How reliable is the link depth info from Xenu?

[danatanseo]

Hi everyone!

I searched existing Q & A and couldn't find an answer to this question. Here is the scenario:

The site is: http://www.ccisolutions.com

I am seeing instances of category pages being identified as 8 levels deep. For example, this one:

http://www.ccisolutions.com/StoreFront/category/B8I

This URL redirects to http://www.ccisolutions.com/StoreFront/category/headphones - which Xenu identifies as being only 1 level deep.

Xenu does not seem to be recognizing that the first URL 301-redirects to the second. Is this normal for the way Xenu typically reports? If so, why is the first URL indicated to be so much further down in the structure? Is this an indication of site architecture problems? Or is it an indication of problems with how our 301-redirects are being handled? Both?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

[Dr-Pete]

It's hard to be completely sure without digging into the crawl, but keep in mind that Xenu is crawl-based, to both things can be true. Somewhere, a link to that page is 8 levels deep, event if it 301-redirects to a page that is only 1 level deep. This could indicate a problem and/or a mismatch in your architecture. Ideally, if you're 301-redirecting the page, then there should be no internal links to the old URL. Mixed signals can make messes, so I'd try to pin down where this link is coming from. Xenu probably is seeing something real.

[Kara.Wallace]

Hi Dana,

It looks like some of the *.cat links are still being used through your site.

For instance, /StoreFront/B8I.cat is actually 301-ing to /StoreFront/category/B8I.cat and /StoreFront/B8I.cat (with anchor text "headphones or earbuds") is being used on the /StoreFront/category/controlling-the-low-end-on-your-stage page.

The /StoreFront/category/controlling-the-low-end-on-your-stage page is at level 7 in your site and is linking to /StoreFront/B8I.cat, making it at level 8, which then 301s to /StoreFront/category/B8I.cat, keeping it still on level 8 because of the 301, and finally redirecting with a 301 to StoreFront/category/headphones (which is a level 1, because it is accessible from the homepage (level 0) navigation).

Does that make sense?

It did in my brain... just let me know if it does on paper : )

Hope this helps.

Mike

[danatanseo]

Thanks so much Dr. Pete this is very helpful. My apologies to both you and Mike for taking so long to circle back and mark this as answered. You both have done an excellent job of explaining what I am seeing. It makes perfect sense, even though it does point to some site architecture/internal linking problems we need to fix. But that's exactly why I asked the question:-)

[danatanseo]

Hi Mike,

Many thanks ro both you and Dr. Pete. I apologize for leaving both of your answers hanging here for so long. Both explanations made perfect sense and I totally get it now. Now it's just a matter of fixing some of those issues. I've know since coming on board here as an in-house SEO that we had some pretty significant site architecture problems. This is just another one to add to my "to-fix" list Many thanks to you both I really appreciate your responses!

Dana