Create Pages for real or on the fly?

[Joss]

This is all about a site that will have a lot of pages, or might have, depending how I do it.

So:

I have a parent page with a long list of manufacturers. Each links to a page for that manufacturer. The pages have identical copy, except the name of the manufacturer is changed within the text. 

Each manufacturer page has a long list of products. Each links to a page for that product. The product pages have identical copy, except the name of the product is changed throughout.

At the bottom of each manufacturer and product page is a list of services that can be applied to each item. These link to the services page which is customised with the name of the manufacturer or product.

One way or another, there could be a lot of pages - I am guessing at around 1000.

Now, there are two ways to do this.

The hard way is to create actual page records in the back end of ProcessWire, possibly with default text taken from some central page and then using hanna code to replace key words with either manufacturer name or product name.

The other way is to do the pages on the fly using URL Segments to supply the name of the product or manufacturer.

There are certain advantages from my point of view to both - the second is one hell of a lot quicker for me to create, while the first allows me to override default text if that is needed (though, it possibly never will be).

This is really all about SEO in the end and is because lots of other companies in the same secteur are doing similar things and the client wants the same.

So, the question is:

Which is the better route?

Are there performance issues? (The client will be on a shared server - they are only little)

Are there management issues? (Though the client is not exactly tech savvy - he sees his entire world through his iphone, and not very efficiently)

Are there SEO issues (not with the copy, but with things like site maps, crawlers and so on)

I will probably use ProCache in the mix on this one.

I am just planning this out to code up in the next couple of days, and if anyone has any sage advice, I would be very grateful...

Joss

[diogo]

I would do the segments to keep it DRY.

In my opinion there are less management issues, since the data is in only one place.

I don't see any problem for SEO if you go this way, just create the site map accounting with those pages and for the crawlers the pages will be as real as with the other method.

I also can't think of a performance issue created by this, would probably be worse with Hanna code.

[Joss]

Thanks!

[Joss]

There is also a halfway house here, I suppose.

Since I have to list all the products by name anyway at some point (make a list), I could use the batch page creator to create actual pages for them. These would use the default text that is held centrally, unless it is overridden by filling in the equivalent field on the new page.

However, all the related service, which could be 10 or 15 per product and therefore the huge bulk of the pages, could be generated on the fly.

Really, PW is very good for this sort of mass, localised, SEO - maybe that is something that should be written up (including some howtos). Very useful for any developer!

Any serious SEO experts on here want to put together a list of tips that could go into a tutorial that I can then write up?

[DaveP]

What diogo said.

[Joss]

Dave, that's cheating!

[DaveP]

It's a safe bet, though! Joking apart, diogo's answer covered exactly the points that occurred to me as I was reading the original post.

My only concern would be the amount of duplicate content (which I know you excluded from the original question).

[Joss]

Yes, I am not sure what to do about duplicate content, though I will put enough bits in the text that get replaced by the product or manufacturer name so it is not completely identical.

In the end, the client simply cannot afford for me to write it all out manually.

I suppose, If I were clever, I would write out five alternative paras that are included by default and the page randomly picks one each time it loads.

Though, that may create complete confusion, and I have no idea where ProCache will feature in that situation....

Partly because of that I am going the halfway route - at least that will allow some overriding of text if needed.

[diogo]

You can also have a textarea field on the pages where you are holding the names. If there's some text there it would be used instead of the default.

[Joss]

Yep, that is what I am doing

I am doing that with all relevant fields including meta description so if needed they can be overridden.