Should URLs end with a trailing slash?

Either works for SEO, as long as you pick one and use it everywhere. The problem is serving both versions, which creates duplicate URLs. Set your platform to use one form, redirect the other with a 301, and make internal links and the XML sitemap match. Changing an established site's convention later is rarely worth the redirect work.

Do keywords in URLs help rankings?

Only slightly. Descriptive words in a URL help users and search engines understand the page, but they're a minor ranking factor. Choose a short slug that names the topic clearly, and don't repeat keywords or lengthen URLs to fit more in. A clear, stable URL is worth more than a keyword-heavy one that you later want to change.

How long should a URL be?

As short as it can be while still describing the page. For most marketing pages, that's a few words in the slug after a short folder. There's no strict character limit to aim for, but long URLs get truncated in search results and are harder to share. Remove filler words such as "the", "and" and "ultimate".

Should I change URLs when I change platforms?

Keep them if you can. Most modern platforms, including Webflow, Framer and Next.js, let you set custom slugs and folder paths, so you can usually match your existing structure. Change URLs only when the old structure causes real problems, and when you do, map every old URL to its new one with a single 301 redirect.

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Web design & development

URL Structure Best Practices for Marketing Websites

URL structure best practices for marketing websites: rules for clean, SEO-friendly URLs that survive redesigns, platform moves and new pages without redirects.

By Mehdi HassanOct 29, 20267 min read

The short answer

URL structure best practices for a marketing website are simple: use short, lowercase, hyphenated words; group pages in a few shallow folders that reflect stable categories like /blog/ or /customers/; and keep dates, IDs, campaign names and platform paths out. The best URL is one you'll never need to redirect.

Key takeaways

Design URLs to outlive the current design, platform and org chart; every later change costs a redirect.
Use short, lowercase, hyphenated slugs that describe the page in a few words.
Keep folders shallow and stable: one level for most pages, two only for real groupings.
Never put dates, file extensions, IDs or platform-specific paths in URLs you plan to keep.
For multilingual sites, use language subdirectories such as /de/ rather than parameters.

Part of Website Information Architecture: How to Structure a Marketing Site

What is the best URL structure for a marketing website?

The best URL structure for a marketing website is short, readable and stable: a few top-level folders for stable categories, descriptive hyphenated slugs and nothing that depends on the current platform, campaign or team. Good URLs help visitors know where they are, help search engines understand how pages relate, and spare you redirect work later.

URLs are the most permanent part of a website. You'll redesign the pages, rewrite the copy and maybe change platforms, but each URL that changes needs a 301 redirect, and every redirect is a small risk to rankings. That's why this guide focuses on rules that survive redesigns. URLs are one layer of your site structure; our website information architecture guide covers the rest.

Rule	Good	Avoid
Use words, not IDs	/customers/acme-logistics	/customers?id=4821
Lowercase and hyphens	/pricing/enterprise-plan	/Pricing/Enterprise_Plan
Short and specific	/blog/saas-pricing-page	/blog/the-ultimate-guide-to-designing-a-pricing-page-for-saas
Shallow folders	/solutions/fintech	/solutions/industries/financial/fintech-companies
No dates in evergreen content	/blog/url-structure	/blog/2026/10/url-structure
No platform paths or extensions	/about	/about.html or /pages/about-us-2
No campaign names	/demo	/demo-q4-launch

What makes a URL SEO friendly?

An SEO-friendly URL is one that a person could read aloud and understand, that describes the page's topic in a few words, and that doesn't create duplicates. Google's own URL structure guidelines recommend simple, descriptive words and hyphens to separate them.

Keywords in URLs are a minor signal, so don't stuff them. The bigger SEO value of a clean URL is indirect. It's easier to share and link to, it shows up readably in search results and AI answers, and it avoids the duplicate-content problems that come from parameters, mixed case and trailing-slash inconsistencies.

One URL per page. Pick a canonical form, with or without a trailing slash, and redirect the other.
Lowercase only. Some servers treat /Pricing and /pricing as different pages.
Hyphens, not underscores or spaces. Hyphens read as word separators.
No session IDs or tracking parameters in internal links. Use them only on inbound campaign links, and set canonicals.

Parameters, pagination and filtered views need their own rules, especially on blogs and integration directories. Our guide to pagination, faceted URLs and parameters covers them.

How should you build a URL hierarchy?

Build a URL hierarchy with a small number of top-level folders that name stable kinds of content, and put individual pages one level below them. Most marketing sites need no more than two levels. Deeper nesting looks organized on day one and becomes a redirect project the first time you reorganize.

Top level for core pages: /pricing, /about, /demo, /security.
One folder per content type: /product/, /solutions/, /customers/, /integrations/, /blog/.
Pages directly inside the folder: /customers/acme, /integrations/slack, /blog/seo-audit.
Avoid folders for topics or categories that may change. Blog categories, for example, are better as tags than as URL folders.

