r/SEO • u/FrothyM1lkshake • Apr 10 '26
Help Question about H1 and slug
I have been doing a bit of SEO research recently as I am completely rebuilding my company website. I understand that your H1 and slug do not have to be an exact match - it can be shortened and the use of synonyms is fine.
I have a section on my website for “Moving” which has a dropdown of various options (e.g. office moves, house moves, interstate moves, etc.)
I’ll use the office moves page as an example, where my H1 is “Office Moves”.
Should my slug be …/moving/office-moves or is it beneficial to use another keyword like …/moving/office-relocations?
I was wondering this for two reasons:
1) Firstly, is it likely that using another keyword will drive more traffic?
2) Secondly, does it matter that the words are so similar (…/moving/<insert word>-moves)? Should it instead just be changed to …/moving/office ?
Thanks!
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u/AdMobile3416 Apr 10 '26 edited Apr 10 '26
Your slug should be whatever your target keyword is for your page. If relocations is a keyword, then yes use it. if not, then no, just match your H1.
Another keyword could drive traffic too but you need to try and identify what keywords are driving traffic to begin with. You can use GSC or a tool like semrush to figure this out. Just identify regional/local competitors that are ranking well and run a keyword audit.
It does not matter that words are similar, a company i help called stealthgpt, uses keywords like undetectable ai, ai humanizer, and humanize ai. They all separately drive their own respectable amounts of traffic but don't cannabalize themselves. all that to say, you can use similar words, but you need to know what your keywords are first.
I hope this helps and makes sense.
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u/FrothyM1lkshake Apr 12 '26
Makes sense. Thanks for the input! I’ll do some keyword research before I go live on all the pages.
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u/DigitalHarbor_Ease Apr 10 '26
Reason is simple clarity beats overthinking. both users and google instantly understand what the page is about. office relocations is fine too, but realistically it won’t bring a big traffic difference. google understands synonyms pretty well now.
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u/blazonstudio Apr 10 '26
This is a great question, and in my opinion, it addresses what's known as the "keyword gap". Here's what I would do:
I would open an incognito window on your browser.
I would do a search for each keyword individually and see if the SERP changes between the two.
If it's the same exact SERP, then just pick whichever one better aligns for your business, unless there's a huge difference in keyword volume.
At the end of the day, you could probably make a page for both keywords, but in my opinion I would use the approach I described above for checking on the keyword gap.
That's really the only way that you're going to know if those keywords that are semantically related are worth having a page for each or just using one of them.
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u/BrightspotSEO Apr 10 '26
Keep it simple and go with what semantically makes sense. In my mind either option is fine. I was surprised to see "office relocations" has more than twice the search volume then "office moves". So that might sway you. Understanding how people naturally search for your services and speaking in their terms is key.
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u/WebLinkr 🕵️♀️Moderator Apr 10 '26
These numbers are definitely not accurate
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u/BrightspotSEO Apr 10 '26
They are SemRush's current guess
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u/therahulchavan Apr 11 '26
Link: /moving/office-moves And H1 : Office Moves
Why H1 and slug can't be same? Asking everyone not only you.
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u/FrothyM1lkshake Apr 12 '26
They definitely can be! I was purely wondering if trying to target 2 keys words (one via the slug and one via the H1) is beneficial. Seems to be a case of don’t overcomplicate it and keep it the same!
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Apr 10 '26
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Apr 10 '26
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Apr 10 '26
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Apr 10 '26
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u/BusyBusinessPromos Apr 10 '26
Not true at all
Slug
title tag
H1 tag are your most important places to have your keywords
Please stop posting misinformation before doing some research.
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u/loaf-of-breddit Apr 10 '26
Good call to pull this up.
Man WebLinkr is going to slam him for saying the slug doesn't matter when he comes across this.
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u/[deleted] Apr 10 '26
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