A question about menu's

Hi all
I am in the process of tweaking one of my sites.

The menu is split into different categories.
for example:

blue widgets
blue widgets 1
blue widgets 2
blue widgets 3

red widgets
red widgets 2
red widgets 3
red widgets 4

Yellow widgets
Yellow widgets 2
Yellow widgets 3
Yellow widgets 4

Green widgets
Green widgets 2
Green widgets 3
Green widgets 4

etc etc

Now, for example, someone wanted to look at "Green Widgets 2" .......
they would scroll down the page and click on it.
Then, if they wanted to click on "Green widgets 3" they would again
have to scroll to get to that section.

Presently the menu is static throughout the site.

I was thinking is it a good idea to have the "Green widgets" section
at the top of the menu if they are on a "Green widgets" page ?

.......... and have the Yellow Widgets section at the top, if they are
on a Yellow Widgets page ..... and so on, and so on.

I think for SEO it would be good as the keywords will appear first for
the page. But for a users point of view. will it confuse them ?

any ideas please

Kind Regards
Paul


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Paul Burke <webmaster (AT) houstoncrafts (DOT) com> wrote in
news:b47p819r7plnmnbd7i5qmv2t2hcl4p7bih (AT) 4ax (DOT) com:

I think for SEO it would be good as the keywords will appear first for
the page. But for a users point of view. will it confuse them ?

I think there is a strong risk of that, if you move things about.

If you just want to do it for SEO, you could always move the menu in code
order, then put it back into the normal place with css.

However, if the menus are that long, it might aid usability and aid
relevance if you contracted all the menus apart from the section you are
on?

Like this:

red widgets

blue widgets

green widgets
green1
green2
green3
green4

purple widgets

It does mean you aren't spreading your link pop so evenly through the site,
but you are concentrating it on the main category pages instead, which
might even be a good thing. There is less link anchor text, but it might
be a bit more focussed?

Victoria
--
Clare Associates Ltd
http://www.clareassoc.co.uk/
--

On Thu, 19 May 2005 16:24:59 +0100, Victoria Clare
<victoria (AT) markpoles (DOT) org.uk> wrote:

Paul Burke <webmaster (AT) houstoncrafts (DOT) com> wrote in
news:b47p819r7plnmnbd7i5qmv2t2hcl4p7bih (AT) 4ax (DOT) com:


I think for SEO it would be good as the keywords will appear first for
the page. But for a users point of view. will it confuse them ?

Hello Victoria
Thank you for replying.

I think there is a strong risk of that, if you move things about.

I thought as much. Hence I have left it alone.

If you just want to do it for SEO, you could always move the menu in code
order, then put it back into the normal place with css.

However, if the menus are that long, it might aid usability and aid
relevance if you contracted all the menus apart from the section you are
on?

Like this:

red widgets

blue widgets

green widgets
green1
green2
green3
green4

purple widgets

It does mean you aren't spreading your link pop so evenly through the site,
but you are concentrating it on the main category pages instead, which
might even be a good thing. There is less link anchor text, but it might
be a bit more focussed?

I see what you are getting at, but these are already the main headers.
forget the widgets. They are like this

pearl necklaces
pearl earrings
pearl bracelets
pearl chokers

gemstone necklaces
gemstone earrings
gemstone bracelets
gemstone chokers

and so on.
The owners wanted it like this rather than have all earrings together
etc.

Thank you for you help. I shall leave it as it is.
Kind Regards
Paul

Victoria
--
Clare Associates Ltd
http://www.clareassoc.co.uk/

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