Do URLs Make a Difference for SEO?
It is as old as SEO itself and causes a stir whenever it is mentioned on popular SEO forums, but the question is still asked, do keywords in the URL make any difference in SERPS? There has admittedly been some strange happenings in UK SERPS over the last month or so across all search engines, none more so than Yahoo.
Yahoo seems to have bumped sites that have keywords somewhere in the URL. With a search for ‘digital cameras’ we see all but one result in the top ten containing the keyword either in the domain or the file path, where Google throws back only six. This being said, Google does highlight the keyword within the URL when listing the results.
One unsubstantiated theory could be that Microsoft’s acquisition of Yahoo has lead to the neglecting of Yahoo search listings as they are focussed on delivering a return on the 100mil USD marketing investment they made in Bing. However there have also been changes in other search engine algorithms and positions.
File Path or Domain?
Although it is only one small variable in the SEO spectrum, it is certainly worth considering if you are designing a new website, or especially writing a new file path into an existing domain, however all the research shows that transferring to a new domain name is just not worth it for the SEO value that this change would provide.
SEO guru Matt Cutts published a video earlier in the year stating rather opaquely that it is not important enough to start shifting domains but does make some difference to SEO. If you speak ‘Matt Cutts’ then you can translate that to saying that the file path in the url is part of the relevancy trail and should be keyword specific, but again – it is not worth switching domains over it.
Elsewhere in the news, Google’s VP of Search Products and User Experience Marissa Mayer, addressed the US Senate to respond to accusations from news providers that Google’s ‘parasitic business model’ was profiting unfairly from news searches. During this speech she highlighted the possibility of living URLs, ‘a permanent, single URL as a living, changing, updating entity.’
Living URLs
Already used on Wikipedia pages a living URL would be updated as a story developed, enabling a consistent relevancy in the URL with a steadily growing amount of content. Mayer used this suggestion as a proposed solution for the monetisation of news content which we can assume comes from Google’s own business model based on selling relevant, keyword-specific ads.
Any slithers of information from Google need to be taken seriously and the fact that Mayer mentioned the living URL at all can be taken as a strong indicator that it does play some role in the relevancy trail. So should SEO companies start adopting the concept of a living URL into blogs and news articles?
We will be testing the concept of a living URLS on the subject of… you guessed it, URLs. Anytime we feel the urge to write something about URLs in relation to SEO then we will be updating the same post, monitoring the progress of the post and site for developments in SERPS for the keyword ‘URL’ in the main search engines. Literally watch this space for more details.
Domain Registrations
Another regular question that arises around URLs is that of domain registration and the history of domains. Does the registration date and history of a URL affect the SERPS of that domain? As with the issue of keywords in the URL, it is a grey area and the signals from Google based on recent comments, is that it is not essential but it could help.
After some analysis it appears that domain registrations could be a bigger factor than Google has alluded to. Consider how tough it can be to build a site on a new domain, organically optimise it for competitive keywords without some pre-existing power from a 301 and compete in SERPS with already established sites. Although some progress can be made short term, it is a real uphill battle to compete for top positions.
Now consider the concept of a domain which has been used over a period of years and has expired. Does the history of that domain create positive or negative implications for new developments on that same URL? It is all relative, however after examining the oldest URL in existence as a case study, we were surprised by the findings.
Domain Registration Case Study
The oldest registered live domain is that of Symbolics.com which was registered on 15th March 1985. The domain belonged to Symbolics Inc until 27th August 2009, when it was purchased by the domain investment company XF.com. The current site has a Page Rank of 5 and although it has 983 links, there is no other reason why it should have such a decent PR.
There is one active page and a series of other Spammy sub-domains and 404 pages indexed by Google. There is a three monthly average bounce rate of 86.6% and a weekly average of 94.4% [mainly because there is only one active page]. There is no information of any value on the site and nothing that could be remotely labelled ‘quality content’.
When looking at the domain through Archive.com we can see that since 1996 there have been very few changes to the site, with the Spammy sub domains introduced around 2006. The site has been stagnant and has expired at least twice in the period between 2000 and 2006, however the site still maintains a PR5 without any optimisation ever.
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