In the beginning, it’s rather simple to throw 4 or 5 webpages out into the world. But give it a month or two and pages will grow, blog posts will multiply, and next thing you know, all hell is unleashed on the structure of your website.
An organized website is a user-friendly and SEO-friendly website. Keep your website organized with blog tags and categories, a clear plan for the purpose of the site, and a plan for pages and subpages of the site. Keep your most important pages one, two, or three max subpages from the URL. For example:
mysite.com/important-page/twosubpages/threesubpages-lesser-important-content
Blog Categories (Topics)
Categories help your blog posts stay findable and relevant for both your users and Google. Categories also prevent your blog posts from competing with each other for the same keywords and allow your category pages to rank for more general terms.
You should evaluate your categories regularly, add subcategories and tags if needed, add pagination to your archive pages, and get rid of outdated content. (Here’s a good article from Yoast SEO on this topic).
A good blog structure will improve the usability and SEO of your blog and make your content last longer.
Same Site Different Purposes
One website can be used for a single purpose (to sell t-shirts) or for multiple purposes (t-shirt sales, online forum, showcase videos). Just make sure the organization matches the purposes.
mysite.com/shop/t-shirt/red-and-white
mysite.com/shop/t-shirt/black-striped
mysite.com/blog/videos/how-to-wash-cotton
mysite.com/blog/winter/best-tshirts-to-keep-you-warm
This website example represents a t-shirt company that is well-organized. Serving up a clear website structure for the blog, the shop, and any other aspects of their business.