One of the things that still concern me and my colleagues when we get requests to help with a website in distress or offer advice to a client planning a new website is how often the URL structure gets over looked, especially when in relation to database driven sites, which often need the most guidance.

The URL structure can play a very important part of any SEO campaign and is something that you should always take great care and consideration when planning a new website, again, especially more so if the site is going to be driven by a database with thousands of possible data outputs.

What Is The URL Structure?

It is very easy to go into unnecessary complex details when explaining what the URL structure of a website is, and indeed there are a few elements, but the basic answer is the URL structure is how your URL looks to search engines and of course your clients.

Take for example two different websites, WebsiteA and WebsiteB. Both sites deliver thousands of products for sale to the general public, everything from washing machines to fridge freezers. They are both database driven sites, they are both offering the same kind of products and are both hosted in the UK, so in theory, should be similar in ranking.

We are going to look at the example of a Samsung Plasma TV. SiteA doesn't really understand the importance of URL structure and therefore all of its links are similar to:

WebsiteA/10004553455000455 429493466319?cm34_re344

SiteB is really switched on and therefore understands the importance of the URL structure to the search engines, so its URL is similar to:

WebsiteB/televisions/plasma_tvs/SAMSUNG_PS50B450B1WXXU

Straight away you can begin to see the difference of how the search engines will take to the links. WebsiteA tells the search engine nothing about the product, whereas WebsiteB not only tells the search engine the product detail, but also that it is a television and in fact a plasma TV.

So when the customer searches for a Samsung Plasma TV, WebsiteB has a far greater chance of ranking well, where as it will take WebsiteA a lot more time and hard work to rank for this product.

When designing your website, make sure you place as much importance on your URLs as anything you are considering in your planning stages. Getting this right from the start will make sure your site is indexed correctly as you really do not want to go changing your structure half way through the indexing process, or even worse, a year down the line.

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