Keywords In The URL?

[chesa7]

Is it possible to add keywords into product page level URLs that are created dynamically? Currently, my URLs don't have any text that would tell the search engines anything about the page. As they are automatically generated by the ecommerce software, I don't know if there is anything I can do about this?

Laura

[Logan]

There is a way, but it may not be very practical. Research 'url rewriting' for more

The benefit of keywords is little, and I would not make that my primary concern. looking at your urls though, I would make an effort to remove the session id. This can cause problems because every time the spider visits your pages they receive a unique url (because of the session id).

I would contact your ecommerce provider and ask them if they can make the urls so the session id is not included. Typically the programmer of the ecommerce functionality is going to be the best person to address this.

See this from google as well -
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogsp...atic-urls.html

[torka]

May I second what Logan said?

The SEs are going to figure out what your pages are about by looking at the page <TITLE> tag, the text on the page and the anchor text of the links pointing to the page. Those are really all the "clues" they need to do their job in that regard.

You don't need keywords in your URLs to tell them what the page is about. Keywords in the URL may help slightly with rankings under some circumstances, but they're waaaay down toward the bottom of the list in terms of importance.

Much, much, much, much more important to get rid of those session IDs. Those can stop spiders in their tracks -- or, more accurately, cause the spiders to index your pages over and over and over and over, each time with a different session ID (which counts as a different URL every time). Session IDs in URLs often lead to massive duplicate content issues.

--Torka

[chesa7]

Thank you so much for your input! I had no idea about the session IDs -- I will have my web guy get to work on that!

Laura

[ktaylor310]

Logan or Torka - in OsCommerce I always set "prevent spider sessions" to true.

On one site the url produced is:

ezraproject.org/catalog/product_info.php/cPath/21_22/products_id/29

On another I have installed a module for "SEO urls", which produces a url like:

cameojewels.com/store/animal-cameos-bird-cameos-c-21_26.html

Do they look ok and are you saying that either will perform just as well? Installing the modules are a pain in the bahookey, so if it is not worth it??

[chesa7]

In comparison, also osCommerce, here is what mine looks like -- is the session ID that you are concerned about the last digit?

http://www.chesapeakebaygiftbaskets.com/product_info.php?cPath=25&products_id=534

[Logan]

Here is how they look to me

http://www.chesapeakebaygiftbaskets.com/index.php?cPath=1&osCsid=4e9fbeb35acdb5d4d96814027fada433

The last variable there is the session id

Kim, I would just leave as is and don't hassle further with installing the 'seo' module.

[SashaMike]

Well Chesa7 you have your main keywords already targeted in your URL

[ktaylor310]

Chesa7 if you are using osCommerce, turning off spider sessions is easy. From the admin panel choose "Configuration | Sessions" and then set "Prevent spider sessions" to true.

[spencer]

I prefer to add my target keywords in my URLs and both rewriting URLs and adding keywords in the query string work fine.