Hi all. Sorry about the dodgy title but that's the best I could describe it. I apologise beforehand if this is a stupid question but it's bugging me so I figured I'd jump on here and ask the people in the know ... Right, basically all I would like to know is if it makes any difference to SEO how you structure the urls of categories. Or 'slugs' or whatever. For example: X.com/category/reviews or X.com/reviews (with the /category/ removed but still a category) Would that make any difference whatsoever from an SEO perspective? I'm trying to index categories for different keywords in my niche by creating seperate title tags for each category and a static introduction that also contains keywords for the category so the category gets indexed for those keywords. And then I'm using links (just links, no article text whatsoever) below the intro to link to each article within the category to avoid duplicate content issues. Does this make sense or am I talking dribble? Thanks again. Any help is MUCH appreciated. Thanks for your time.
It would seem that it is inherently more useful to use a custom tag of %postname% so you wind up with site.com/postname That said, there are several useful purposes for having say %category%postname% or, if you are a news outlet for instance, the date is entirely appropriate to have in the url. If your url has absolutely nothing to do with the task at hand, out of the gate, it may be beneficial to have a category. I am not exactly sure where google stops giving a shit in regards to the length of the url. I will try to give it some thought though. Nigel
Hi Nigel, thanks for the response. What I'm trying to say is does it matter (in terms of SEO) that I DON'T use %category%postname%, I just use %postname% I use X.com/blah as a category (just one word). I use X.com/blah-blah-blah for posts. I suppose all I'm really asking is does it help G identify a category if it's set up as: X.com/category/blah instead of just X.com/blah Damn, I'm confusing myself now ...
No, as a general rule it is best to have site.com/postname What I was trying to intimate is that, for instance, I own hubbleprints.com I am not served by creating hubbleprints.com/news/hubble/postname I am better served by hubbleprints.com/news/postname or, no need to duplicate a category name in this case. does that help? shoot me or us a link and I will tell you what to do Nigel
Yes it does. I think I'm fine with how I've done it now, thanks a lot for your help. One other question, does it really matter for seo what you use as a url for a category? For example; Let's say I'm trying to optimise for "weight loss products". Will it help in any way for seo if I use the category slug X.com/weight-loss-products or can I just use X.com/reviews and optimise the title tag for the necessary keywords (weight loss products in this case). Title tags are all that matter, right? (within reasn of course, obvioulsy it would be a bad idea to use X.com/ice-hockey and the category slug for a weight loss products page). You get the idea Thanks again for your help. Much appreciated.
According to the experts, no http://www.wilsonweb.com/seo/jill-whalen-select-seo.htm She is in the top 5. It pays to listen to her. Nigel
I always use /%postname%/ It's the fiirst thing I change when I make a wordpress site. But sometimes I forget