SEO Best Practices

2 On-Site Optimization – Site Level

2.5 Link vs. Directory Structures

One misconception is that website link structure follows physical directory structure. The two should be viewed as mutually exclusive entities. URLs can have deep directory paths with embedded keywords and still be linked directly from the home page.

How a site is structured physically has no bearing on how it is structured navigationally. Deep directory structures with embedded keyword phrases are the ideal method. These deep directory pages can be linked one level down from the home page. If done properly it is optimized 2 ways:

1. The anchor text link to the page
2. The keywords embedded in the URL
3. On-Site Optimization – Page Level

This section covers page level optimization. It covers relevance with respect to a web page's merits. By improving the relevance of a page this aspect directly affects its ability to rank for the targeted keyword phrase.

As mentioned above, the ideal is to optimize a page for no more than 2 keyword phrases; preferably "nested" keyword phrases. Attempting to optimize for disparate phrases only serves to lessen the relevance for each phrase. For example, optimizing for cow paths and railroad cars makes it difficult to achieve both goals and, goes against the grain of the Information Architecture paradigm.