29 Nov Is Including Categories in WordPress Permalinks Effect SEO?

Categories are one of those important facts for SEO, however including category links into WordPress permalinks is a little bit complicated issue. This can effect your SEO positively and negatively. It depends on what you have done and what you are doing with your website. I will mention about some scenarios here to help those who wants to understand this situation. If you have any questions regarding to this, please feel free to comment this page. I will try to respond your questions as soon as possible. I also recommend you to check my recent article on 85ideas: How to Setup SEO Friendly Permalinks on WordPress?

Category Links in Long Domains

Long domains is not something which Google likes… I have done some good business with long domains, however I should admit that it was a painful process. So if you get a long domain and if you add category links into it, the SEO process is going to be more painful for you. I don’t tell you it is impossible. However it won’t be clever to make it difficult. Keep your urls short as much as you can. However don’t forget that your url structure will effect your SEO. You will need to setup your urls properly for your each articles. We also recommend you to use breadcrumbs for your categories.

Category Links on Short Domains

If your website is just a short domain with a brand name, then category links in url can help you about this situation. Categories and schema markups are helpful for SEO. If you combine categories with breadcrumbs, you will have the best results from your Permalinks settings. This will also help Google to understand what subjects you use on your website.

Brand+Keyword Domains

Brand+Keyword domains are one of the best options for SEO. I have already mentioned about best SEO practices for domains before. You can get more information on that in 85ideas. If you get a brand+keyword domain, I don’t think that you will need to use category links in permalinks for that. Breadcrumbs will be still needed for this.

Why do you need category links for long domains but not others?

The answer of this question is simple. Generally long domains are including keywords and Google can easily understand what is your website about with that. Same goes for brand+keyword domains as well. However short domains (brand domains) generally don’t include the keyword of the website. So using category links will provide the best SEO practice for those.