Does the number of subdirectories in a URL affect its ranking?

[WilliamNaville]

are these videos by google or by a third party...iam confused

[loadeduk]

am i the only person who listened to the blah blah derb derb derp bit about 5 times lol

[VideoLeadsOnline]

@Indurios Because like it or not, how you build your site matters a lot, maybe just as much as the all hailed "content, content, content" expression because if your site is not found (using Google's algos) then your content is not seen by enough for it to matter. (read: Big Billboard in my BackYard).

[xowi]

Great, thanks for the information.

[sivaganesh1232000]

MC did not understand well.. he is not about PR.

Actually if you have major keyword in the URL , it is good. But not too longtail URL.

Hope it helps.

[lastactionseo]

I allways hear pagerank. pagerank is dead, isn't it?

[Richreeve75]

If Google webmaster tools are releasing these snippets of information, why doesn't google just relax and release EVERY key feature of their algorithum? At the end of the day I'm sure your making updates and changes on a regular basis so it's not like anyone will steal your No.1 possistion. If you released a full list of updates each year too, this would be great and give us SEO's a real qualification in a sense.

P.S spammers wouldn't spend much time on it cos it would still take WORK.

[johnmweaver]

He's had to answer this before. :)

[kdeelstra]

The question is why you have the keyword so deep in your site architecture. In most cases this means the page is also deep in your menu structure and thats why -without external links- the PageRank and ranking can still be lower. So the lowering effect is indirect due to site navigation structures.

[webbusinesskit]

theres that annoying smirk again at the end of the clip!

[StuartLittleJr]

Dude, cut that hair, you look better without it - just like me ;)

[HolidayNova]

Matt did answer the question really well !!! thanks!

[HolidayNova]

I have gone over this topic with my developers lately and have asked them do SEO with less levels and put in - ... I don't know if I should have done or most importantly if it's easier for people to read? we can also put in long tail keywords in the url. Should I use _ or / ?? does it make a difference?

holidaynova....croatia/dubrovn­ik/radisson-blu_hotel_delux-ro­om_en

[HolidayNova]

@HolidayNova

Should I use _ or / ??

or it doesn't matter, it's all about keywords ... if I have longer directories I guess that's just longer tail keywords. Or does google treat only look at the last directory for key work and use the other directories for some organizational assessment?

[dz1ncha]

@HolidayNova You should use "-" to separate words in the url.

[MrJamesBond007]

@dz1ncha Spot on! Matt Cutts talks about this in another recent video. Use "-" as a separator. Never underscore "_" which Google bot interprets it as nothing and joins your keywords together which may create a different meaning to your page's content. Eg I aim for thsi result: "keyword1 keyword 2" using "-" in urls instead of "keyword1keyword2" as a result of using "_".

[alternatereality85]

Brilliant to have that confirmed, thanks!

[SEOAly]

Hooray for ambiguity! "Not a major factor...". I'd have been surprised to find anything more concrete in the answer to this question. I think the real question is this: 

ALL else being equal, which of these two pages would rank better:

domain.com/keyword.html

OR

domain.com/category/keyword.ht­ml

[alternatereality85]

@SEOAly My guess is that the "Not a major factor..." comment is Matt saying 'look its basically ok as long is its within reason.' If someone buries files, hmmm let's just say as a nice round number, 10+ directory levels deep, and those directories are all extensively keyword rich, then its probably going to trip something or raise an electronic eyebrow so to speak. on one of my sites, its logical for the architecture to go 5 levels deep, but I personally wouldn't want to go much further.

[SEOAly]

@alternatereality85 - right. I get the reason for his ambiguity. I've been amused by Matt's vague answers to questions for some time. Site architecture should be as flat as possible not only to make crawling easier, but - more importantly - navigating the site easier for visitors.

My suggestion was to formulate questions to Matt in a more concrete manner. Rather than "how much of a difference...", ask "Which will rank better - A or B?" Less opportunity for vague or ambiguous answers.

[alternatereality85]

@SEOAly Ah righty, I hear you, and agree it would be nice to have precise answers to questions like this. However, I don't imagine the ambiguity from Matt or any other Google search engineers will change at any time in the near future if at all though. I guess they can't give too much away in terms of their algorithm as far as search competitors go, and because they are leaving themselves wide open to black hat abuse, which I imagine might be a key reason for the ambiguity.

[alternatereality85]

@alternatereality85 or when I say precise *answers* to questions like this - what I really should say is precise *questions* for Matt to answer hehe. For me personally, I think these short videos from Matt are a really great idea and long may they continue, very helpful and good pointers in the right direction at the very least for many folk in what is a fast evolving, ever changing industry thats hard to keep up with every aspect even if you spend almost every waking hour trying to.

[SEOAly]

@alternatereality85 - no doubt about it. I would never expect a straightforward answer. Though I believe the way in which questions such as this are worded can certainly make a difference.

Though I have a feeling questions worded in a more concrete "option A" vs. "option B" manner probably aren't chosen as Google Webmaster Help video feature questions. Just a hunch. :)

[webmastertool]

@SEOAly What are you talking about. If you watched the video he does give a straightforward answer. It is The Number Of Subdirectories does not matter from a SEO point of view but it does from a usability point of view. Learn how to gather information from sources. Usually in life, things aren't presented directly to you, you have to look for it.

[SEOAly]

@webmastertool - Matt's states, verbatim, "...I wouldn't worry very much at all about whether things were at one level deeper..." and "...it's really not a major factor in Google search engine rankings." Not straightforward answers. Nor would I expect them to be.

The phrase "does not matter" is not interchangeable with "wouldn't worry very much" and "not a major factor". While I appreciate the suggestion to "learn how to gather information", I'd suggest you learn how to interpret it.

[LifeAsBee]

Awesome! Thanks! I always wondered about this regarding number of subdirectories myself.

[fewsilly]

Matt i think your answer was too simple and too literal. you need to read between the lines. People dont know all the jargon that we use and often times dont know how to ask what they mean.

[nqkoi159]

"Not a major factor" you say. So it is a factor?

[PCRecycleCA]

@nqkoi159 Everything can be a factor to some extend. Obviously, you will not get exact answers from the horse's mouth. Since Google looks at your site structure to decide whether or not they will include site links in the serp, I would assume that it has a minimal importance.