Case studies: URL parameters, in the logs

Case studies: URL parameters, in the logs

The parameter problem is invisible until you grep for it.

→ Distilled faceted-nav audit — counted Googlebot hits on every parameter combination; 'sort=' and 'color=' together generated 1.2M crawlable URLs from 8k products. The bot spent 64% of budget there.
Takeaway: parameters multiply; logs show the multiplication.

⭐ Pick of the week — Builtvisible canonical-vs-crawl study — proved Googlebot kept crawling parameterized URLs for months after canonicals were added, just at a declining rate. Logs quantified the decay curve.
Takeaway: canonicals suggest; they don't stop crawling overnight.

→ Google parameter-handling docs — current guidance after the old GSC tool retired.
Takeaway: robots.txt is now your main lever; logs verify it worked.