URL architecture optimized for AI visibility
Description
An optimized URL structure is clear, descriptive, and hierarchical, reflecting the site's architecture and page content. It avoids complex parameters, uses relevant keywords, and maintains a reasonable length.
A good structure facilitates navigation and indexing, and improves the user experience by making URLs predictable and understandable.
Why is this important for ai search?
LLMs use URLs as contextual indicators to understand the nature and hierarchy of content.
Descriptive URLs help models categorize information and establish relationships between pages.
When generating citations, clear URLs reinforce the credibility of sources and make it easier for users to verify them.
Technical details
- Inappropriate Characters in the URL
- URL Length
- Use of hyphens instead of underscores
- No superfluous parameters
- Use of lowercase letters only
- URL Depth (number of slugs)
1. Inappropriate Characters in the URL
A clean, readable URL is essential for search engines and users. Using non-standard or special characters can cause interpretation and crawling problems.
- Recommendation: The URL should contain only alphanumeric characters, hyphens (-), and slashes (/). Avoid spaces, accented characters, symbols (?, &, =, %, etc., except for legitimate parameters), and special characters that require encoding.
- Encoding: If special characters are unavoidable (e.g., in URL parameters), ensure they are properly URL-encoded (e.g., a space becomes %20). However, it is best to avoid them in the semantic part of the URL.
2. URL Length
URL length can affect its readability and how it is displayed in search results. URLs that are too long can be truncated and less appealing to users.
- Recommendation: URL length should be kept to a reasonable minimum, ideally less than 115 characters. This includes the protocol (http/https), domain name, and path.
- GEO Impact: Generative AI engines may favor concise and clear URLs to better understand the topic of the page.
3. Using Hyphens Instead of Underscores
The choice of word separator in a URL is important for search engines to understand.
- Recommendation: Use hyphens (-) to separate words in the URL (e.g., my-great-article). Search engines interpret hyphens as word separators, while underscores (_) can be interpreted as connectives, making words less distinct.
4. Absence of superfluous parameters
URL parameters can be useful for tracking or personalization, but too many superfluous parameters can dilute the URL's relevance and create duplicate content issues.
- Recommendation: Avoid unnecessary or redundant URL parameters. If parameters are necessary, ensure they are essential to the page's function and do not create multiple versions of the same content.
- Canonicalization: Use the rel="canonical" tag to indicate the preferred version of a URL if parameters create different URLs for the same content.
5. Exclusive Use of Lowercase Letters
Consistent use of lowercase letters in URLs is a good practice to avoid duplicate content issues and improve usability.
- Recommendation: Use only lowercase letters in URLs. Web servers may treat uppercase and lowercase URLs differently, which can lead to duplicate content and crawling issues.
- Redirects: If your site uses uppercase letters in URLs, set up 301 redirects to redirect all uppercase versions to their lowercase equivalents.
6. URL Depth (Number of Slugs)
URL depth refers to the number of directories (or slugs) in the URL path. A URL structure that is too deep can make navigation difficult for users and bots.
- Recommendation: Keep URL depth to a minimum, ideally ≤3 slugs maximum. A flat structure is generally better for discoverability and comprehension. Example of an optimized URL: https://www.example.com/category/subcategory/article-name
Resources & useful links
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