What is the best way to structure URLs?

[rodhull]

I have read a lot of conflicting advice on this, so it would be interesting to hear what your views are. What is the best way to structure URLs for SEO purposes?

Some people say that pages should be close to the root of the domain. So we could have:

mysite.com/product-one-keywords.html
mysite.com/product-two-keywords.html

But others say that a logical URL directory structure should be used, such as:

mysite.com/category/sub-category/product-one-keywords.html
mysite.com/other-category/sub-category/product-two-keywords.html

I much prefer the look and organised structure of the second method, and the ability to get extra keywords into the full URL. But, does the fact that the product name keywords are then further from the root domain have a detrimental effect?

Has anyone scientifically tested these two approaches?

[AussieWebmaster]

this may help http://www.wolf-howl.com/seo/bandaid-seo/

while keywords in url are good you need to develop for scale and smooth pathing

[rodhull]

Nice article, and I agree with what Michael is saying. I want to get this URL structure right to begin with, but I'm still not sure which approach would be best.

[rodhull]

Any other thoughts guys?

[jag]

Tell us your preferred way. We will try to help you.

Best,

[rodhull]

I already mentioned the one I preferred in my first post, but ultimately I want to use the method that is best for SEO.

[jag]

Asked with reference to the article.

I would go for the tree structure

domain.com/catalog/product-name/subproduct-name/item-name with same structure in breadcrumb on the page and added title tag with item name and possible combination of keywords with item name.

Best,

[Web Marketer]

i would suggest you to use this url structure as this is more short and simple and precise...

mysite.com/product-one-keywords.html
mysite.com/product-two-keywords.html

[AussieWebmaster]

the simple way is good but if the site is a monster it gets unruly and limits how you can path the power of pages

[jag]

Short/simple URL were good in older days of search technology. Now Google and others are so smart that they compress URL based on search keywords listing. You can notice when you google for keywords that lists pages with long URL.

URL with tree structure will help with category based keywords combination search. Now a days length and size doesn't matter if the information and products are solid and interesting.

Best,

[rodhull]

Thanks for your replies. I agree that for a small site, the simple structure may be best but that the tree structure is especially good for large sites. Is there likely to be any detrimental effect of having the product keywords further from the root domain if using the tree structure? Or is this a myth?

Also, if a (fairly large) site is currently set up using the simple structure, will it cause problems (short term or otherwise) to change every URL to use the tree structure? Obviously 301s would be implemented for each page, but even so, is it possible that ranking could drop as a result of the movements?