Many, Many Index Pages On One Site

[SEOHolicc]

Hello all,

I have a client that would like an index page for each product they sell. I'll give you some examples.

This is what I recommend:
www.sample.com/products/bluewidgets.html or
www.sample.com/products/redwidgets.html

This is what they want:
www.sample.com/bluewidgets/index.html
www.sample.com/redwidgets/index.html

They would like to change it like this for all of their different products, so that means they will have somewhere around 200 index.html pages, but in different folders. I don't think this is a good idea. Can anyone give me some advice or evidence on how this could be a bad idea. The designer says this is something that he heard about at an SEO conference and I have never heard of anything like this. How would a search engine see all of these different index.html pages.

[crankydave]

Basically what this will do is when a visitor types in a partial URL such as www.sample.com/bluewidgets they will automatically be taken to the index.html page by default.

I don't know that it will do any real harm but I don't see it as providing any real benefit. If anything it dilutes what little strength the keywords have in the URL with "index".

Other than "hearing something" about it, was there anything the designer offered as a "plus" for structuring files in this way?

Dave

[chowell]

Shorter URLs generally work better:

www.sample.com/bluewidgets/
www.sample.com/redwidgets/

They're still using an index.html page, because it's the default to load for a folder path, but it's omitted from the actual URL that the browser and search engine spiders see.

Be careful about using the URLs with and without the index.html at the end also or you'll dilute their SEO value. If you don't pick one URL and stick with it everywhere, you'll end up with duplicate pages/content, which the engines won't like.

[craigmn3]

Being a member of the Old School SEO club.....you know, before it died.... I always want to keyword my page names.

I would propbably use:

www.sample.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html
www.sample.com/widgets/redwidgets.html

this way the page name is the keyword.....and not just the path.

But SEO is dead...right?

[SemAdvance]

Originally Posted by chowell

Shorter URLs generally work better:

www.sample.com/bluewidgets/
www.sample.com/redwidgets/

Better gas mileage??

Browsers open the page sooner??

How would they work better?

Originally Posted by craigmn3

But SEO is dead...right?

Not for my clients and I

but if you can spread that rumor to the 99% of SEOs who cannot SEO a keyword term with 2,000 competing pages that would be cool!!!!

;->

[Webnauts]

An Accessibility/Usability and SEO Tip:

Domains should be 12 characters or less, and URLs should not be longer than 72 characters.

The reason is that you must focus on performance before preference and reduce the user's workload.

[themezoom]

Hi,

Not that anyone necessarily cares that it is MAtt Cutts, but there was some basic discussion about URL Canonicalization on Matts blog.

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/seo-ad...onicalization/

There is a WHOLE BUNCH of deeper issues around this topic that I do not have time to go into here.

- Russell Wright

[gearoid]

Forget about it!
Who is telling who what to do?

While it can be done a number of effective ways, what is the point without a specific advantage?

[Nick Spence]

To my knowledge, using folders with index pages such as joessite.com/redwidgets and joessite/bluewidgets does not affect seo. However, as a marketing tool, it is clearer than joessite/products/redwidgets.html

~Nick

[Nick Spence]

My bad.

That should have been (of course):

joessite.com/bluewidgets

vs.

joessite.com/products/bluewidgets.html

~Nick

[edhan]

Originally Posted by craigmn3

Being a member of the Old School SEO club.....you know, before it died.... I always want to keyword my page names.

I would propbably use:

www.sample.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html
www.sample.com/widgets/redwidgets.html

this way the page name is the keyword.....and not just the path.

But SEO is dead...right?

Yes, I do agree with this method:
www.sample.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html
www.sample.com/widgets/redwidgets.html

This is more organised and you just have a single index to list out all the different widgets.

SEO dead? I don't think so.

[just-trying-to-help]

I'm confused,

Yes, I do agree with this method:
www.sample.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html
www.sample.com/widgets/redwidgets.html

This is more organised and you just have a single index to list out all the different widgets.

Lets pretend his url is www.bestonlinewidgets.com

now how does having url's like this benefit the site.
http://www.bestonlinewidgets.com/wid...uewidgets.html
http://www.bestonlinewidgets.com/wid...edwidgets.html

It would seem a bit spammy to me.

Wouldn't
www.bestonlinewidgets.com/bluewidgets.html
www.bestonlinewidgets.com/redwidgets.html
work just as well.
+ pages are in 1st level directory, not 2nd.
My 2 cents...
Ken

[edhan]

Originally Posted by just-trying-to-help

I'm confused,
Lets pretend his url is www.bestonlinewidgets.com

now how does having url's like this benefit the site.
http://www.bestonlinewidgets.com/wid...uewidgets.html
http://www.bestonlinewidgets.com/wid...edwidgets.html

It would seem a bit spammy to me.

Wouldn't
www.bestonlinewidgets.com/bluewidgets.html
www.bestonlinewidgets.com/redwidgets.html
work just as well.
+ pages are in 1st level directory, not 2nd.
My 2 cents...
Ken

You have a point too. But if you organise it under sub-folder for widgets, you can add other sub-folder like :
www.bestonlinewidgets.com/specialdeal/
www.bestonlinewidgets.com/newproduct/
etc.

