Keywords in URLs as ranking factor?

[Dimitri]

Hi,

At a time, you could rank first for anything, just because you had keywords in the URLs, of course it didn't last, because it was way too easy to exploit it. So over the time, I feel like keywords in URLs was less and less important. And today, does it still has any kind of significant importance as a ranking factor? And in fact, can it have a negative impact, to use them? I mean, may be it can be seen as an attempt of "over" optimizing.

[Wilburforce]

Giving a page a name that reflects its content clearly isn't exploitive, and the practice is too common to become a likely target (but also too common to be of much benefit).

In my view, calling a spade a spade is good practice (better than calling it page1.htm), but you'll need more than that to earn a Distinction.

[keyplyr]

Keywords anywhere have been significantly reduced as a ranking factor. The AI algo looks to match custom results with user intent.

[lucy24]

can it have a negative impact

You mean, might
example.com/widget/widget/widget/widget/widget.html
come out worse than
example.com/widgets.html
? That gets us into the realm of “All things being equal ... only all things never are equal”.

[Robert Charlton]

You mean, might
example.com/widget/widget/widget/widget/widget.html
come out worse than
example.com/widgets.html

It's likely that
widgets-widgets-widgets.tld/widget/widget/widget/widget/widget.html
might come out worse yet.

[lucy24]

widgets-widgets-widgets.tld

These days, probably widgets-widgets-widgets.widget

The other day I saw a movie preview that included the inevitable website plug, only instead of the usual examplemovie.com--or, more likely, nearestexamplewecouldfindtoanavailabledomainname.com--it was example.film. I thought, hey, that's a sensible reason for a specialty tld.

[tangor]

Ha ha! Those might even qualify as "duplicate content"!

AFAIK keyword is one of several hundred factors in play ... we don't actually know what weighting might be applied to that factor.

[Wilburforce]

You mean, might
example.com/widget/widget/widget/widget/widget.html
come out worse than
example.com/widgets.html

It probably would, but I wasn't suggesting you should call a spade a spade/spade/spade/spade/spade.

[tangor]

when it is spade/shovel/trowel/hand/spade-shovel-trowel-hand.html
followed by
shovel/spade/trowel/hand/shovel-spade-trowel-hand.html
it does look a little wonky.

[cr1m]

Even if the keywords aren't a ranking factor, they can give additional value to the searcher showing up in the URL part of the search result snippet. As long as they aren't abused, but rather reflect the real contents of the page.

[tangor]

Agreed! Unfortnately 42kzillion spammers will try to game the system and ruin it for everyone else. :)

That's why CONTENT remains King (and even then that gets spammed like crazy!)

The web in 1996 was one kind of place... then g came along and within 5 years the script kiddies spoiled the place. Nothing has been right ever since. (sigh)