How to get URL structure right
Every audit we run turns up some version of this. The short answer to URL structure is that it is mostly a sequence of small decisions, not one big one.
Search work compounds slowly, which is why it gets abandoned about two months before it would have paid off. The version that survives contact with a real deadline is the simple one.
The reason this keeps coming up
Short, readable URLs get shared and clicked more. Small and consistent beats large and occasional here. It is the sort of thing that looks like polish right up until it costs you an enquiry.
The steps
- Establish what you have today before changing anything
- Changing them later costs you rankings unless you redirect
- Words beat numeric IDs for both people and crawlers
- Write down the decision so the next person does not re-litigate it
Words beat numeric IDs for both people and crawlers. None of that requires a large budget, only a decision and someone to own it. Check it against what you would want a competitor's site to get wrong.
What to do next
How to tell if yours is fine
Technical fixes remove obstacles; content earns the position. Both are needed and they are not interchangeable. Three things worth confirming about URL structure before you move on:
- Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
- Changing them later costs you rankings unless you redirect — and you know whether that is true here
- There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped
Most of the value here comes from doing the first two things, not all of them.