: Search Engine Friendly URLs with Query String I have content that can be accessed from various ways. For example my content is reviews and I have three type of reviews: /customer-reviews/11/slug.html

@Welton855

Search engines, at least Google, don't care either way. If you have a clean URL structure (no duplication via URLs like /productname/colorname/ & /colorname/productname/ ) then they generally won't have a problem whether you use URL path elements or URL parameters. Both URL kinds have been around since "forever" so there's no need to worry about that.

My advice would be to primarily focus on the user and let that guide you regarding a decision like this. What works best for the user? And related, how will international (non-English) users be able to cope (if they're a part of your targeted audience)?

Things to keep in mind regardless when choosing a URL scheme:


Make sure you avoid duplication as much as possible
Use the rel=canonical where it makes sense
Don't try to stuff keywords into your URLs (it's not necessary)
Try to avoid unnecessary/unused URL elements (avoid having /123-pagename/ and /123-randomtext/ show the same content)
Avoid "infinite" URL nesting (/123-pagename/ links to /123-pagename/related/ links to /123-pagename/related/234-otheritem/ etc.)

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@Frith620

I like your use of query strings, but I would also suggest to have a "default" version that effectively means no query string. When the url is processed the default query string can then be added through url rewriting to process the request. If your using an MVC framework then this can be handled for you by default routes.

You can also make use of canonical url links to mitigate this problem further.
www.seomoz.org/blog/canonical-url-tag-the-most-important-advancement-in-seo-practices-since-sitemaps

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@Welton855

I agree with Mr. Disappointment that using URL segments is the way to go. And I think you will eventually end up with shorter URL's. Query strings are more verbose. I would use URLs like this:

/reviews/11/slug/customer/
/reviews/11/slug/third-party/
/reviews/11/slug/product/99/

/products/11/
/products/11/category/99/
/products/11/supplier/99/


It's debatable if you should end your URLs with a slash or not.

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