Adding a breadcrumb feature to your website or blog can improve your site’s overall user experience and search engine optimization (SEO).  It is a simple addition to any site, especially if you are using a CMS platform like WordPress (see my post on Integrating Breadcrumbs with WordPress).  It is also considered by some to be a “best practice” for modern web design.  Let’s jump into breadcrumb basics and how you can maximize this feature on your site.

What Are Breadcrumbs?

Breadcrumbs are a secondary form of navigation links that are usually organized by a hierarchical base.  They provide a trail for user’s browsing your site to navigate back to parent categories and pages.  Most experts agree that breadcrumbs should be placed horizontally and directly before the main content (below header).

Home Page > Section Page > Subsection Page

Better User Experience

User’s want to get to the information they need fast and hassle-free, so extra navigation and click-routes are usually a good thing.  Breadcrumbs can be especially useful for user’s which have delved deep into your pages possibly from an internal site search, external search engine, or referring link.

Better Search Engine Optimization

Now for my favorite part.  Breadcrumbs improve your site’s search engine friendliness by making it easier for search engines to determine the structure of your site.  While there is no proof that Google incorporates breadcrumbs into their search algorithm, Google does seem to add its own version of a breadcrumb trail to certain search results.  Take a look at this example:

Breadcrumbs can also be used to increase internal linking.  It is important to use keyword rich anchor text in your links to maximize your SEO.  Keep in mind that breadcrumbs are meant to increase a site’s ease of use, so don’t let the anchor text become too obnoxious for your site’s viewers.

Overall Benefits

• Maximize views/page per user
• Reduce bounce rate
• Increase impressions and conversion rate
• Increase search engine friendliness
• Increase internal linking
  

Now for My Breadcrumb Recipe

• Place your breadcrumbs in the top left and separate by the > (greater than) symbol
• Use keyword-rich text as your anchor text with the NoFollow attribute
• Avoid abbreviations
• Do not use in place of  a main navigation system, only use as secondary navigation aid
• Do not use in the page “title”
• Do not link the current page to itself
• Finally, be consistent and use throughout your site so that your users will become comfortable with your site’s navigation layout

Hopefully you can get a noticeable boost in your SERP and search engine traffic with your new knowledge for breadcrumbs!  Thank you for reading and please share any tips or comments below.

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