-case letters in your URLs, not only do people have a hard time remembering them, but file path names can be case-sensitive on some servers.