Why It’s Important To Separate Content On Your Website

One of the most common issues we see with websites is also one of the easiest to resolve. Cramming too much content on a single page occurs regularly, especially with small businesses who offer a range of services which they are eager to talk about. Even worse is when all the content is located on a single homepage, as this creates even more confusion for search engines trying to understand what your website is about.

Why does it matter? Well, one of the factors search engines use to determine rank is the URL and URL structure. The URL you decide for a business is a big indicator of what the content on the page will reflect, so it’s important to create specific pages for each of your services. 

Let’s look at a (fictional) example – say you are setting up a new bakery business, offering chocolate brownies, shortbread and cookies for sale. You also might branch out into other products as you expand, so you want to keep the URL generic – so you settle on ‘example-bakery.co.uk’. 

On the homepage, you list out your new products in order and explain how tasty each one is and a price list. Easy to understand. So far so good. 

However, you’re finding that your homepage isn’t appearing very high in search results for the terms ‘chocolate brownies’, ‘shortbread’ and ‘cookies’. Let’s have a look at the top results for ‘chocolate brownies to buy’. Notice what most of them have in common?

That right – the URL of the business specifically mentions brownies. These businesses clearly specialise in selling brownies, so Google is confident that they answer the search query that’s being presented. 

Why does this happen? Well, although you do offer chocolate brownies, the content on your cluttered page also refers to shortbread and cookies. In this scenario, search engines won’t be able to decipher quickly enough whether you offer the right product, so it will use a website which they are more sure offers the right answer for the user. 

Even worse, your page may get penalised and removed from results – if search engines can’t work out exactly what you offer, they may just ignore you entirely. 

So what do you do in this scenario? Well, the clue is at the bottom – thepuddingwagon.co.uk has created a sub page specifically designed for brownies. Although they sell a wide range of products as indicated by their domain name, by creating a specific landing page optimised for ‘chocolate brownies’, they have successfully got onto the first page of results against competitors who focus specifically on one product.

While this is a basic example, you get the idea – each of your services should be broken down into clear, separate pages. Take a big company like Asos for example – how crazy would it be if every single item of clothing was on the homepage? 

By having clear categories for their products, Asos are able to rank highly across multiple search terms – here they occupy the top two spots for the search term ‘jeans’, split across mens and womens. 

Now, before you go splitting every bit of content, it’s also important to remember that quality still matters. A page shouldn’t be broken down for the sake of it, and don’t get too granular.

Asos has a separate category page for ‘jeans’, but further breakdowns such as bootcut, slim, skinny etc are done within the page using filters. If they split out every single variation of jeans, along with their other products, it would actually become more confusing for the customer and harm their rankings. 

When setting up your page and URL structure, it’s important to think about how usable it is. Put yourself in your customer’s shoes and explore your website, or better yet, ask a friend or acquaintance to take an objective look and offer their feedback. Does the right content appear where it should be? How easy is it to find the pages they are looking for? 

So there you go – armed with the new information, take a look at your website and see if you can benefit from splitting down your content and creating specific pages to improve your SEO performance. 

Want a free digital consultation? Why not get in touch and see how we can improve your SEO performance today.