Better SEO thanks to friendly URLs

Better SEO thanks to friendly URLs

XperienCentral makes it possible to optimize URLs. As a result you can have friendly URLs like www.gxsoftware.com/home/contact instead of an nonsensical one such as www.gxsoftware.com/id=77581/langid=42. Website visitors as well as search engines benefit from friendly URLs because they provide insight into the content of a page and make it easier for a search engine to index it which results in the link appearing higher up in the returned search results. For website visitors, friendly URLs are easier to remember and serve as good waypoints for those who surf through multiple pages on a website.

Option 1: select the URL yourself

In XperienCentral, you can assign the URL for a page or content item yourself.

1. Navigate the content item or page in question.
2. Click [Edit] in the Properties widget.
3. Click Basic and enter the string that you want to use as the URL in the “URL Title” field. For example:

Option 2: let the URLs be automatically generated

If you don’t specify a URL title, XperienCentral generates one automatically. In the first instance, the navigation title is used as the friendly URL. If the navigation title is missing, then XperienCentral uses the title of the page or content item as the friendly URL.

If you have an isolated page or content item (one that does not appear in the tree structure), then there is no navigation title. In this case, the title of the page or content item is also used as the friendly URL. For example:

Note: Friendly URLs in XperienCentral do not use uppercase letters: all friendly URLs in XperienCentral are always lowercase.

Friendly URLs can only be used by one page/content item

In some cases, on the basis of the URL title, title, or navigation title, a page and/or content item will have a friendly URL conflict. In this case, XperienCentral solves the problem by suffixing a digit to the friendly URL of the page or content item that wants to have a friendly URL that is already in use. For example:

If you want to free up an existing friendly URL for use by another page or content item, you have two options:

1. If you don’t need to keep the “first” page or content item that is claiming the friendly URL, simply delete it. Its friendly URL is now available for the “second” page or content item. Note that the “second” page or content item will not automatically inherit the friendly URL from the “first” page or content item and will still have as its friendly URL <title-x>. You need to rename the “second” page or content item to something else, save it, and then rename it to the friendly URL that you originally wanted.
2. If you want to keep the “first” page or content item but want to release the friendly URL for the “second” page or content item, follow these steps:
   1. Rename the “first” page.
   2. While still on the “first” page, click [Edit] in the Properties widget and navigate to the SEO tab.
   3. Select “Delete” next to the friendly URL you want to free up under “This page is also available at URLs” and then click [Save]. The friendly URL is now free to be used by the “second” page/content item. Note that the “second” page or content item will still have as its friendly URL <title-x>.
   4. Rename the “second” page or content item to something else, save it, and then rename it to the friendly URL that you originally wanted.

For complete information on friendly URLs, see the online help topic
Help > Traffic > SEO.