If you don’t follow a site hierarchy and don’t keep the files and pages under a tree structure for a common topic, your ranking can be affected.
Rank has a connection to hierarchy.
For example for our site we are dealing with a major topic called kerala.
This is a state in India. However the content for it is located in three different trees under one parent folder and structure. While this is not a huge problem as far as our site is concerned it may not be the case with others.
Keep common data under common folder tree.
We also have other content under this parent folder which has no relation to the keyword kerala. Hence we are not getting the affect of the combined data for the keyword kerala.
Hence site structure has an affect on search engine ranking. Affect may not be always very bad. However it is important to understand the presence of an affect.
Next: Static Linking
Quotable Quotes:
“Free advice costs nothing-
unless you act on it!”