Personally I prefer to organise with sub-folder instead of cluttering in the main folder. It is a matter of preference.

[tenkiya]

That's really simple to do. Look at what I've done on transpacificradio.com - that site's front-end has only 4 actual php flies and we use Apache rewrite rules to make all URLs look neat and clean. All content comes from the database and is spit out in one of three template pages.

In terms of both SEO and marketing, have neat and clean URLs is a huge advantage.

[MarcThai]

This looks like a transparent attempt to spam the SE's with lots of tempting Index pages. There may be no actual harm in it, but as others have said here, it does dilute your keyword strength. I would advise your client to do their business and let you do yours.

There is no good reason that I can think of to try and fool the SE's like this, and it could backfire instead.

Why not name the files with the product name instead? This would strengthen your chances of getting listed high in the SERPS.

We actually had this discussion a few weeks back from someone else, didn't we? Perhaps you should go back and read the responses to that discussion too.

[danners02]

organise your content into logical groups, then base your directory structure on that - simple.

www.mysite.com/widgets/ (list of widgets)
www.mysite.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html
www.mysite.com/widgets/redwidgets.html
www.mysite.com/widgets/on-sale/ (list widgets on sale)
www.mysite.com/widgets/on-sale/redwidgets.html
www.mysite.com/on-sale/ (all items on sale)
etc

If you have several versions of eg: blue widgets then it would be logical to sub-section this:

www.mysite.com/widgets/bluewidgets/ (list of blue widgets)
www.mysite.com/widgets/bluewidgets/style1.html
www.mysite.com/widgets/bluewidgets/style2.html
etc

The deeper you bury content in directory structures the harder it is to find
Your breadcrumb trail should also reflect your directory structure too

[JezC]

Why use "bluewidget/index.html" rather than "bluewidget.html"?

What if you want to change from HTML to PHP, or ASP? If you link to "bluewidget" consistently, then the page rank should not be damaged when you change the technology for delivering pages.

Additionally, you avoid distracting the user with the irrelevancy of the delivery technology, if the SE shows the page name as the link reference you use. For example, "bluewidget.asp" is less attractive to users than "bluewidget". Not a lot, but a little - for example, I've encountered users who won't use pages with ".cfm" suffix, because they didn't have ColdFusion installed on their own systems. I've also come across people who insist that pages with ".htm" won't render properly, because it is a subset of "html". Users pick up strange ideas and you want to confuse them as little as possible.

However, there are some weaknesses to this technology independence. For example, Browsers may follow a URL to a directory, but bookmarking will cause the full URI to the file name to be recorded. Ideally, browser bookmarking should record the URL to which you were sent, not the URI that you wind up on, to allow for the best technology independent delivery. Most browser developers insist that this is barking mad, so don't expect to see changes to bookmarking any time soon.

OTOH, how fast do you mutate the site? Usually the point at which this becomes important is the point when you want to move from, say, ASP to PHP. In that case, a rewrite rule that delivers index.php or bluewidget.php instead of index.asp or bluewidget.asp works just as well - so long as you do remember to do the 301 or 302 (in this case, a 301 is the "right" answer as you permanently intend to move).

SEO? Dead? No... But it is now more properly a subset of information architecture. It is possible to deliver the same content and get one lot ranked and the other lot buried, just because of the way that you build the page, the site and the links. It's still SEO, just not the way it used to be.

Personally, given a choice, I'll pick a technology-neutral directory naming system and include a bunch of rewrites from "index.htm", "index.php", "index.asp", etc so that users end up on the right page, whatever they think the delivery technology is, and whatever got bookmarked in the dawn of time.

Cheers, JeremyC.

[pathikbd]

Originally Posted by craigmn3

Being a member of the Old School SEO club.....you know, before it died.... I always want to keyword my page names.

I would propbably use:

www.sample.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html
www.sample.com/widgets/redwidgets.html

this way the page name is the keyword.....and not just the path.

URL names are one of the minor component for Search Engine Marketing. There are many things that are more important. If you search "Search Engines" in Google, you will find Google on the SERP. But, it does not have any text of "Search Engines" in their homepage or in the link.

However, for small sites (I mean fresh sites) small decisions are very essential. Therefore, I would also prefer keyword name for each page.

Rather than having all the products page in a single folder, you can cluster all the products in major categories as edhun suggested. That way you can come to the mid point where you have sacrificed a little and your client has sacrificed a little also.

Originally Posted by craigmn3

But SEO is dead...right?

Old School SEO is actually not dead. It's in coma :-). But SEO is not dead. Rather it now has a new life. It just got more juvenile and more dynamic as well as more challenging. It created a new industry with lots of diversified professionals like: copywriters, bloggers, market researchers, online support & marketing staffs, etc. who necessarily don't have to know what html is. But, the old school SEO was limited only to webmasters.

[jrb@w3f.com]

Originally Posted by SEOHolicc

This is what I recommend:
www.sample.com/products/bluewidgets.html or
www.sample.com/products/redwidgets.html

This is what they want:
www.sample.com/bluewidgets/index.html
www.sample.com/redwidgets/index.html

...

