Most of the website owners make great efforts to develop their Voice over studio website, create great content, and have the best UI and UX to make it more attractive. However, one element that is often overlooked or left out is URLs and their structure. What they are missing is that the URL may be missing for their website's overall success.
URLs (and SEO-compliant URLs) consist of the following elements:
1. Protocol
This refers to http and https://
This is usually set automatically by your content management system (CMS) and is based on whether an SSL certificate is installed on your site to ensure that pages load securely. Google already considers SSL a ranking factor. So, if you don't have SSL, it's worth getting one.
2. Subdomains
Subdomains are used to manage individual areas of your website. Simply put, the subdomains are added before the main domain and separated by a full-stop.
As an example:
www.microsoft.com and blog.microsoft.com are subdomains of the main domain: microsoft.com. Subdomains are also sometimes used to divide content by language or region.
Whether your content is hosted on your main domain (or www.) or a subdomain depends on your current content management system and/or servers. For example, if your blog is on HubSpot but your main website is on WordPress, your blog must be hosted on a subdomain. When setting up a new subdomain, make sure the subdomain is kept as short as possible and the type of content hosted (blog. Content. Or language/region. General subdomain) is clearly communicated.
3. Your Brand
Your company name must be included in your URL. If you're just starting out, here are a few things to keep in mind:
Do a Google search for your brand idea before blocking it. Maybe someone else thought of it, or worse, it means something disgusting in the Urban Dictionary that you don't know about! Your domain's actual branding may vary based on what's available for purchase. If you can create a brand that uses keywords, people can search for your offerings. This gives you a good start against your competitors. e.g. london-taxi.com is a better domain name for London taxi companies than abc-cars.com
Don't make your domain name too long or all the URLs on your page will get very long too. Shorter domain names are easier to remember and enter.
4. Sub-folders
They follow the end of the domain name. Example: website.co.uk/topic/content. Debate still rages on whether your blog on a subdomain is worse for SEO than hosting on a subfolder. In our experience we've seen better results for subfolders, so we prioritize it.
5. Page
Part of the URL is the page itself. Example: www.website.co.uk/topic/content/how-to-write-blogs - part of the URL for writing blogs is the page.
6. Top-level domains (TLDs)
If you have to read the URL aloud, this is the section at the end after the last "dot". The TLD can be used to show users which country you are in. However, a number of industry-specific TLDs have also become available in recent years. Some TLDs are more exclusive than others. For example, .ac.uk is only for verified UK universities that have passed the application process. Also, because they are considered a reliable source, content hosted or linked to these TLDs receives little SEO boost.
7. Anchor name
The anchor tag determines where the reader lands on the page when they click the link. Use it only when you share a link and you want users to go to a specific part of the page.
How should SEO-relevant URLs be structured?
Now that you know your URL structure, what can you do to improve your URLs and make them SEO friendly? Well, if you keep your URL simple, relevant and attractive, readers and bots can understand it and click on it (which is a good requirement for ranking).
Here are some other things you need to do to create SEO friendly URLs:
Don't use numbers and codes instead of words that people can understand
Keep it clear and concise - people need to understand what a page is at a glance
Use hyphens to separate words - don't use underscores, spaces, or other special characters
Make sure your target keyword is part of the page URL. This is very important if you want to qualify. For example, if the web page is an article or blog post, use the main keyword from the article title in the URL.
Develop a standard URL structure for sequences. Don't make it too complicated. You have several categories to break down.
Use canonical tags. It's a little more technical, but when you have different versions of a web page, you want to make sure that the latest version shows up on Google (and other search engines). The canonical tag allows you to do this.
