Monday 22nd September 2008 Google wrote a post that fundamentally is wrong for many reasons, while at the same time does have some foundation, although not much!

For some strange reason a post written on Monday by Juliane Stiller and Kaspar Szymanski, of the Search Quality Team at Google, did not think before hey put finger to keyboard and created a post that sparked outrage and angry comments. You can read the entire article by following this text.

We've come across many webmasters who, like our friend, believed that static or static-looking URLs were an advantage for indexing and ranking their sites. This is based on the presumption that search engines have issues with crawling and analysing URLs that include session IDs or source trackers. However, as a matter of fact, we at Google have made some progress in both areas. While static URLs might have a slight advantage in terms of clickthrough (CTR) rates because users can easily read the urls, the decision to use database-driven websites does not imply a significant disadvantage in terms of indexing and ranking. Providing search engines with dynamic URLs should be favoured over hiding parameters to make them look static.

Firstly the motivation behind the post by Google can be seen in a different light if you are thinking in terms of marketing. Google is not wrong in the post just did not think of the bigger picture before it was written, they also are quite self serving and don't care that the fact is they are not the only search engine in this world.

Google are coming in on the tac that best suits their objectives, when a URL is poorly rewritten or worse has errors it impedes their ability to find the relevant content for their users, and hurts the authors you.

However, the fact that some developers incorrectly create rewrite rules does not mean that sticking with dynamic written URL's is now the 'best practice.' It simply means you have to do it the right way. Furthermore it creates even more contradiction when the exact post Google has written uses a rewritten URL.

Firstly let us look at the pros and cons of dynamic URL's and rewritten or static URL's

Pros of dynamic URL's:

1. Google only one of the four major search engines) says they can effectively crawl and index them

Cons of dynamic URL's:

1. Lower click-through rate in the search results, in emails, and on forums/blogs where they are cut and pasted
2. Virtually impossible to write down manually and share on a business card or read over the phone to a person
3. Gives the user no idea of what it is they are about to read, or if it corresponds to their actual query
4. A greater chance of cutting off the end of the URL resulting in a 404 or other error when copying or pasting
5. Lower keyword relevance and keyword visibility
6. Hard 'if not completely impossible' to manually remember
7. Not usable in branding or print campaigns
8. Will not typically carry optimised anchor text when used as the link text (which happens frequently due to copying & pasting)

Pros of Static URL's or rewritten URL's:

1. Higher click-through rates in the SERPs, emails, web pages, etc.
2. Higher keyword prominence and relevancy
3. Easier to copy, paste and share on or off-line
4. Easy to remember and thus, usable in branding and off-line media
5. Creates an accurate expectation from users of what they're about to see on the page
6. Can be made to contain good anchor text to help the page rank higher when being linked to
7. All 4 of the major search engines (and plenty of minor engines) generally handle static URLs more easily than dynamic ones, especially if there are multiple parameters

Cons of Statics URLs:

1. You could not implement the url rewrite module properly which in turn makes your content hard to find and could create resource not found 404 errors

In the article Google even admit that a rewritten URL does increase CTR (click through rate) to some extent, also it does have beneficial gains in ranking of the page with the rewritten URL. Furthermore Google is not the only search engine to be considering here, for instance Yahoo places more weight in keywords placed in the URL than Google does, so by not using rewrite URL's you could in fact be making it harder to rank in other search engines.

We also have to look at other factors, just because Google can read and index the URL is a small part of the overall picture. It goes into usability and branding, simplicity of telling someone an easy to remember URL. We implement rewrite solutions on our clients sites and own own constantly, and in our own experience, CTR is higher, rankings are higher and usability is higher. It makes sense to use a URL that displays as xwz.com.au/BMW-Used-Cars then xwz.com.au/index.php?/11008/cat=34?&page=284jht? try putting that on a piece of marketing media or a business card.

Just because something works ok one way, does not mean it should not be done the correct and easier to use way. Come on Google you are not the only search engine in the world, and there are factors far more important like usability, and common sense to think of.