Changin what appears in the address bar

Hi, i am struggling to figure out how to change what appears in the address bar. I know how to change what appears in the page tab but cant quite work out how to alter what appears in the address bar. I own an adult based website and this is an example of how i would like it to be. eg http://www.total-pleasure.co.uk/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=123_111 is the url for my condoms page but i would like it to be www.total_pleasure.co.uk/condoms and the same would need to apply for all of my page is possible. Can anyone help?

What you're talking about is changing the dynamically generated URL to a static text type URL. There is an add-on that accomplishes this. But the question is why?

RescoCCC:

What you're talking about is changing the dynamically generated URL to a static text type URL. There is an add-on that accomplishes this. But the question is why?

It helps with Search Engine Optimization, I'm sure that's his main reason.

cilaes:

It helps with Search Engine Optimization, I'm sure that's his main reason.

It's a fallacy that it helps with SEO. Modern search engines are quite capable of indexing dynamic pages.

Hi thanks for the replies. Its just because http://www.total-pleasure.co.uk/inde...&cPath=123_111 looks horrible in the address bar and aesthetically www.total_pleasure.co.uk/condoms would look much better. It will also be easier to identify what page is what as opposed to not having the foggiest idea because of all the numbers and symbols. Could you possibly tell me which add on accomplishes this. Thanks for the help.

This seems to be the most popular one:

http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?main_page=product_contrib_info&products_id=1269

Unless you are going to publish direct URL's on external sites, there is no need to change your dynamic URL's to static URL's.

In fact, search engines prefer that url's are not re-written, and are more than capable of trawling and indexing content behind a dynamic URL. For about 10 years now, search engines have invested heavily in the development of their spidering algorithms to tackle dynamically generated pages, and can now follow internal links to considerable depth behind a dynamic URL.

There is no "SEO" advantage in converting your URL's. There may even be a risk associated with doing this as the SE's may trawl both the dynamic and static pages, and see duplicate content as a result. For this you will be penalised, and cleaning up the resultant mess can be onerous.

We have built a huge number of ZC sites, and never used "SEO URL" modules, and all the sites we have built feature very strongly on major search engines.

However, it is our company policy to encourage competitors to put their sites at greater risk, as this reduces competition for our clients' websites, so if you are in an industry shared by our clients, then please go ahead and install a SEO URL module. :smile:

Yay, let's have the dynamic versus static URLs discussion again :clap::clap::clap:

There is no evidence now that dynamic URLs are bad for SEO. There is also no evidence that it is a disadvantage to have static URLs.

As far as duplicate content issues go. Gosh I thought that was what the canonical tags were for? But maybe I misunderstood...

If for whatever reasons you want to have static URLs then there really seems no reason not to have them. The Ceon mod does what it says on the tin. It gives pages static URLs and let's you adjust them. Connor, who is the author of the mod, has said many many times that he doesn't claim that the mod will improve SEO performance and it probably won't. It simply changes the dynamic URLs to static ones so if you like that then it is probably a good mod for you.

(The only downside of the Ceon mod is that it won't automatically create URLs for existing products. Which actually in my experience is a good thing in most cases. You just need to go through the products and accept or edit the new URL )

Ok, Thanks for allypur help its much appreciated. After all the advice, think i will just leave it as it is. Thanks again

Sorry, I had just always had been told that <keyword> inurl held SEO value.

That used to be the case... years ago. Old knowledge dies hard, especially when you can find it today without disclaimers that it is old.