Our SaaS website sitemap template shows the folders we use at each stage of a company, so seed-stage pages already sit where they'll live at Series B. For content hubs, the hub page doesn't need its articles nested beneath it in the URL; internal links and breadcrumbs carry that relationship, as explained in our guide to pillar pages in site architecture.

Which URL structure best practices survive a redesign?

The URL rules that survive redesigns are the ones that describe what a page is, not how or when it was built. A redesign changes layout, copy and often platform; it shouldn't need to change addresses. Before a redesign, check your current URLs against these rules and decide which, if any, are worth changing.

Name content, not containers
Use /customers/acme, not /case-studies-v2/acme or /cms/stories/acme. Container names change with platforms and redesigns.
Keep the slug when the page survives
If a page keeps the same purpose after a redesign, keep its URL even if the title changes slightly.
Strip platform defaults
Remove auto-generated prefixes and suffixes, such as numbered duplicates, before launch, not after.
Leave dates out of evergreen content
Dates in blog URLs force you to keep old dates or redirect when you update a post.
Avoid product codenames
If marketing renames the feature next year, the URL shouldn't have to follow.
Write the redirect map anyway
For every URL that does change, record a one-to-one 301 to its new home and test it before launch.

When is it worth changing existing URLs?

Changing URLs is worth it when the current structure actively causes problems: duplicate pages from mixed case or parameters, URLs that expose an old platform, slugs that name a product you no longer sell, or a hierarchy so deep that adding pages is painful.

It usually isn't worth it for cosmetic reasons, such as slightly shorter slugs on pages that already rank well. In those cases, the redirect carries some risk and the gain is small.

If you do change URLs, do it once, as part of a planned launch, with a full redirect map, updated internal links and a fresh XML sitemap. Then watch Search Console's indexing report for the following weeks. Sites built as single-page apps often need this kind of change; our guide to moving a React SPA to an SEO-friendly website covers that case.

How should multilingual websites structure URLs?

Multilingual websites should usually put each language in its own subdirectory, such as /de/ or /fr/, on the main domain. The sources we reviewed for our research agree on subdirectories as the default for most companies, because they're simpler to run than separate domains and keep authority on one site.

Use the same slug structure in each language folder, translated where it helps readers.
Add hreflang tags that reference every language version, including the page itself, with a return tag on each version.
Set an x-default for visitors whose language you don't serve.
Avoid query parameters such as ?lang=de for language versions.

Missing self-references, missing return tags, wrong language codes and duplicate tags from plugins are the hreflang errors that come up most often. Our multilingual website guide covers the strategy, and our guide to migrating a multilingual website covers moving one between platforms.

How do you check your current URL structure?

Check your URL structure by crawling the site, exporting every URL, and reviewing them against the rules above. The goal is a short list of real problems, not a rewrite of every slug.

Crawl the site and export all indexable URLs with their status codes.
Flag uppercase letters, underscores, parameters on internal links, file extensions and duplicated slugs.
Check that each page resolves to one canonical URL, with or without a trailing slash, never both.
Look for redirect chains, where one old URL hops through several others before reaching the page.
Mark which flagged URLs carry traffic or links, since those need the most careful handling.

If you're tempted to rebuild a site with an AI cloner or rebuilder tool, check the URLs it produces before launch; our article on whether website cloner tools are safe for SEO explains what to look for.

Frequently asked questions

Should URLs end with a trailing slash?: Either works for SEO, as long as you pick one and use it everywhere. The problem is serving both versions, which creates duplicate URLs. Set your platform to use one form, redirect the other with a 301, and make internal links and the XML sitemap match. Changing an established site's convention later is rarely worth the redirect work.
Do keywords in URLs help rankings?: Only slightly. Descriptive words in a URL help users and search engines understand the page, but they're a minor ranking factor. Choose a short slug that names the topic clearly, and don't repeat keywords or lengthen URLs to fit more in. A clear, stable URL is worth more than a keyword-heavy one that you later want to change.
How long should a URL be?: As short as it can be while still describing the page. For most marketing pages, that's a few words in the slug after a short folder. There's no strict character limit to aim for, but long URLs get truncated in search results and are harder to share. Remove filler words such as "the", "and" and "ultimate".
Should I change URLs when I change platforms?: Keep them if you can. Most modern platforms, including Webflow, Framer and Next.js, let you set custom slugs and folder paths, so you can usually match your existing structure. Change URLs only when the old structure causes real problems, and when you do, map every old URL to its new one with a single 301 redirect.

Mehdi Hassan · CEO & Design Director

Copywriter, designer and developer, and founder of Designify Studio. Over five years, 60+ projects across 14+ industries, for startups that have raised $300M+.

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