Feb

Google Sitemaps Just Got Better

admin

Having a Google Sitemap just got better! Not only does the
search engine company check your sitemap, but now they give you
feedback! The new feature was quickly noticed by many users of
the service recently as a way for Google to alert the webmaster
about possible problem pages that they have had trouble
indexing.

I had the wonderful experience of getting to know this service
first hand when I logged in to Google Sitemaps to check on the
status of one of my many sitemaps. Along side of the address for
the sitemap, there was a link with the anchor text “verify”.
This helps Google to know that you are the actual webmaster for
that site and is a wonderful addition for security.

Once you are verified (which is a simple process of creating a
page on your root directory that they will see) you are able to
see the stats for the site index. Often times, you won’t see
anything in the stats area, but if you have recently updated,
redesigned, or deleted certain pages that Google has in its
index, you have a good chance of seeing something there. Google
will tell you about possible errors in the indexing process such
as pages that are not showing, or pages that they can’t see.

You might already be familiar with the new Google Sitemap
Program, but if you aren’t here’s a quick synopsis. The Sitemaps
program is a new offering from the Google family and is
currently in beta testing.

The goal of the program is to allow Google to see the complete
sitemap or a sitemap of frequently changing pages. This is
extremely helpful if you have links that can’t be reached by the
Googlebot when it’s indexing your page due to things like Java
script menus and such. The codes on a page that prevent the bot
from viewing your site ultimately hinder you in the search
engines.

So using the XML standard coding language, which is easy to
understand once you get the hang of it, you create a log of the
various pages on your site and tell Google some attributes about
it such as the overall priority of the page, how frequently you
alter the content, when the page was updated last, and of course
its location.

This will give Google the overall picture of the layout of your
site and does help in getting the pages indexed for greater
relevancy. There are protocols for the creation of the sitemap
so it’s best to read all the information completely at the
Google Sitemaps website at http://www.google.com/webmasters/ .