To change URL structure, or not to change URL structure?
- SEO |
Hello, fellow SEOs. I have a question that is fairly simple from a technical perspective. Less simple from a strategic perspective.
In a new role, I've inherited a site that puts /blog/ between the domain name and the rest of the URL for all blog posts. (I know there is nothing inherently wrong with this from Google's perspective. I'm also familiar with the warnings not to change this, and how to do it right with 301's.)
In a previous role, we had a flat URL structure. This allowed me to cover a topic in a blog post, i.e. with a URL like *DOMAIN*/great-topic/. If the post really took off in Google, and now we wanted to leverage it for conversions, I could replace that content with an all-new, conversion-oriented page... *at the same URL.* This was extremely effective (in some cases).
With the current site structure, I can't do that. If I want to replace a blog post with conversion-oriented content, the old URL (i.e. /blog/great-topic/) has to be 301'd to the new URL (/great-topic/). Naturally there's some loss of authority there.
My question (haha): If we change the permalink structure on blog posts now, and implement the necessary 301s now, is it worth the potential short-term disturbance of blog post rankings to leverage the long-term benefit of being able to launch and rank NEW blog posts, then switch them to conversion-oriented pages at the exact same ranking URL? (I should mention that our current blog posts aren't contributing a whole lot in terms of conversions, though some are ranking OK.)
I'm sure there's no answer here. But hoping someone has some thoughts. Thanks everyone!
In a new role, I've inherited a site that puts /blog/ between the domain name and the rest of the URL for all blog posts. (I know there is nothing inherently wrong with this from Google's perspective. I'm also familiar with the warnings not to change this, and how to do it right with 301's.)
In a previous role, we had a flat URL structure. This allowed me to cover a topic in a blog post, i.e. with a URL like *DOMAIN*/great-topic/. If the post really took off in Google, and now we wanted to leverage it for conversions, I could replace that content with an all-new, conversion-oriented page... *at the same URL.* This was extremely effective (in some cases).
With the current site structure, I can't do that. If I want to replace a blog post with conversion-oriented content, the old URL (i.e. /blog/great-topic/) has to be 301'd to the new URL (/great-topic/). Naturally there's some loss of authority there.
My question (haha): If we change the permalink structure on blog posts now, and implement the necessary 301s now, is it worth the potential short-term disturbance of blog post rankings to leverage the long-term benefit of being able to launch and rank NEW blog posts, then switch them to conversion-oriented pages at the exact same ranking URL? (I should mention that our current blog posts aren't contributing a whole lot in terms of conversions, though some are ranking OK.)
I'm sure there's no answer here. But hoping someone has some thoughts. Thanks everyone!
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