Site Architecture Planner
Design an optimal site structure that improves crawlability, user experience, and search visibility.
Use This When
Articles, service pages, AEO/GEO content, interlinking, SERP-informed briefs.
Inputs Needed
URL, target keyword, audience, competitors, location, search intent, internal links, products/services.
Expected Output
SEO brief or content draft with search intent, outline, on-page elements, internal links, FAQ, schema suggestions.
The Workflow Prompt
You are a technical SEO strategist and editorial content lead. Objective: Site Architecture Planner Context: Design an optimal site structure that improves crawlability, user experience, and search visibility. Original task: You are a world-renowned site architecture strategist who has reorganized websites with 1M+ pages, resulting in 40-60% traffic increases through structure optimization alone. Your expertise spans information architecture, URL structure optimization, crawl budget efficiency, link equity distribution, and user experience architecture. You understand how site structure directly impacts rankings, crawl efficiency, and internal linking power flow.Design an optimal site architecture for [YOUR_DOMAIN/NEW_PROJECT]. Deliver:1. **Current State Audit**: Map existing site structure, page hierarchy, and URL organization; identify structural bottlenecks2. **Information Architecture Design**: Create a user-centered IA that aligns with user intent, content clusters, and keyword relationships3. **URL Structure Optimization**: Design semantic, hierarchical URL structure that reflects content importance and logical organization4. **Breadcrumb Strategy**: Plan breadcrumb implementation that improves UX and distributes link equity efficiently5. **Category Page Strategy**: Identify optimal category/pillar structure; determine appropriate number of hierarchy levels6. **Siloing Strategy**: Create thematic siloing approach where related content links internally to concentrate topical authority7. **Crawl Budget Optimization**: Identify pages wasting crawl budget; recommend removal, noindexing, or reorganization8. **Link Equity Flow Analysis**: Map how link equity flows through the site; recommend internal linking changes to strengthen priority pages9. **Subdomain vs. Subfolder Strategy**: Assess when to use subdomains vs. subfolders for different content categories10. **Pagination & Faceted Navigation**: Design pagination strategy for large content sets that avoids duplicate content issues11. **Implementation Roadmap**: Create phased implementation plan minimizing negative SEO impact of URL changes Inputs I may provide: URL, target keyword, audience, competitors, location, search intent, internal links, products/services. Operating instructions: - First, restate the objective in one clear sentence. - If critical information is missing, ask up to 5 focused questions. If there is enough information to proceed, make practical assumptions and label them. - Use a Detailed response style. - Be specific to the business, audience, channel, and constraints provided. - Avoid generic AI advice. Give concrete recommendations, examples, templates, copy, or steps I can use. - When current facts, competitors, laws, prices, policies, or market claims matter, use current research and cite sources. - Do not expose hidden chain-of-thought. Provide a concise rationale or decision summary instead. - End with a short QA checklist that helps me verify the output. Required output: SEO brief or content draft with search intent, outline, on-page elements, internal links, FAQ, schema suggestions. Caution: Use live web research or source documents before finalizing claims.
QA Follow-Up Checklist
After the AI returns its output, verify against:
- Output is specific to the provided business/context.
- Assumptions are clearly labeled.
- No unsupported claims without source checks.
- Next actions are clear and usable.
- Search intent, internal links, FAQ, and on-page elements are included.
Follow-Up Prompt
Now turn the result for 'Site Architecture Planner' into a client-ready version: tighten wording, remove fluff, add missing assumptions, and provide the next 3 actions.
Avoid / Cautions
Use live web research or source documents before finalizing claims.
How Different Verticals Use This Workflow
Restaurant & Hospitality
A 12-location chain with a flat URL structure (every location at /location-name) outgrowing it runs the prompt with their growth plan + service queries. Output: a /locations/[city]/[neighborhood]/ hierarchy enabling city-level pages to capture broader queries while individual location pages stay sharp. Migration plan is phased over 6 weeks with redirect mapping.
Retail & E-commerce
A growing apparel brand with category pages organized by season runs the prompt. Output: shifts to a /shop/[category]/[subcategory]/ structure (with season as a filter, not a folder), enabling permanent category pages that accumulate authority. Old seasonal pages 301 to the new evergreen structure; organic category traffic lifts 60% in 5 months.
Professional Services & B2B
A consulting firm with services scattered across /what-we-do/, /services/, and /capabilities/ runs the prompt. Output: consolidates to /services/[practice-area]/[specific-service]/ with industry pages cross-linking. Migration cleans 40 duplicate/thin pages and structures the remaining 30 around commercial intents. Lead form fills lift 22%.
Beauty & Personal Care
A multi-service spa with services, packages, and memberships in tangled URLs runs the prompt. Output: /services/[treatment-type]/ for evergreen pages, /packages/ for bundles, /membership/ as a single conversion page. Eliminates 12 thin URLs that competed with main service pages; consult bookings from organic rise 35%.
Local & Trade Services
A roofing company with 8 service pages and 12 city pages all at root level runs the prompt. Output: /services/[service-name]/, /service-areas/[city]/, with each city page linking to all services and each service page linking to all cities. Internal linking lift + crawl efficiency moves 80% of city+service combos from page 3 to page 1 within 90 days.
Frequently Asked
When should I actually re-architect a site vs leave it alone?
Re-architect when content has grown past what your IA was designed for (typical break point: 200+ pages on a site built for 50), when you can't add new content without forcing it into a wrong category, or when GSC shows important pages buried 4+ clicks from homepage. Don't re-architect because it 'feels messy' — every URL change is a SEO risk and the gains have to outweigh the redirect debt.
What inputs actually matter for the model to produce a useful IA?
Your existing URL structure, your top 50 commercial intents (the queries you want to win), and your business model (services? products? content?). Without the commercial intents, the model designs a beautiful IA optimized for nothing. Without the business model, it defaults to a SaaS structure regardless of what you do. The 5-minute prep is what separates useful output from a wireframe template.
How do I migrate to the new architecture without nuking my rankings?
Three rules: 1) Map every old URL to a new URL with a 301 before you ship (no exceptions). 2) Migrate in phases — never the whole site at once. Start with a low-traffic section, monitor 2 weeks, then expand. 3) Update internal links to the new URLs before redirecting; don't rely on the 301s to do that work. Sites that lose 40% of traffic on migrations skip step 3.
Subdomain vs subfolder — what's the actual call in 2026?
Subfolder for almost everything that shares brand and intent. Subdomain for technical or business reasons: completely separate product line, regional version with different infra, or a help center hosted on a third-party platform. Google has gotten better at attributing subdomain authority to root but it's still imperfect. If you want consolidated SEO equity, subfolder. If you have a real technical reason, subdomain.