Should we use URL parameters or plain URL's=

[Peekabo]

Hi,

Me and the development team are having a heated discussion about one of the more important thing in life, i.e. URL structures on our site.

Let's say we are creating a AirBNB clone, and we want to be found when people search for

apartments new york.

As we have both have houses and apartments in all cities in the U.S it would make sense for our url to at least include these, so

clone.com/Appartments/New-York

but the user are also able to filter on price and size. This isn't really relevant for google, and we all agree on clone.com/Apartments/New-York should be canonical for all apartment/New York searches. But how should the url look like for people having a price for max 300$ and 100 sqft?

clone.com/Apartments/New-York?price=30&size=100

or (We are using Node.js so no problem)

clone.com/Apartments/New-York/Price/30/Size/100

The developers hate url parameters with a vengeance, and think the last version is the preferable one and most user readable, and says that as long we use canonical on everything to clone.com/Apartments/New-York it won't matter for god old google.

I think the url parameters are the way to go for two reasons. One is that google might by themselves figure out that the price parameter doesn't matter (https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1235687?hl=en) and also it is possible in webmaster tools to actually tell google that you shouldn't worry about a parameter.

We have agreed to disagree on this point, and let the wisdom of Moz decide what we ought to do. What do you all think?

[joseph.chambers]

Personally I would just $_POST price and size - and be done with it. ( as opposed to $_GET which shows the parameter in the URL ) - No need to over think creating more URLs and complicating life.

If anything - you can define in WMT what price is and what size is but just keep it clean. Also, remember # tags in the URL doesn't get followed by google. So, clone.com/Apartments/New-York#price=30&size=100 could work too.

[gazzerman1]

OK, not to sit on the fence here but both are good options.

However when it comes to "URL Parameters" there is a section in Webmaster Tools that you can set to ignore certsin parameters. So that's always an option.

I like to look at sites like oodle in cases like this.

Here is an example

http://cars.oodle.com/1995_2000-cadillac-eldorado/for-sale/coupes/color_black/mileage_100000_200000/price_3000_7000/

they spent a lot of time working out the best process and they use the node type url.

However Google has been said to prefer shorter urls recently.

Hope my sitting on the fence did not make things worse LOL

[joseph.chambers]

Good example of a site that does show up in the SERPs for all things related

[PinpointDesigns]

Personally, I would agree with you an opt for the following option:
clone.com/Apartments/New-York?price=30&size=100

I don't think it matters whether that section of the URL is readable to everyone. I would actually say that anyone who has a technical background would find the URL above easier to change than the other one, as having /'s in the URL almost symbolised different directories rather than a parameter (that's how I would generally interpret it anyway).

I think in the grand scheme of things, It's going to make little different as you don't want the additional sections to actually be indexed in the search engines. Like Gary correctly pointed out, you can setup 'URL Parameters' in GWT and I think that's your best option. There's more information about that here - http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/improved-handling-of-urls-with.html

You could also use robots.txt to block the parameters in the URL but this depends on whether the search engine crawling your website chooses to use it.

Hope this helps!
Lewis