A ‘url’ or ‘uniform resource locator’ is the identifier by which your website is found. Also known as your ‘web address,’ your url acts as the “street” address of your web page on the internet and includes several pieces of unique information needed to locate and identify it.
http:// – file type, of which there are several, including the secure https:// you may see on shopping sites
www. – indicates it’s on the World Wide Web; sometimes the www. is not used
accurateimaging.com – domain name – location of the file’s web server
/seo.htm – path or directory on the computer to this file; it may be considerably longer if it is deep within a sub-directory; the seo is the name of the document and the .htm refers to the fact that it is an html document type
Search engine optimization of your url strings, particularly if your website is dynamic and urls are also dynamically generated, ensures they contain real text and not just symbols like &, % and ? that make accessing and indexing your web pages difficult for search engines.
Although your domain name remains unchanged, it is possible to rename other elements of your url to reflect the directories and documents using real words. Here’s an example of a dynamically generated page from a product catalog for cabinet glass: http://bendheimcabinetglass.com/productDisplay.cfm/Bendheim-Cabinet-Glass/European-Clear-Pyramid/product_id/104/category_ID/0/scndctgry_ID/0. The url has been search engine optimized to include the keyword phrase “cabinet glass” and the product name “European clear pyramid;” additionally only real text is used to identify the product ID and category ID with which this particular product is associated in the database.
