How to create a search-optimised URL slug

URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator. A URL is just an address that is given to a unique resource on the Internet. In theory, every correct URL leads to a unique resource. Such resources can be an HTML page, a CSS file, an image, etc.

BASICS: Anatomy of a URL

Let's look at an example: https://a-v-seo.com/ru/solutions/seowriting/ 

How to create search-optimised URLs

http:// is a "protocol." It represents which protocol the browser should use. This is usually the HTTP protocol or its secure version, HTTPS. This is what you will most often see, but browsers can also use other protocols such as mailto: (to open an email client) or ftp: to start file transfers, so don't be surprised if you suddenly see other protocols.

How to create search-optimised URLs

a-v-seo.com is a "domain name". It signifies which web server should be queried. Alternatively, an IP address can also be used, but this is rare.

How to create search-optimised URLs

The path to the page (/en/solutions/seowriting/) is then specified, consisting of directories and subdirectories, which in turn includes its title.

How to create search-optimised URLs

More specifically, (/seowriting/) is a "slug." SEO slugs are used to identify web pages in a form that is easy for users to read. Simply put, a nice, clean part of the URL on any of your web pages that explains the content of that particular page is an SEO slug.

Note: There are also a number of other building blocks and rules that apply to URLs, but they are rarely used by users and developers. Therefore, are optional.

How to create a search-optimised URL slogan

The most important part for SEO is the "slug", so let's focus on it.

Start with the page title

Strangely enough, most headers turn into perfectly optimised addresses after a little modification. So let's use our header as an example and follow a series of steps to get the best URL slug possible.

For a clear demonstration, let's take one of our own articles with the title: Everything you need to know about social media and SEO (Top 5 points)

Remove special characters

URLs never have backslashes () or square brackets [], as these are unsafe characters that should not be used in URLs.

You should definitely remove them. But an equally useful solution is to remove all special characters in general, such as commas, colons, semicolons, etc.

Getting: Everything you need to know about social media and SEO top 5 items

Remove digits

Having a number in the title shouldn't bother you because it's easy to change. But that's not the case with the URL. Every time it changes, you have to create a redirect from the old address to the new one.

The best solution is to get rid of the numbers in the URL completely. That way, you won't have to update the address every time you make a minor change to the page content.

So let's remove the number from our future URL (replacing it with a generic word): Everything you need to know about social media and SEO guide

Remove redundant information

Google says it's best to keep URLs as simple as possible, and there are a couple of reasons for this.

Excessively long addresses can deter visitors.

Long addresses often get clipped in search results.

So let's remove everything we can do without from our future URLs.

Everything you need to know about social media and SEO

Reduce everything to a keyword phrase

Most headlines, by their very nature, contain keyword phrases within them. So at this point, you're likely to be left with a simplified, keyphrase-laden version of your headline.

With us, it looks like this: social media and SEO

Add keyphrase modifiers (optional)

Using a pure keyphrase as a URL flag is often an acceptable solution, but not always. Sometimes when you do this, the address lacks informative content.

This can be easily fixed by adding keyphrase modifiers.

Keyphrase modifiers are words that add some context to your URL. You can find them in the Organic Keywords ("natural keyword phrases") report we used in the previous step.

We already have it, so we leave it at: social media and SEO

Make the slug readable (optional)

Perhaps it's purely personal, but some URLs seem easier to read than others.

In our case, it's easier to read "social media and SEO" than "SEO and social media", so we leave the original option.

Replace spaces with hyphens

You can't use spaces in a URL. Browsers replace them with the %20 code. So the last step is to replace spaces with hyphens (-).

Here's the final slog for the article: social networkingseo
Our advice is not to spend too much time creating optimised URLs, although it still makes sense to approach their creation wisely and apply best practices.