Long URL's

[Joshlaska]

So I'm super new at SEO and learning a lot. I'm a small business owner and enjoy doing it myself.

Are long URL's good or bad?

Like this:

http://www.farnorthkennel.com/german-shepherd-puppies-the-girls/long-haired-german-shepherd-puppies-lava

Is that too long? The german-shepherd-puppies-the-girls is an actual page with actual content.

Do those hurt me?

[jeremycbray]

Hi Joshua

A lot of SEO's recommend 70 characters or less, unless you are seeking particular long tail key word combinations. I agree

I recommend you read the following articles:

In particular the title tags section: http://www.seomoz.org/beginners-guide-to-seo/basics-of-search-engine-friendly-design-and-development

and this blog post http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/title-tag

[KaneJamison]

Hi Joshua,

There's not a perfect cutoff mark as far as URL length. In general, I try to clearly identify the keyword targeted as the page URL, and stick to one subfolder, or occassionally 2 subfolders on a larger site. Beyond that, I try to avoid being redundant, which is the biggest issue with the example you presented - you should try not to duplicate long strings inside the URL - in this case using "german-shepherd-puppies" twice is what makes it too long and redundant.

Assuming you want to target the keyword "Long Haired German Shepherd Puppies", I would rather see a URL like one of these:

• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/puppies/long-haired-german-shepherd/
• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/long-haired-german-shepherd-puppies/

Then for the actual page for Lava or one of the other dogs you'd probably do one of these:

• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/puppies/long-haired-german-shepherd/lava/
• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/long-haired-german-shepherd-puppies/lava/

That is an effective URL that isn't too keyword stuffed and isn't redundant.

Taking a further look at the site, you could also consider options like these:

• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/girls/lava-long-haired-german-shepherd/
• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/puppies/female/lava-long-haired-german-shepherd/
• http://www.farnorthkennel.com/german-shepherd-puppies/long-haired/lava/

[KaneJamison]

Just to clarify, 70 characters is a good rule of thumb for title tags, however that limit is largely in place due to the number of characters that Google displays in search results.

I personally think 80-100 is a good rule of thumb for maximum length on a URL but it's not always feasible, and the best practice for URLs is not as clearly delineated as title tags.

[infinart]

Excellent questions thanks.

I wish to further the question by asking if Google or Bing actually penialise you for long url such as in the original question or as in my own site: http://www.ditalia.com.au/wedding-dress-wedding-dresses-and-bridal-gowns-designed-and-made

Do the SE's look in the urls for the search terms? I was told they no-longer do that.