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A URL structure is carried out to sequence your website’s content. They perform like an interactive connection between your content and the user. The URL of your website is the primary thing that users see. It’s mandatory to design it according to SEO rules. Aside from content, URL structure is the most important factor which plays a crucial role in increasing website traffic. SEO-friendly URL helps the user to understand the content. It also provides a more satisfactory user experience.
When URLs are perfectly structured according to the rules of SEO, it makes it more effortless for developers to index the content of your website. To increase your website ranking with a handful of traffic, you should structure SEO-friendly URLs.
We have devised a list of practices to structure your website’s uniform source locator correctly and according to SEO rules.
Here’s the list.
A Good and SEO-Friendly URL Structure
The sequence of your website URL should be structured well. There is no specific structure on which it should be based. It would be best if you structure it according to the purpose of your website.
Your website’s URL structure should be simple, logical, and decent so the user can understand the content without confusion.
Ensure that it makes a simple connection between different pages. It helps users and search engines to understand the connections. Once it is structured correctly, selecting suitable keywords for every page is more effortless.
Use HTTPS Protocols For The Safety of User
HTTPS protocol is the secure version and Sockets Layer (SSL) that encrypts contact between your browser and website in a code. If hackers hack the data, they can’t know what is written as it is encoded.
It makes your website safe and secure because it indulges safety in the user’s mind. If your website is connected to it, they feel secure on it while transferring personal information like credentials or addresses.
According to a report, only 70% of websites are connected to HTTPS. If your site is connected with only HTTP, use HTTPS protocol. It gives a good Google SEO ranking.
In Google Chrome, the lock icon on the top left of the URL bar shows whether your website is secure. Connection to an HTTPS protocol is essential to make your URL SEO-friendly.
Hide The WWW HTTPS:// Prefix in Your Domain
The www prefix was used to avoid confusion among users because it represents a website domain. But at present, it’s not mandatory to include it in your website’s domain.
If you include it, it looks out-of-date. It makes your domain lengthy to type and takes more space in the URL bar. Instead, the Chrome browser also hides the WWW and HTTPS:// prefixes in its URL bar because it isn’t essential to display.
Remember that you have to make SEO friendly structure. For that, you have to save the typing time for the user.
Keep it Short And Simple for an SEO-Friendly URL
A default URL automatically uses the page title. But sometimes, it can be a set of long characters and numbers irritating the user. Keep your URL as simple and short as possible. A shorter URL tends to rank more.
Use Keywords Carefully
If you want to make your URL SEO-friendly, only use one or two relevant keywords. It will help Google understand your content’s topic to show relevant results while the user searches. Don’t mix more keywords in your URL because google will identify your page as spam. Make sure to use a keyword that you used in the title of the page.
Aside from the URL, don’t forget to add these keywords in your page’s meta description, as Google shows these words as the search results, which results in your page having a higher rank.
Use Hyphens Instead of Spaces
As an owner of a website, you would surely know that URLs don’t have spaces or underscore to separate words. SEO-friendly URLs contain the use of hyphens between long words. It helps google to understand where the break is used.
It is easier for the user to read the URL with a hyphen than without it. SEO experts always recommend using hyphens in URLs. This step can help you somehow to rank your website.
Do Not Use Stop Words
According to SEO rules, stop words such as (the, or, and, to, a, an, for, of, and many others) have no place in URLs. Stop words always make your URL hard to read. Eliminate the stop words to make it effortless to read. As per SEO rules, the user should understand and remember your URL just after seeing it.
Always Use Lowercase Alphabets
Aside from domain names, URLs are very sensitive. Using lowercase letters is unnecessary, but most of the website’s URLs are in lowercase letters. It is because lowercase looks excellent and straightforward. The lowercase letter in the URL can also prevent a 404 error while using uppercase can cause it.
Never Use Dates in Blog Posts
Don’t add dates in your URL, as it makes it outdated or old-fashioned. People always want to search for the recent or latest trends or matters. URLs without dates help to increase click-through rates through search engines.
It makes your content rank for years. For example, suppose you made a website on cricket in 2007 and added a blog post with a date about England vs. Australia match in 2022. In that case, google identifies it as antique, but people still want to hear the history, especially in cricket.
Add Canonical Tags
Canonical tags tell search engines why they should prioritize your website’s URL. Using these URL tags can avoid duplicate content even with the same topic. Without it, your content can be declared unindexed, leading to poor search engine rankings.
These strategies can surely help you structure an SEO-friendly URL. If you want to rank your website, follow the early mentioned strategies. Aside from this, some affordable SEO services can help you rank your website on page one.
Read on to learn more about them.
What Are Some Affordable SEO Services?
SEO services help you to carry out your website in front of the world. Many people whose websites are highly ranked have already gotten help from SEO services. If you can’t afford expensive and 100% guaranteed SEO ranking, don’t worry.
We have taken out a list of some cheap but the most effective SEO services. Here is the list.
- Technical SEO (Backend website optimization)
- Content Marketing (Digital marketing strategy)
- Link Building (Internal and external link building strategy)
- Video Marketing SEO (Digital marketing strategy)
- Social Media Platform SEO (Social media marketing strategy)
- Local SEO (Frontend website optimization)
Aside from these services, some SEO tools help your website stand out against competitors’ sites.
What Are the Some SEO Tools?
SEO tools help you to structure your website correctly with SEO optimization. We have taken out a list of some best SEO tools for you. Here is the list.
- WordPress: A website to create a user-friendly and SEO-optimized website.
- PageSpeed: It makes your website understandable to Google.
- GT Metrix: It is used for testing and monitoring the website.
- Xenu Link Sleuth: The tool is used to figure out errors and missing tags.
- CognitiveSEO Toolset: It is used to make an SEO-based structure for your website.
Conclusion: Ways to Create an SEO-Friendly URL
Properly using SEO-friendly URLs is a vital first step in improving the rank of your website. It is important because search engines love to easily understand what information they are getting with each page that links through them. If you know SEO, start now and learn to implement these simple yet very effective strategies into your overall SEO-friendly URL game plan.
Search engines and passersby aren’t stupid. Your website architecture is one of the best ways to ensure that your content will be found, read, and shared by more people. We have focused on ten best practices for creating SEO-friendly URLs and discussed some SEO services and tools in this article.
All these plans would surely help your website standby on the first page against competitors.
Click here to learn everything you should know about digital marketing.
End Note:
Remember that mixing up all these strategies would fail your website. To rank your website, implement the strategies mentioned earlier one by one and see the live result. Then decide which SEO-friendly URL practice is best for your website.
Hello Elena, thanks for your informational review on seo
Hello Elena, thankyou for your informative review on SEO url