What's your approach to structuring a menu navigation?

[cockus]

What's your approach to structuring a menu navigation? Does it matter to build navigation menus based on keyword volumes or does it matter more to build a main navigation category based on user experience rather than target keywords?

 

[Tagency]

I usually build the menu based on tags that represent core content topics. When users click on these main keywords in the menu, it also helps increase the value of those keywords in the eyes of search engines.

 

[leriack]

I keep the menu simple and easy so that the user doesn't have a hard time finding anything. I keep the important pages at the top and divide the rest into categories.I don't give too many options so that there is no confusion. It can be used easily on mobile too.

 

[OnlineReputation]

if you build navigation primarily around keyword volume, you’ll usually make the UX worse and that ends up hurting SEO anyway. The winning approach is UX-first, keyword-informed, not keyword-driven.
Keywords are important, but not as the driver of structure.

 

[cockus]

lets say I create a travel guide website

Which is best?

category menu button with descriptive label "WHAT TO DO "with sub menu dropdown items "Museums", "Shopping" etc VS category menu button with keyword rich label "NYC attractions" with sub menu dropdown items Museums etc?

 

[2155476]

What's your approach to structuring a menu navigation? Does it matter to build navigation menus based on keyword volumes or does it matter more to build a main navigation category based on user experience rather than target keywords?

Hello @cockus ! good menuis one that is user friendly make it easy to navigate and find what they need. Make sure your categories match how users think and search for things then use keywords in the content and meta tags.

 

[Danielcross]

What's your approach to structuring a menu navigation? Does it matter to build navigation menus based on keyword volumes or does it matter more to build a main navigation category based on user experience rather than target keywords?

I’d say UX comes first, keyword data is useful for naming and structuring categories but if it doesn’t make sense to a real user it usually doesn’t perform well anyway

 

[tazarbm]

category menu button with descriptive label "WHAT TO DO "with sub menu dropdown items "Museums", "Shopping" etc VS category menu button with keyword rich label "NYC attractions" with sub menu dropdown items Museums etc?

in the example you gave both scenarios work well because the keyword-rich menu item is short and topically relevant, so in this particular case I don't think there's a wrong or right way of doing it, it only depends on your end goal and vision of your site.

But like others said, I also have in mind user experience when creating menus, SEO-ing the menus is among the last things on my priority list

 

[Thunder Digitals]

In local SEO, i keep it as simple as possible.

like, home>Services>About Us>Contact Us

Then in the services menu, I add services like Roof repair> Roof replacement> Roof installation, etc.

 

[dmffmd]

lets say I create a travel guide website

Which is best?

category menu button with descriptive label "WHAT TO DO "with sub menu dropdown items "Museums", "Shopping" etc VS category menu button with keyword rich label "NYC attractions" with sub menu dropdown items Museums etc?

Menus should guide people, not try to rank by themselves.
I use keywords in navigation only when they fit naturally. If the label sounds forced, I keep the menu descriptive and let the category pages, titles, and internal links do the SEO work.

In your example, I’d use “What to Do” as the main menu label, with sub-items like Museums, Shopping, Food, etc. Then I’d optimize the actual category or landing pages for terms like “NYC attractions” rather than trying to force that into the main navigation.
So the menu is for direction, not for stuffing search volume into the header.