This 14-page document discusses how to create SEO-friendly URLs to improve search engine ranking and attract more traffic to a website. It begins by defining what a URL is and explaining why they are important for SEO. It then outlines best practices for creating SEO-friendly URLs, such as using keywords in the URL, keeping URLs short, using hyphens over underscores, and making URLs easily readable. Following these practices can help websites rank higher in search engines and attract more visitors.

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How to Make SEO-
friendly URLs that
can Improve Your
Search Engine
Ranking & Attract
Traffic
April 2021
EDITED
BY IHAGH GODWIN

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Motivation & Environment
Presents:
How You can Make SEO-friendly
URLs that can Improve Your
Search Engine Rankings &
Attract Traffic
Copyright Free: You may distribute
without permission, and share with
anybody
Edited by Ihagh G.
MSc (Water Resources & Environmental Eng.),
BSc (Civil Engineering), and 7 years university
teaching experience
Editor, Motivation & Environment
Email: godwinihagh@gmail.com

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How to Make SEO-friendly URLs that can Improve
Your Search Engine Ranking & Attract Traffic
There is hardly any site owner who wouldn't like to attract traffic
to their site and improve their search engine ranking. Apart from
creating useful content for readers, one other significantly
important thing that can improve your search engine ranking
and attract traffic to your site is SEO-friendly URLs which you
can create for your posts or pages.
Under the following topics, this article discusses what URLs are
and how to make SEO-friendly URLs that can improve your
search engine ranking and attract traffic to your site:
 But first, what is a URL?
 Why are URLs important in SEO?
 What is an SEO-friendly URL?
 SEO-friendly URLs are one of the basic pillars of SEO
 How to make an SEO-friendly URL—10 things to do
 Conclusion

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But first, what is a URL?
Some people use the terms “URL” and “domain name”
interchangeably. A URL doesn't mean the same thing as a
domain name; there is actually a difference between the two.
URL is an acronym that means “Uniform Resource Locator”. A
URL is an address to a location or resource on the Internet. For
example, in the URL https://schmitt-
trading.com/2021/04/25/seven-reasons-why-an-own-domain-
is-so-important/, “schmitt-trading.com” is the domain name
which consists of a top-level domain (TDL) popularly known as
“.com”.
Generally, a URL consists of:
 a protocol (example: “https” or “http”).
 a domain name (which includes a top-level domain—TLD)
like “.com”, “.org”, “.net”, etc.
 a path that leads to a specific page, post, file, or resource on
a site. A path is usually located after a hostname, and is
separated by a forward slash: “/”.

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Why are URLs important in SEO?
In addition to your tags, links to anchor texts, and the quality of
your content, search engines use the URLs of your site or web
pages to understand the details of your content and what they
are all about.
What is an SEO-friendly URL?
An SEO-friendly URL is a URL that is optimized to help internet
users and searchers find the type of content they want. URLs
that are optimized for SEO tend to be concise, short, contain
keywords, and provide a better user experience.
Although it is not a major ranking factor, the structure of a URL
structure can help your post or page move to a higher position on
search engine results pages (SERPs), improve your search engine
ranking, and attract traffic to your site.
SEO-friendly URLs are one of the basic pillars of SEO
In fact, Backlinko had once stated that URLs are a significant
ranking factor: In Google’s top 200 ranking factors, URL length
was listed as number 46, while URL path was listed as number

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47, and keyword usage in URL was listed as number 51. When
you knit this information, you will conclude that URL
optimization (creating SEO-friendly URLs) is quite a big deal.
How to make an SEO-friendly URL—10 things to do
1. If you can, select a top-level domain (TDL) that is the most
popular, or highly popular
Search Engine Land’s infographic clearly shows the qualities of
an SEO-friendly URL, and one important point highlighted is that
it's more ideal to select “.com” as a top-level domain (TDL). In
essence, this means that it is more ideal to select a “.com”
domain instead of a “.net”, “.biz,”, “.tel”, “.pro”, or other types of
TDL.
If you already have a domain that isn’t “.com”, don't waste your
time placing too much emphasis on this point—the type of TDL;
also, don’t assume that your site is doomed or will be doomed if
you select/have selected a top-level domain that is different from
“.com”.
However, it is important to note that the type of TDL you select,
matters; therefore, consider ".com" whenever you want to select a

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TDL in the future. Although the type of TDL selected doesn’t
directly impact a site’s search engine ranking, it does matter to
an extent because most internet users and searchers tend to
trust ".com" and probably ".org" more than the rest.
For whatever reason, the type of TDL a site uses can increase or
decrease people’s trust in it—and this is huge! The more people
trust your domain, the more it will impact your site's overall
SEO, improve your search engine ranking, and attract traffic to
your site.
2. Choose https
Nowadays, internet security is a big issue. With the increasing
rate of identity theft and cybercrime on the internet, internet
users and searchers always want to be sure that they are surfing
a secure domain.
As a result, it is highly recommended that you use “https” in your
URLs instead of “http”. In case you don’t know the difference
between “https” and “http”, “https” means “HyperText Transfer
Protocol Secure” which is the secure version of "http", while
“http” just means “HyperText Transfer Protocol”—without the
word “Secure”. This simply implies that information on a site that

