URL

URL Definition

Esempio di URL

URL is an acronym that stands for Uniform Resource Locator. It identifies the name of a resource on the web and, being placed on a web server (hosting), it makes it available to clients looking for resources (web page, a video or audio file, image, etc…). In other words, we put the URL in the address bar of a browser.

URL structure

The URL has a well-defined structure. The following will describe all its parts:

http://www.example.ch/category/subcategory/product_file.html

http:// is the protocol with which you log on to the server, which is the space where it is placed on our website. In this case, the HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol) is the standard protocol for the transmission of resources on the web. Other examples of protocols may be ftp:// URL for file transfer or mailto:/ / sending of electronic mail (email).

www.example.ch is the protocol with which you log on to the server, which is the space where it is placed on our website. In this case, the HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol) is the standard protocol for the transmission of resources on the web. Other examples of protocols may be ftp:// URL for file transfer or mailto:/ / sending of electronic mail (email).

• www stands for World Wide Web it is a system of interlinked hypertext documents through links that are accessible via the Internet
• example is the name that we give to our domain
• .ch is a national top-level domain, which conventionally are formed by two letters (es, it, de, us, etc…). In this case. ch stands for Confoederatio Helvetica (Switzerland). They are distinguished from generic top-level domains, such as (es. .gov, .edu, .com, .org, .net etc …)

category/subcategory/ is the part of the URL that represents the hierarchical path of our file. It is not necessary, but in all cases it is useful to define a hierarchy if we have so much material to offer. In addition, the categorization is also important for displaying a URL because it explains in summary the basic structure of the site.

product-file.html is the web page of the site we display. They can be with different extensions depending on the programming language used (in this case HTML). It must be very descriptive of what it represents because it is the part of the URL that explains exactly what you offer

Difference between absolute URL and relative URL

The difference between absolute URL and relative URL is explained by the following examples:

http://www.example.ch/category/sub-category/file-of-our-product.html

The absolute URL is the complete address that specifies the exact location of our object.

sub-category/file-of-our-product.html

The relative URL is just the location of an object, which can be a file or a folder. This method is often used within a website, for reasons of efficiency and because, even in the face of a shift of web pages to another server, it is not necessary to change all the URLs of other pages.

Why is it important to the URL?

The URL plays a fundamental role in optimization with search engines. It is the first element that is taken into consideration for placement in the search results (SERPs). Also, if it is humanly readable it helps the user experience because it gives the opportunity to interpret immediately what it represents. Below, we will list the reasons why the URL is important:

• Positioning on search engines: having a keyword (keyword) in the URL is very important. Search engines give great weight to the structure of the URL in its entirety.
• Usability: It is important to give a semantic value, understandable by all, the URL in order to convey even more confidence to the user, as well as give information on the subject at the first glance.

Friendly URL

To meet the two points mentioned above you need to have the friendly URL. By default, after the domain, there is a part unreadable as for example:

http://www.seowebmaster.ch/?p=12g#d10pPl3

This is the perfect example of how NOT to do a URL in SEO perspective because it does not give the opportunity to search engines to be able to interpret what is offered. The part after the domain represents a specific web page, that at first glance does not tell us anything extra. It is more useful to have something like this:

http://www.seowebmaster.ch/url

This URL tells us what the web page is, both users and search engines, then that is what search engines want to offer to their customers. If we have so much material to offer, you might think about the categorization of our site. This approach is used by online stores because, through the categories in the URL, it makes it possible to better estimate what is offered