11 ways of optimizing an URL it is an article published in seomoz that seems to be very interesting, it shows really valuable information. The especially part that called my attention was point 6, since the web make fashionable spam seekers with subdomains. Here I left you part of the article.

11 advices to achieve successful URLs

1. Describe your content

An URL who says everything is a magnificent URL. If a user can read the URL and understand exactly the content of the page before at least seeing it, you will have done your work. Remember, these URLs are copied, shared, sent for email, annotated and even approved by the search engines.

2. Keep it short

Briefness is a virtue, remember it always. If you make a shorter URL, it will be easier to copy and paste, to read rapidly, to write it in a presentation card or to use it in hundreds of other slightly common ways, everything which gives it major utility.

3. In a static and clear way

I can certainty say that some search engines treat static URLs in a different way that dynamics ones. Besides, no human being will like to read an URL where the big participants are “?“, “&“, and “=“.

4. Descriptions are better than the numbers

If you think to use an URL as 114/cat223/, change idea promptly for one as/brand/adidas/. Even if the description is not a descriptive word for users, is always better to use words than numbers.

5. Key words never harm

If you know that many of your phrases are competitive to attract traffic, it is a good idea to take advantage of them and include them where you could. If you use some cms, it would be suitable to use key words in the URL.

6. Subdomains are not the answer

First, to have subdomains is sometimes unnecessary and extremely long, for example: siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com. Secondly, think that subdomains have the potential to be treated separately to the primary domain. Now then, if you have few subdomains and interlaces them, it is possible not be affected; but, I would not take this possibility.

7. Fewer folders in the URL

The idea is that the URL has the minor quantity of folders (characters or words). Since, the additional words are useless and reduce the possibility to attract your potential visitors.

8. Hyphens are the best thing to separate words

To URLs that contain a key phrase, is better to separate words with average hyphens, for example /brands/dolce-and-gabbana/. They follow, underscores (_), pluses (+) and nothing more.

9. Keep the conventional thing

If your site has a single format, do not think on doing anything special or different. After established the directives of your URLs, keep them; so your users were get used to them and get a clear idea of how is organized the content of your site (folders and pages).

10. Don’t use Case Sensitive

As URLs can be written in capital letters or small letters, it is preferable not to use capital letters in the structure of your URL. If you already have them implemented you can use the 301 version to avoid confusion.

11. Don’t add strange data

There is no reason to add to the URLs special characters that should generate the same content. You can be sure that your visitors will get confused, as the search engines.