How would a search engine see all of these different index.html pages.

The only problem in having that many index.html files is the ease in which you can upload the wrong one to the wrong place.

My personal opinion is that your suggestion is best.
That assumes a single index.html that list them all,
in that subfolder, with links to all the others.

If there are many products, then a subgroup of sample.com/products/widgets/ might be helpful, but
it is, again, a lot of things to keep track of.

Having the key word 'widget' two times, like: sample.com/widgets/bluewidgets.html may or may not help your SEO effort, but I dont think it would hurt. (and I would be hesitant to have it there three times, but not sure why. (spamming?)

I believe, like many others that responses here, that management is important, and adding huge management issues for miniscule SEO advantages is not worth it.

I always think of subdirectories as 'sub-sitemaps', if you put links to the single items there as a list. A summary text blurb wouldn't hurt either. That also helps management, and may reinforce keyword-in-url issues, but don't go overboard. Also having a folder called 'products' (since it is not a keyword, or is it?) doesn't help SEO, but MAY help manage the site easier if all he sells is widgets.

If he sells 'goodies' and widgets' then a folder called 'products' only makes sense (to him) if he is only selling two or three of each. Seperate product-type folders for small numbers is more work.

Since 'G' highlights the search term(s) pieces in the full-path-url, it must help the reader select your link as being more applicable... (Not a ranking thing
maybe, but sertainly a custormer eye-catcher.)

Make it easy to maintain by making sense to the maintainer, include the key words where you can, cause the reader will see it, and the ranking will take care of itself due to other more important reasons.

[Peter (IMC)]

files have extentions, folders don't have extentions.

So why make files look like folders?

In my experience you even run the risk that a folder that has an index file is treated as a subdomain and thus requires to have links from outside in order to be indexed.

....

I can understand the "SEO is Dead" thought. Now adays just optimizing a website doesn't seem to have the same results as they used to have in the days that backlinks weren't so important. It´s almost like what ever you do on your own server doesn't really matter anymore. However, optimizing your website is still very important, but you have to get some links as well... :)

[jrb@w3f.com]

Originally Posted by Peter (IMC)

files have extentions, folders don't have extentions.

So why make files look like folders?

In my experience you even run the risk that a folder that has an index file is treated as a subdomain and thus requires to have links from outside in order to be indexed.

Since when were folders ever considered sub-domains?

No one suggested making files look like folders....

[chelle60]

first of all, user interface questions are almost totally irrelevant - a site selling widgets in 16 colors is going to have pretty much one page where everything is dynamically displayed for the regular shopper. "browsing" categories seldom actually takes a shopper into any other directories...

the only reason to build these other folders/pages is for search engine indexing. if a user accidentally finds one of these pages, the navigation should be such that the name of the page doesn't matter. besides, what's wrong with having index.html and bluewidgets.html? Change some things so they aren't exact duplicates of each other... then you have a page with widget in the name like you want and they have a directory with an index page like they want.

no matter which (or both) you use, it's more important, IMO, that the content on the page is relevant to the terms you're trying to rank under.

i hope you guys put this much effort into your site map.

[Peter (IMC)]

Originally Posted by jrb@w3f.com

Since when were folders ever considered sub-domains?

No one suggested making files look like folders....

I realize that everything said and written can be interpreted in different way. I guess that applies to what ever I write as well...

I didn't say that anybody suggested to make files look like folders. But the fact is that if you do everything in index files than that´s the result that you get: files look like folders (in the URL that is)

Folders aren't considered subdomains. But in my experience you have a hard time getting a index.html indexed. When you change the file name to a normal file name, Google all the sudden loves indexing it. Try it out and you will see.

[jammybiskit]

It looks to me like no one can give you a definitive and authoritative answer to this question. So why not be empirical?

You say there are 200 products. If so, then that's enough to get some reliable results from statistical tests. Why not try, say, half of the products one way and the other half the other way and monitor the results over the next few months? If you see benefits in one approach over the other, move your entire range over to that method, taking care with redirects, etc.

[SEOHolicc]

I may do that, but for now, I am going to try to talk the client out of doing it the way they want to, and setting up the site the way I feel it should be. Thanks everyone for all of your input!

[ezniche]

Very interesting discussion. In my experience I have had better luck getting good rankings with

www.sample.com/bluewidgets/index.html
www.sample.com/redwidgets/index.html

But when linking I left off the file name and left the url as: www.sample.com/bluewidgets

this has always worked well for me, I still have the keyword but instead of it being in the file name, its the folder name. I just assumed the SE's gave more weight to a folder name than an individual file and that was why I was getting better results.

ez

[incrediblehelp]

You might find this post useful:

You Say Index.html, I Say Trailing Slash

[Peter (IMC)]

That´s a great question they ask there,.. would be better if they'd actually answered it too... :)

[Webnauts]

Originally Posted by incrediblehelp

You might find this post useful:

You Say Index.html, I Say Trailing Slash

Are they really asking a question or is that a joke?

[incrediblehelp]

Considering this topic I thought this might be useful for the poster.