Page 2 - Keywords in URLs - How Important?

Fathom, you just need to understand one thing!

I replied to the title of the thread which reads "Keywords in URLs - How Important?". FYI, I didnot reply to the post that he(thread starter) wrote. Had I replied to his post, I would have used 'Post reply' Option.

If you consider me wrong for saying keywords in URL as 'very important' ....ok fine. I dont mind.

Its always better to have a url like www.companyname.com/keyword-keyword rather than having something with no keyword in it. It is an added advantage to have KW'ss in your URL.

Regardless of whom you think you replied to the rest of world will read and follow you advice to the letter - because they are a newbie and you sound like you write from expert experience...

I didn't say you're wrong - I said what you neglected to say... DON'T DO IT TO ANY DOMAIN THAT'S ALREADY ESTABLISHED [e.g. RANKED]

So to re-correct your post AGAIN... It isn't always better to have a url like www.companyname.com/keyword-keyword

If you're starting a domain from scratch - you are 100% absolutely right.

Unfortunately you side-stepped my comments as to why your way isn't 100% "very important"- the moment you change any established url [that has links to it] you lose the history - and that history is SO MUCH MORE IMPORTANT than keyword in url.

BTW - I post for all readers - not just for your benefit (and the opening poster).

Fothom is harsh but he is right. Listen to him and you will save yourself a lot of stress in the future. While it is right that when you first design a site with SEO in mind that you add keywords to the URL its not a good plan to do it on older sites that google is already used to and is well crawled. In the case of well established urls ... if its not broke dont try and fix it. I know i didnt really say anything new here but i just wanted to backup fathom so you didnt think he was been unreasonalbe

I wont listen to ""Fothom""...and I never did not turned down "Fathom" Points. I never told he is right and I am wrong. I never asked to put the keywords for a older site. I do not know why you people create something out of nothing for just mentioning how Keywords in URL are useful.

Its Fathom and not Fothom

To call Fathom harsh is in itself but a joke. He has his own smashmouth style, does not mingles words and calls a spade, a spade. Some people dont like it as they are not prepared to face the facts.

The response was quite relevant about the Keywords in domains theory as its quite a proven fact as t how important they are and the thread was drifting a bit in a way where KID's were being given weightage. Not that everyone has to believe what one says, but when someone as experienced and seasoned speaks, i prefer to listen.

And obviously there's no bad taste involved between anyone out here, and i feel the thread has pretty much reached its conclusion, and a happy one.

Who you calling KIDS?

I got grandchildren older than you!

I know, i know, agreed........But people say Fathom is too young at heart with a white beard!! Anyways, i dont consider you on a higher side regarding age, after all you are still away from the 50 mark!!


On a serious note, keep up the good work Fathom, you're a legend here!!!

Not really... it comes down to training.

In the military 'orders' are commands that generally 'aren't questioned'... still; commands need to make sense... the sensibility of following bad commands never made anyone correct simply because they follow the order given.

That's the side I approach offering advice from [and correcting others on their advises being offered]...

Debated advice is never right or wrong or 'even bad' so long as the debate is productive... within a topical area that has few absolutes there is much room for debating points.

...someone can say something that I disagree with, and because of my nature I'll challenge your positions... you can either accept the challenge and convince me that the debate isn't worth my time [best of luck in that endeavor] or keep your mouth shut.

That's my nature... many may not like that... for them I offer -- there is always DP forums... over there they don't really care about advice accuracy.

I have 1000's of pages that rank on long tail terms but no page rank or link juice is pasted due to long dynamic urls.

They all rank around - 10 - 20 with well optimised title and h1 tags as well as content.

Would it help to bring the product pages closer to the root url e.g :

/bluewidgets.asp

instead

/product.asp?id=bluewidgets

In the long run would this benifit my rankings and will it help even more to have keywords in the url ?

No... in fact it will HURT!

You would kill all url & link history and "history of urls & links" are very much ranking criteria... in the "top 10 sky booth".

Does this still apply if you do not have any backlinks to these pages or the only backlinks you have are internal. The reason why i ask this is the SEO team that i am working with are insisting that i have rewrite software installed to generate keyword rich urls.

They assure me that it will help with PR and rankings.

To be clear... [particularly with dynamic urls] while a search engine command or backlink tool may not show you backlinks a page that "is ranked" has them... what you would be doing is deleting established pages that have history and while that history might only contain the value of internal navigation links [thus backlinks] they are/were enough to rank the page(s) on their own merits...

You won't increase your rankings by deleting your old pages in favor of better urls... and with dynamic urls you cannot redirect any value you previously developed.

The risk is yours to take but mark my words you'll lose far more than you'll ever gain.