TLDR

Google gives high rankings to sites that prioritize user experience...

What Exactly Is Breadcrumb Navigation?

Breadcrumb navigation is a trail of text links that tells users where they are on a website and how they got there.

They usually appear near the top of the page.

Breadcrumb navigation is essential on your website for two reasons:

  • It has an impact on the user experience. Breadcrumbs make it easier to use and navigate your website.
  • It is advantageous to SEO. Google gives high rankings to sites that prioritize user experience.

Furthermore, breadcrumbs assist Google in understanding your site hierarchy and distributing PageRank throughout your website. This also contributes to your website's ranking.

This post will teach you about the various types of breadcrumbs and the advantages of using them.

But first, let's clear something up:

When Should Breadcrumbs Be Used?

Breadcrumbs are not suitable for everyone.

Breadcrumbs are useful for site navigation only if your site architecture is complex.

That is multiple categories that are further subdivided. Then there are subcategories that point to specific pages on your website. E-commerce websites are excellent examples.

They typically provide a variety of products organized into multiple levels of categories.

If you have a single-level, flat website architecture, avoid using breadcrumbs. Each page is only one click away from the homepage.

That's when breadcrumbs come in handy. Because they provide no navigational benefit to users.

What Are the Various Types of Breadcrumbs?

Breadcrumbs come in a variety of shapes and sizes.

1. Breadcrumbs Based on Hierarchy

Breadcrumbs based on hierarchy follow the site architecture (or "hierarchy") of your website.

2. Breadcrumbs Based on Attributes

Attribute-based breadcrumbs create a dynamic trail based on the various filters that users can apply to a page.

3. Breadcrumbs Based on a Path

Path-based breadcrumbs show the unique path users took to reach a specific page.

Instead of listing out the entire path, breadcrumb navigation is usually implemented in the form of a back button. This allows users to return to the previous page.

What Are the Advantages of Breadcrumbs?

There are numerous advantages to using website breadcrumbs.

1. Increase Browsing and Lower Bounce Rate

Breadcrumbs make it easier for users to navigate your site and find content. This promotes browsing.

If the page isn't exactly what they're looking for, they can easily navigate back to view other pages in the same category using breadcrumbs.

This also lowers the bounce rate.

2. Beneficial for User Experience

Breadcrumbs reduce the number of steps users must take to return to the top of the site hierarchy.

You may need to hit the back button several times on a website that lacks breadcrumbs. Alternatively, click multiple times to return to the top of the hierarchy.

However, with breadcrumbs, you can accomplish this with a single click by selecting a link from the breadcrumb trail.

3. Enhance the Internal Linking Structure and Crawlability

Breadcrumbs improve your website's crawlability by creating internal links between pages and categories.

They provide another way for search engines to understand your site structure, discover deeper pages within your site, and index all of your pages.

This is critical if you want your pages to show up in search results and drive traffic to your website.

4. Show up in Search Results

Breadcrumbs are also useful because they appear in Google search results. Above the meta description and title tag.

The breadcrumbs page informs users of where they will land on a website after clicking.

In Google search results, a page with breadcrumbs may receive more clicks than a similar page without breadcrumbs.

Don't forget to use breadcrumb structured data markup to ensure Google understands your breadcrumbs completely. And appropriately displays them in search results.

Best Practices for Breadcrumb Navigation

Follow the best practices listed below when designing breadcrumb navigation for your website.

1. Only use breadcrumbs if they make sense for your website

This is worth emphasizing once more:

Only use breadcrumbs if your site structure has multiple deeper levels.

Breadcrumbs probably won't add much value to your visitors if you have a single-level site structure with everything only one click away from the homepage.

2. Make Use of Breadcrumbs to Aid Primary Navigation

Breadcrumbs are an additional navigation option. As a result, they should not be used in place of your primary navigation menu.

Consider breadcrumbs as an alternative way for users to navigate your website.

3. Make use of Separators Individual Differences

Special symbols are used to separate text links in the breadcrumb trail.

The most common separator is the greater than sign (>).

However, an arrow () or a forward slash (/) can also be used.

4. Don't use Breadcrumb Trails to link to the current page

The breadcrumb trail concludes with the user's current location.

Adding a link to the current page makes no sense because users are already on the page.

It is unlikely that users will interact with it. It also serves no purpose.

5. Maintain a Simple Design

The breadcrumb design should be as straightforward and unobtrusive as possible. So that it is useful without detracting from the page's actual contents.

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