An XML Sitemap can be crucial for SEO. It is not the same thing as a site map, which is a web page showing the entire structure of a site, with the purpose of helping visitors find their way around. All the major search engine companies support and recommend the use of XML Sitemaps, as they enable search robots to crawl the whole of a site, making sure that every page is included. This is extremely useful as it makes a positive difference for search engine optimisation. XML Sitemaps are special files, listing all the URLS within a website. They are manually submitted to search engines to increase the chances of all a site's pages being crawled and indexed. The information they contain helps search robots to discover pages which might otherwise have been missed. There are a number of ways of creating a Sitemap and as the process is fairly complex, requiring some knowledge of coding, it is well worth hiring the services of a reputable SEO company to carry out the work. What are known as 'XML Sitemap generators' are available online. These can automatically generate a Sitemap file and in some cases may also submit the file to search engines. Alternatively, a basic text file can be produced which lists all the pages on a site. Sometimes there are a number of pages which have similar content. Here the Sitemap is extremely useful, as it can include information specifying which is the definitive version. This is a better option than leaving the search engines to choose which page to display in their search results, which can prove detrimental. Other data contained inside Sitemaps includes: when pages were last updated, and how often such updates have generally been carried out. This can affect how frequently search robots visit a particular site in the future. After they have been created, Sitemap files are always placed inside one of the high-level directories of a site, preferably the root folder. It is necessary to update them occasionally, when new pages are added to the site, and when a number of pages are removed for any reason. Each of the major search engines will require a Sitemap to be supplied, so each time there is an update a new file will have to be submitted to all of them. Although it might initially seem like they involve quite a lot of work, the benefits of Sitemaps are worth it, as their presence means search engines will be likely to crawl all the pages of a site and in the case of duplication will know exactly which page is the original version. It is generally thought that, when a website has taken the time to create an XML Sitemap and register it with a search engine company such as Google, this increases its apparent trustworthiness. What is definitely known is that including a Sitemap certainly seems to improve the search engine optimisation of a website. At SearchEngineOptimization.co.uk we can create an appropriate XML Sitemap for your website.
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