Yesterday I read two blog posts, that’s right, TWO in one day, and it got me thinking.
The first I read was lovely Jane’s post, Google’s Advice – Godsend Or Gimmick?, which sparked the usual Google is great/Google sucks debate.
I then read a post on the Webmaster blog, Dynamic URLs Vs Static URLs.
The gist of this post is that traditionally, from an SEO and user perspective, a short, explanatory URL is better than a parameter filled, ampersand/question mark riddled dynamic URL that stretches beyond the imagination of your address bar.
Google has noticed that a lot of people re-write URLs in order to make them more useful for web users and to help with organic search. As a result, a lot of people re-write URLs wrong (it should really be done at the ISAPI level), and this is confusing Googlebot, causing it to ignore pages, repeatedly index pages every time a URL is assigned and create all kinds of duplicate content issues. Google does not like this because Google’s users cannot find what they want, and Google’s index becomes very messy as a result.
The post from Google suggests they have now solved previous problems with dynamic URL indexing (there used to be parameters and symbols Googlebot couldn’t recognise, which caused search and index problems). As these are (apparently) now sorted, we no longer have to worry about re-writing – Yay!
But wait.
Re-writing is very useful, particularly in sites where dynamic URLs are a must (such as large ecommerce websites with a big, ever changing product catalogue).
For example, I’m English, and the weather sucks and is totally unpredictable. I’m shopping around on Amazon.com and I find some weather monitors. “Hey,” I think, “maybe I’ll tell my friends about this genius invention via email.”
So I copy and post the link for the weather monitors page:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_7434042_5?ie=UTF8&plgroup=3&docId=1000268881&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=gp-center-3&pf_rd_r=1RNWE033Z2M53ZNN9JNC&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=434400901&pf_rd_i=286168
Holy crap.
I drill down to a product in the hopes it will be better:
Not much, but at least something resembling the name is in there. However, there isn’t even a breadcrumb trail on this page to tell me where I am. Nightmare.
While these URLs may no longer provide a problem for Google to index (which I’m not convinced is true – haven’t tested yet), they are a problem for me. There are several things wrong here:
- I want to share this URL, or print it, or even (intake of breath) write it down. If you aren’t a web savvy user it is easy to misread, copy incorrectly, or miss chunks of this beast.
- The URL is way, way too long.
- I don’t need or want to see the masses of dynamic information in there; it’s confusing for the casual user.
- If Google’s post is just spin, that is not going to help Amazon’s organic optimisation
This is a prime case for URL re-writing, and while some may level the claim that it is ‘vanity’ re-writing, I think there is powerful and justified usability support for doing so.
Imagine if the URL looked like this instead:
www.amazon.com/Patio-Lawn-Garden/Weather-Monitors/Wireless-Weather-Forecast-Station-WS-9077TWC-IT-CBP
Now admittedly, due to the product this URL, is still quite long. However, it is now informative. I can see:
- The site navigation
- The product name
- Category and sub category
- Relevant keyphrases
- It will look much better in search results
The point of this rambling post is this: do we have a clash between the Googler and the Google?
Google wants to improve their search algo, and they don’t want people to incorrectly re-write URLs. This is better for them, and as a result (they will say) better for us. Fair enough.
However, as is shown above, a huge dynamic URL is not necessarily better for us; in fact, it could be much worse.
Maybe I’m making a bit fuss over nothing, but it seems to me that from a development point of view, as well as a usability point of view, dynamic URL re-writing is here to stay for now.
Have at you sir/madam.
