Sitemap

Search engine spiders can also quickly find and index every single page of our site in the least amount of time. The SEO benefits of using a sitemap far considerable and should not be ignored.

There are some rules to creating an effective sitemap that you need to follow:

Our sitemap must only be linked to from our homepage and no other page. Why? We want the search engine spiders to find this link directly from our homepage and follow it from there. Our sitemap MUST NOT be linked to from every other page of our site. Also from a Google PageRank point of view only linking to our sitemap from our homepage can also "funnel" PR quickly to pages all over our site.

We have large website of 50 pages or more limit the number of pages listed on our sitemap to a maximum of 30. This is to prevent our sitemap from being misinterpreted as a link farm by the search engines.

How should we structure our sitemap?

The following tips must be adhered to in order for our site to gain the maximum possible benefit from having a sitemap.

1. The title of each sitemap link should be keyword rich and link directly back to the original page.

2. Include 10 - 20 words of text from the original page of content underneath the relevant sitemap link. This creates more content for search engine spiders and human visitors can see exactly what each page is about in advance of clicking.

3. Ensure that the look and feel of our sitemap page is consistent with the rest of our site. Use the same basic HTML template we used for every other page of our site.

Regards
Kerri Case