Website Structure and SEO: An Overlooked Exercise

Yes, that’s right, I’m actually talking about website structure and SEO in 2025 and you can’t stop me. This might seem like old-school SEO territory and that’s because it is – it peaked in the early days of SEO but it has become something of an enlightening exercise for myself and our clients over the last few months. 

In essence, both ROAR and our clients have renewed clarity in how and why our respective websites are structured in the way they are. And unfortunately, the outcome hasn’t always been the kindest. Though, the overall feedback for this exercise has been overwhelmingly positive not just for SEO, but for the entire marketing team. 

Because, while this is an old technique by today’s standards, ultimately when done well, logical website structure gives every page a clear purpose. Reviewing your existing structure can help you better align your content to your users and unlock some fresh opportunities for organic search performance. 

What I’m trying to say is that sometimes the often overlooked, simplest and well established techniques are some of the most powerful to bring back into the fold. Here’s how and why: 

What is website structure in SEO?

Website structure and SEO is all about how your website is organised and how they interact and link together. Both in terms of navigation and deeper into your content. It’s effectively a sitemap, sure, but it’s also the foundation of your internal linking strategy, the start of your topical clustering and how both users and search engine bots will navigate through the website. 

That’s why the importance of a clearly defined website structure supports not just your SEO, or solely your website users but your marketing function too. It makes it clear what the purpose of each page is, what it should ideally need to rank for and helps bring a level of clarity to all stakeholders in the marketing department. 

If we’re thinking purely from a practical perspective too, it’s the start of your plan to help share and pass link equity through your website to core service pages, avoids any orphaned content or pages, and helps prevent a poor click depth. More than that, it helps your website make sense to everyone who is going to use it. 

If you’ve never done a full structure audit before, or it’s been years since your sitemap was created, now might be the time to pause and ask: “Does our structure still make sense?”

Let’s get the conversation started with a free SEO audit. 

Why I think it’s overlooked in 2025.

There is simply just so much noise in SEO at the moment, it’s overwhelming. From ‘GEO’ to ‘AISEO’ to ‘LLMO’, I would confidently say that I’m not the only SEO in the game who is just tired of all the clickbait and doomsayers. 

Website structure and SEO just isn’t flash, new or shiny and it’s not a fast win, or a trending hack or new ultimate technique to ensure ‘we’re aligned and to focus our attention on maximum synergy with’ blah blah blah. 

And I think that’s because it’s a foundational technique, that most often gets left alone and things get piled on top to inevitably collapse. As a relatively new homeowner, I liken it to the foundations of any home. If the foundations underneath aren’t right, nothing you stack on top of it will be how you expect and could lead to disaster. 

To be frank about it, it’s easy to brush past a website structure and think, ‘oh it’s fine’, or be so wrapped up in internal jargon and industry nonsense that you convince yourself that it will be fine. 

That is until you map it all out. Until you put the gaps in front of you, analyse the cannibalisation of pages, the disjointed structure and clusters, and that’s when the pang of regret sets in. 

The reason it is still relevant today. 

At the very core of my being, I love a good logical, organisational structure. Nothing gets the engine revving more for me than naming conventions, standard operating procedures and a clear hierarchy. 

What can I say, I was born a bonafide party animal. 

That’s why it’ll come to no surprise that my idea of a good time and a new way to provide value to our clients was to send them a keyword map and ask them to  go away with their team and review your website structure. 

It’s because clarity still matters, arguably now more than it ever has before. 

Google’s understanding of content has improved massively, but it still needs a kick up the arse sometimes. Structure can be that boot up the heinie to help search engines, and users, and even you, understand how your pages relate to each other and what their purpose is. Especially if you have a content-heavy, constantly growing website. 

What we’ve seen in these exercises with our clients is that rethinking structure forces conversations about what content matters most, what your users need and how content needs to be grouped together to better support not just your growth but your brand perception too. 

It will help you and the team work smarter, not just harder. 

Simple doesn’t always correlate to outdated. 

This one hits home, it’s at the very heart of it. Website structure and SEO isn’t outdated, it’s just pretty basic. I’m not afraid to admit that because that doesn’t mean it’s less effective or ineffective, it means that it’s tried and tested. 

In the fast moving world of marketing, we sometimes need to slow down and go back to the fundamentals. Because if your website doesn’t have a clear structure that is logical, all your new content, technical tweaks, and keyword strategies are on shaky ground. 

In fact, this might just be the reset your website needs right now to help make the rest of your strategy click. 

Quick tips and our recommendations. 

I have already said it, mapping out an SEO friendly website structure really just needs a whiteboard or pen and paper, it’s that simple. But, based on a few of our learnings from our exercises here’s some tips and recommendations to get you started on the best foot:

1. Map out your core pages and group them by theme, or service on Google Sheets or Excel.
2. Identify orphan pages or duplicate content that might confuse search engines.
3. Use topic clusters and internal links to build relationships between related pages.
4. Consider your navigation and whether it supports key user journeys.
5. Don’t be afraid to consolidate low-performing content that adds no value.
6. Use tools like Screaming Frog or even a simple whiteboard to visualise your current structure.

Key Takeaways:

• It can improve SEO, UX, and content performance in one go
• It helps marketing teams gain clarity and focus
• It’s an old-school technique with new-school benefits
• It’s often overlooked — but shouldn’t be
• I’m a party animal. 

Exercises like this are what we bring to the table on a monthly basis for our clients, we’re constantly innovating and challenging our methods to achieve the best results possible. Can you say for certain that you’re doing the same? 

If your team could benefit from clarity, alignment, and a clearer foundation for growth, let’s talk. 

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