What is a Sitemap?
A sitemap, or site index, is a webpage that shows all the different pages the site possesses. If the site is huge, the sitemap may provide a general guide, not to each page, but to pages under certain subject headings. A lot of home pages for websites have a link to the page’s sitemap. When you look at the map, you’ll see a number of links that let you know where to find each type of page. The site index doesn’t have to be fancy. It you have a blog on music for instance, with lots of entries, you may have several pages with indices. A simple list could look like this: Home Page About This Site How To Contact us Post a Comment Contemporary Music Folk Music Classical Music Each of these listings are linked to their relevant pages. Your sitemap listing on Contemporary Music could then lead to an index page on all topics in this subject. It can be extremely helpful to have a sitemap when you have a lot of pages, since it allows people to more easily navigate your site. You can use the map
• In its simplest form, a sitemap can just be a simple plain text list of URLs from your website. It may also be written in a recognized syndication format such as OAI-PMH or RSS. For further information, see the Sitemaps Protocol: Other Sitemap formats • But most often it is written in XML – following the XML Sitemaps protocol – and can include the following additional information: • when each URL was last updated • how often each URL changes • how important each URL is in relation to other URLs on the site This additional information allows search engines to crawl websites more intelligently. See also the Sitemaps Protocol: Sitemaps XML format • You can create a sitemap either by hand, by customised routines, macros or programs or by using off-the-shelf sitemap generation software. A good Content Management System (CMS) should now be able to create XML sitemaps. If you are procuring a new CMS, check that it can – or make it a requirement! • Once uploaded to the website, search engine
A Sitemap is a simple data file that tells search engines about pages in a web site that can be reviewed by the search engine. A Sitemap is invisible to your site visitors but can help search engines do a better job of reviewing your site — which in turn can improve your chances of appearing in search results. Please note that a Sitemap does not guarantee inclusion in search engines or better rankings. Rather, it’s one way to help your site get indexed. If you’re using Site Solution or Store Editor, we’ll create and update a Sitemap for you, but with a little effort, you can create your own Sitemap using any tool you like. Learn how to create your own Sitemap.