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has “https” is encrypted and provides a significantly heightened
level of security.
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comparison with WordPress.org
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WordPress.com
Searchmetrics had reported that “https” is gaining more
relevance, and becoming more of a ranking factor for Google:
“https” increases the level of trust and conversion rates because
of the encryption and extra security it gives to sites that have
purchasing processes, or sensitive user information.
3. Choose lowercase letters and avoid uppercase letters
Although this is commonly practiced among most site owners, it
is still important to mention it so that people who aren’t aware
can become aware. Always choose lowercase letters because the
use of uppercase letters potentially leads to 404 errors or
redirects on some servers.

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4. Choose hyphens instead of underscores
Spaces aren’t allowed in URLs; so if you want to put spaces in
between words, you can use only one of two choices: hyphens ( -
), or underscores ( _ ); although you can choose between the two,
it’s recommended that you should always use hyphens because
that’s what Google prefers; therefore, be rest assured that
hyphens are the best option.
5. Choose safe characters and avoid unsafe characters
It’s totally safe to use safe characters in your URL, but it’s not
totally safe to use unsafe characters which you should avoid as
much as possible because they are known to create usability
issues and significant issues for browsers.
Examples of safe characters include alphanumeric characters
such as: 0 to 9, a to z, mathematical symbols, brackets,
punctuation marks; on the other hand, examples of unsafe
characters include: ~ { } < > % ^ [ ] #.
How keyword optimization made my article attract the highest
number of views & rank almost 1.0 on Google—6 screenshots & a
practical example

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How keyword optimization continues to make my articles attract
increasing numbers of views from Google—with screenshots
Why you should crosscheck grammar in your content before
publishing
6. Use one or two keywords
Although it is unlikely that placing keywords in your URL will get
your posts or pages to the top of search engines, it can boost
your ranking on search engine results pages. Therefore, it is
important to include keywords in your URLs, but be mindful of
how you use them so they won’t be viewed as spam, and get your
site penalized.
From a user’s or searcher’s point of view, it could be important to
use keywords in a URL because, even if you don’t attach an
anchor text to the URL, in a certain way the URL can still serve
as the anchor text and instantly tell users what your content is
about. This could encourage a lot of people to click on the URL
even if it doesn’t have an anchor text.
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on search engines

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The numbers of words are not as important as the impact of
words on readers
Definition, importance & advantages of using keyword search
optimization
The internet’s most popularly used words that make headlines go
viral
According to information available on one of Search Engine
Land’s pages, choose one or two keywords per URL; adding more
won’t help to improve your ranking on Google and other search
engines. In terms of positioning, it’s best to put your keywords
at/toward the beginning of your URL.
7. Don’t repeat or stuff keywords
Repeating keywords or stuffing them in URLs could lead your site
to disaster. Don’t stuff keywords unnecessarily in your URL.
There are no rewards for repeating keywords; the practice could
be viewed as an attempt to manipulate search engines and could
diminish your site’s credibility in the eyes of users and search
engines.

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8. Use the least number of words you possibly can: if
possible, use between three and five
In an interview with Google’s Matt Cutts, URLs with three, four,
or five words are perfectly okay, but the longer they become, the
lesser Google’s algorithm will weigh the words and just not give
the URL as much credit.
In summary, distill the essence of your content into anywhere
between three to five words. Generally, keep the number of words
to the least minimum, but do it in a way that can still enable
users or readers to have an idea of what to expect when they
clicking a URL.
9. Keep the length of your URL to the least number of
characters you possibly can: if possible, use between 50 and
60 characters
Backlinko analyzed 11.8 million Google search results and found
out that “Shorter URLs tend to rank better than long URLs”;
therefore, the shorter a URL, the better it will improve your
search engine ranking and attract traffic to your site.

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Backlinko also analyzed one million Google search results and
the statistics showed that, in order for a URL to perform as best
as it possibly can in a search engine, the maximum number of
characters in the URL should be kept to anywhere between 50
and 60 characters. Having up to 80 or more characters could
negatively impact your search engine ranking and traffic.
10. Make your URL easily readable
There is a strong bond between a user-friendly URL and overall
SEO. A readable URL will make it easy for users and search
engines to understand the type of content that should be
expected on a destination, post, or page. Therefore, do all you can
to structure your URL in a way that can make it easily readable,
even if it has some hyphens and forward slashes.
Structure your URL so that it can be simple, clear, and easily
understood by users immediately or shortly after they glance at it
for a few moments.

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Conclusion
If you can create useful content, and make SEO-friendly URLs by
using the points stated above, you will be able to improve your
search engine ranking and attract more traffic to your site.
While the process of making SEO-friendly URLs might appear
difficult, time-wasting, and tricky, it uses a lot of common-sense
principles that you can easily practice, apply, and benefit from.