I don’t really think it does, and personally, I would not do that. People like to know that it’s an HTML page that they’re hitting. If you have a directory, then sure, have the directory.
But, if you don’t have .html and if your web server is not configured correctly, then we’re making guesses; is it a PDF file, or is it a .exe, or is it a CFM etc, all the different types there are, trying to figure out what type of content it is.
If possible, I would just stick with the standard convention; have something htm or html, users understand that; they don’t get confused; they won’t be as cautious clicking on the result.
So, it doesn’t make that much difference in core ranking, but I think behaviorally, not making something that is rough edge that people get stuck on or worried about.
I would probably stick with having the extension, having .html or something like that.
Related posts:
- We are changing a fairly large HTML site to CMS. What are the essentials to keep in mind so that we do not lose our search rankings?
- Is there a way to benefit from content scraped from your site?
- How does Google calculate site load times in the data it exposes in Google’s Webmaster statistics? Is the calculation simply average time to get and receive the HTML content for a page?
- Is it good to put a ‘coming soon’ page for new domains? Google seems to prioritize new domains in SERPs. Will a ‘coming soon’ page stand as negative for it?
- What impact does “page bloat” have on Google rankings? Most of the winners in SEO seem to have very simple pages (very few images, HTML-only design), sometimes to the detriment to the user in a poorly designed page.
