A website hierarchy is the way your pages are arranged from the most general to the most specific: the homepage at the top, main sections under it, and detail pages under those. It decides what goes in your menu, what your URLs look like, and how easily visitors and search engines find each page.
The three levels most sites need
- Level 1, the homepage: says what you do, for whom and where, and links to every main section.
- Level 2, main sections: the pages in your top menu, such as Services, About, Pricing, Blog and Contact.
- Level 3, detail pages: one page per service, product, location or article, each linked from its section page.
Pro Tip
A good rule of thumb: any page should be reachable in three clicks or fewer from the homepage. If something important is buried deeper, move it up a level.
Hierarchical website structure examples
A local service business (for example a plumber): Home > Services > Drain cleaning, Water heaters, Repiping; Home > Service areas > one page per town; Home > About; Home > Contact.
An online store: Home > Shop > Categories (for example Dresses, Accessories) > Product pages; Home > About; Home > Shipping and returns; Home > Contact.
A blog or content site: Home > Blog > Topic categories > Articles; Home > About; Home > Newsletter. Each article links back to its category and to related articles.
Inside each page: sections and content
The hierarchy continues inside every page. A page is a stack of sections (a hero, a services list, reviews, a contact form), and each section holds content such as headings, text, images and buttons. On the page itself, use one H1 for the page title, H2s for each section and H3s for items inside a section, so the heading order mirrors the structure.
How to plan your website hierarchy
- List every page you need on paper or in a spreadsheet before you build.
- Group them under 4 to 7 main sections. Those become your menu.
- Give each page one job and one main search phrase, so two pages never compete for the same search.
- Match URLs to the hierarchy, for example /services/drain-cleaning under /services.
- Link down from each section page to its detail pages, and back up with breadcrumbs or a clear menu.
Building it on We.Inc
Describe your pages when you start, for example "a plumber website with a services page, a page for each service, a service areas page and a contact page", and the AI builds that structure on a paid plan (from Starter at $20 a month). On the free plan you can start from a template, which already has its pages and sections laid out, and publish up to 3 template sites on a we.inc address. Either way you can then edit any section by clicking it in the preview.
Important
Changing a page URL after the site is live can break links people have saved. Plan the hierarchy first, and if you must move a page later, redirect the old address to the new one.