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Before we begin - What is a Sitemap?
Google first introduced Sitemaps in June 2005 so web publishers could publish lists of links from their sites. Shortly afterward, MSN and Yahoo announced joint support for the Sitemaps protocol along with Google. Sitemaps are now everywhere on the net, not just on the corporate business site.
So, a Sitemap is an XML file that lists all the URLs of your website with additional metadata about each URL. It is useful for every site (or blog) to have a sitemap because it is an easy way to keep the search engines informed on when a page was last updated, how often it is updated, and how important it is in relation to the other URLs of your site.
What are the Benefits of a Sitemap?
1. Sitemaps make your site more search engine friendly.
The more friendly your site is to the search engines, the more visible your site becomes. When you create new content, the search engine crawlers (also known as “spiders”) can discover that content more rapidly through the use of a sitemap.
2. Sitemaps help make your bandwidth usage more efficient.
When new content is created, search engines can find it more rapidly with a Sitemap and avoid having to crawl unchanged pages. This is especially useful for large sites with dynamic content. Search engine spiders will be able to quickly discover what is new and what hasn’t changed without scanning thousands of pages.
3. Help index large sites.
For sites that have a large archive or a database of resources, it is sometimes very difficult to return quality search results for deep pages. If your pages are not well linked to one another, or your site uses AJAX or Flash that is not visible to the search engines, a Sitemap will help the search engines find the content.
4. Find new sites sooner.
If your site is new and has few links to it, submitting a Sitemap will help the search engines discover it faster.
Please note that submitting and/or using a Sitemap does not guarantee inclusion in any search engine, it is just a way to help the web crawlers find all your site pages.
But - this is only the beginning. What types of tools, process can you use - if you decide to utilize these options?
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