To Silo or Not to Silo

Link to main Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Web page

To “Silo” or not to “Silo” that is the question. Siloing is a Web site content structure that gets more than its share of pros and cons, especially from the SEO world.

The concept of siloing Web site content is fairly simple: group related content in physical descending order that represents “drilling down” deeper and deeper into the details of the main topic at the top of a particular content silo.

A good example of “siloing” on this Web site (obviously I’m a fan!) is how the sub-topics under “Search Engine Marketing” are structured in the Digital Marketing Tutorial Table of Contents. Note that there are no direct links on the TOC page to any of the topics listed under “Search Engine Marketing”. That was done on purpose to make search engines crawl this material in an ordered fashion – the content has been siloed.

The topic of Silo Web site structure was recently discussed in an article in relation to where content, especially new content, belongs on a Web site, in a related content “silo” or in the Web site’s blog. The article, titled. “Everything Should Not Be A Blog Post: Start Using Silos” by Patrick Stox is on Search Engine Land.

A good thought provoking read on this subject.