Long URLs vs short URLs?

Long URLs vs short URLs?

Ok, I've been thinking about this for quite some time now, and am going to kick myself over the ledge and make a statement that is counter to almost everything I have read here at POTN.

Long URLs are overrated.

There, I said it.

For example... let's say your photo business is XYZ Photography. Many here, and this was the overwhelming advice I got several years ago, was that xyzphotography.com was the preferred choice over something a bit more manageable like xyzphoto.com.

I'm sorry, but as time has come to pass, I simply disagree.

First, and foremost, I have come to firmly believe that the vast majority of customers and potential customers simply don't give a rat's behind. It's not important to them in the slightest, AND they all still know what "photo" is.

Second, even though many people will find you via clickable links, easy of use is still important. "Photography" is too easy to misspell via a simple typo. Especially when speaking with people verbally. Keep it simple.

Third, and relating to #2, the URL does need to be relevant. Don't have a business named XYZ Photography and have a URL as "lastthreeletterssnpsh​ts.com", for example. That would be too absurd the other way.

Back when I went with *photography.com, but to be honest if I knew then what I know now I would have gone with *photo.com (and purchased *photography.com for my own protection, but that's another issue). Problem is, now my brand is established and I feel stuck with it.

There, the flame-retardant suit is donned and I'm ready to go.

Our business name is Littlejohn Photography and we went with www.littlejohnphoto.co​m because the alternative was just to long for our liking.

I didn't even bother to include Photography.... actually partially true. I did register danmarchantphotography​.com but actually use just danmarchant.com

Dan Marchant wrote in post #17948953
I didn't even bother to include Photography.... actually partially true. I did register danmarchantphotography​.com but actually use just danmarchant.com

Yes, I did the same thing. In fact, just about every wildlife & nature photographer that I know just has their name .com. No need to have "photo" anything in there at all. While some might think that it would be useful or helpful to have "photo" or "photography" in the URL, in real life experience everyone has found that it just isn't so.

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One big reason to have a short URL now is text messages, twitter, and other social media. If someone wishes to send a link to one of your pages in a message, a long URL may cause them to have to send the URL in a message without a full explanation. When text messaging or using Twitter, the shorter the URL, the better.

I agree with you here. Exact match domains (EMD's) were a significant factor in SEO at one point in time. Most experts agree that time has passed (especially for Google).

I think the difference between photo and photography and not including one at all is probably very very small when it comes to ranking.

In other words:
coreypotter.com,
coreypotterphoto.com, and
coreypotterphotography​.com

are all perfectly acceptable and none should offer any significant advantages when it comes to SEO.

My first choice is always to go with the shortest option that still makes sense!

If you want it even shorter, you could get a .photo or .photography domain. So instead of xyzphoto.com, you'd get xyz.photo.

I went with radiant.photography for my domain name. I liked the way that it was a very simplistic domain (without any extra .com or other stuff around it). However, I have to caution that a domain like this does occasionally cause confusion. For instance, I've run into web forms for entering an email address that claimed my email @radiant.photography was an invalid entry when it obviously wasn't. I also feel like I have to mention to people that there is no ".com" at the end of my domain, which kind of defeats the point of having the clean domain to begin with. Finally, when creating business cards, oftentimes people will shorthand their web address to just list such-and-such.com along the bottom as a way to link your website cleanly. I felt like I couldn't do that with radiant.photography. Instead, I decided to use the full http://radiant.photogr​aphy address.

Anyway, I'm still glad I went with it, but wanted to contribute my observations to the discussion as something to think about.

rather than urbanfreestylephotogra​phy.com i went with urbanfreestyle.org which is shorter but still long enough! lol

FWIW: Are Short URLs Safe?

PhotosGuy wrote in post #17986826
FWIW: Are Short URLs Safe?

What is being discussed on this topic and that article are two entirely different things. The article is referring to services that shorten a URL so posters can use it in text messages and Twitter. The article has nothing to do with the actual URL of the website's length.

Nogo wrote in post #17986958
What is being discussed on this topic and that article are two entirely different things.

You are quite right. The article is only talking about URLs that are really long, but have been shortened. This thread was talking about URLs that are either long or short, natively.

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PhotosGuy wrote in post #17986826
FWIW: Are Short URLs Safe?

Not actually all that related to what the thread is about.

Also the security risk really has pretty much nothing to do with short URLs, and everything to do with leaving data open on pages that do not require credentials.

Leaving read rights open on data isn't terrible in many cases, assuming it isn't super critical, but write rights can get you in trouble, especially if it is to a general folder. (Not great to leave files like google docs/spreadsheets open, but there is less to be done there, and the attack vector is smaller.) Share the file/folders to specific accounts which require username and login, and avoid using 'open' links that access data/folders without a login for anything important. Think of it as leaving the key to your front door hidden under a rock vs leaving the lock itself hidden under a rock. If it is just the key, then anyone can wander by and then open your door. If it is the lock? Well then they still need to find a key to open it.

https://www.youtube.co​m/watch?v=gocwRvLhDf8 gives a bit of an overview of those addresses and the mechanics behind them. You very rarely gain any actual security with long URLs given the "Human readable" nature of them and the consistent structure that is used for many sites. They might contain 5, 10, or even 100 times as many characters, but often they haven't actually expanded the mathematical complexity of them because so much becomes heavily repeated 'boiler plate' text.

Not only that but if you break down the structure of a long URL then you can actually target specific content once you establish enough working data. (Go to Amazon.com or another retailer site that generates fairly long URLs, and copy-paste the addresses of a few random products into a simple text editor with wordwrapping turned off. There are patterns and definitions embedded in those addresses. Learn enough about them and you can start manually writing valid addresses without having to know the page exists.) Short URLs by their nature destroy structure and information. You can't take AAAAAAA and modify it to AAAAAAB to navigate with any sort of reliability. In fact AAAAAAB probably doesn't even exist.

Nogo wrote in post #17986958
What is being discussed on this topic and that article are two entirely different things. The article is referring to services that shorten a URL so posters can use it in text messages and Twitter. The article has nothing to do with the actual URL of the website's length.

I said "FWIW", as a possible item of interest. Feel free to ignore it.

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And it was worth something - I learned something about shortened URLs and internet security that I never would have known otherwise.
Thanks for sharing that!

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