Where is the point of diminishing returns for silos and keyword subdirectories?

[BrianAlpert78]

And as a follow-up, is that point far enough out to justify making a site's folder structure different from its navigation structure?

I'll give an example. Say I was to do SEO for a hypothetical (I hope) someconstructioncompany.com, and the the menus/submenus were laid out as

• About Us
• ---- Our company
• ---- Our staff
• ---- Locations
• -------- Albany (default path would be .com/about-us/locations/albany-ny.html)
• -------- Miami
• -------- Liverpool
• Services
• ---- Kitchen remodeling (default path would be .com/services/kitchen-remodeling.html)
• ---- Above ground pools
• ---- Green building
• Photo galleries
• ---- Kitchen photos (default path would be .com/photo-gallery/kitchen-photos.html)
• ---- Pool photos
• ---- Green building photos

Would there be any benefit (and if so, enough of a benefit to outweigh the additional overhead of keeping track of a separate structure) to having the menus set that way, but the actual files siloed as stuff like

• someconstructioncompany.com/kitchen-remodeling/kitchen-renovation-services.html
• someconstructioncompany.com/kitchen-remodeling/custom-kitchen-photo-gallery.html
• someconstructioncompany.com/above-ground-pools/above-ground-pool-photos.html
• someconstructioncompany.com/albany-ny/green-building-custom-home-remodeling-contractor-albany.html

Would that separation of navigation structure and file structure be beneficial or would that time/effort setting it up be better spent elsewhere?

Thanks!

[TomRayner]

Hi Brian

I understand why you're asking this, as site architecture is very important in passing the link equity/authority of pages and the domain throughout the site.

However, unless your site is navigated differently as well, a change in URL structure like the one you have given won't make much of an SEO difference if the page still takes the same amount of clicks through the site navigation.

It may have some effect for the user - you may want to use the second structure if you believe it gives the user a more accurate URL to read (I'm undecided on this).

It could also have some slight positive SEO effect - it looks as though you'll be getting the targeted keywords in the URL.  There is evidence to suggest a very slight correlation with keywords in URLs and higher rankings, but it's certainly not a huge influence. I'd be more inclined to optimise for the user, rather than the search engines, when it comes to URL structure.

You'll notice as well that the SEOMoz report for your site recommends URLs with less than 75 characters and definitely less than 200. Not sure if there is any SEO to this, but certainly from a user perspective being concise can help.

Going back to site architecture, I'm reminded of this great SEOMoz blog post - it summarises that your important pages should never be more than 3 clicks away, for a user or a search engine. This is more about navigation structure than file/URL appearance, but worth reading and noting.

If you wish to change to URL appearance, I'd always bear in mind what looks best for your user rather than the search engine. Provided that the page can be reached in the sitemap and in 3 clicks or less, your site architecture will be fine. Separating the consistency between the architecture and URL appearance is fine and won't negatively effect you, but I'd always do it for the user in mind.

Hope these links and this advice helps you out.