A descriptive URL is something like www.company-name.co.uk/category/page-name. Rather than www.company-name.co.uk/products_new?cat=1&sort=d.
Descriptive URLs are sometimes referred to as ‘static’ while non-descriptive URLs with parameters like ?product= are usually dynamically generated via a database.
Here are 4 reasons to use descriptive URLs on your website.
1. The text in a URL is a ranking factor
Many search engines use the content on URLs to help determine a page’s ranking for specific search queries.
If the URL contains a related-keyword for a search query, it’s more likely to get a higher ranking, helping with SEO.
2. Makes good anchor text
Search engines use the text used in hyperlinks like this (anchor text) to your page from other websites on the web to help determine rankings.
If someone links to your page with the page URL rather than their own descriptive anchor text, the link will carry more weight to help it rank higher if you have a descriptive URL.
3. URLS can aid navigation
If you include use descriptive URLs that show the pages, folder and subfolders of your site users will be able to use the URL to navigate the site.
For example, a URL of www.company-name.co.uk/category1/subcategory2/page-name will tell users that the page is located in ‘category 1′ and ‘subcategory 2′. They can then manually amend the URL to browse these categories if they want to.
4. Search engines use the URL in the SERPs
Search engines use the URL of the page in the search engines results pages (SERPs) and highlight keywords relevant to the search query.
Therefore, a URL that describes the content on your page can give potential visitors the nudge they need to visit your site, leading to better click-through rates (another ranking factor) and more visitors.
Remember – a good URL inspires confidence
In Internet Explorer and Firefox, the URL of a hyperlink appears in the bottom left-hand corner of your browser window when you hover over it. Using a descriptive URL inspires confidence in users and aids click-through rates.
Having a descriptive URL is especially important with URL shorteners like bit.ly and tiny.url becoming more popular as a shortened URL like http://bit.ly/5zzaRe doesn’t inspire much confidence in what you will find when you click through.
And with so much self-promotion and spam on services like Twitter, users want to know what they are clicking on before they click.
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