Permalinks for Friendly URLs and SEO
After initially installing WordPress, you might notice that your URLs are sort of confusing.
For example, they may look something like this: http://wordpresswebhosting.com.au/?p=79. There is nothing in the link that lets the web user know what they are being linked to. Luckily, WordPress gives the option for you to manage what will appear in the URL so that, instead of the weird question mark ending, web users will see something like this: http://wordpresswebhosting.com.au/tutorials/. Isn't that better?
Turn Permalinks On
To create friendly URLs on your WordPress blog, you will need to turn Permalinks on. You can do this in the Settings section of your dashboard. Go to Settings > Permalinks and then choose your preference.
You can simply choose one of the options on the screen, or create a custom structure using the following tags. Many blog sites prefer to use this custom structure:
/%category%/%postname%/
%year% | Four digit year of post (2009).
%monthnum% | Month of post in two digits (04).
%day% | Day of post in two digits (29).
%hour% | Hour of post.
%minute% | Minute of post.
%second% | Seconds of the post.
%postname% | Title of the post.
%post_id% | The post ID number (399).
%category% | The category name.
%tag% | The tag name.
%author% | The author's name.
Friendly URLs and SEO
Now that permalinks are turned on, you will find that your URLs have become much friendlier to the human eye. In addition, choosing the proper link titles helps your site be optimised for search engine rankings, or what we know as SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).
An amazing new feature of WordPress is that you now have the ability to choose the link titles of your post or page on your own. This can be done at the top of the page as in the picture below.
This enhancement places SEO capabilities fully into a WordPress user's hands. Choose your keywords to include in your title and watch your site hits grow.