Sitemap: What is Sitemap? Advantage of Sitemap.

Sitemap: What is Sitemap?


*** A hierarchical list of web pages that belong to a site. HTML versions are typically part of a site’s navigation structure for human use. XML sitemaps are used to communicate a site’s structure directly to crawlers.

http://seo-keyword-consultant.com/glossary.html

*** A site map (or sitemap) is a list of pages of a web site accessible to crawlers or users. It can be either a document in any form used as a planning tool for web design, or a web page that lists the pages on a web site, typically organized in hierarchical fashion. This helps visitors and search engine bots find pages on the site.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitemap

*** The Sitemaps protocol allows a webmaster to inform search engines about URLs on a website that are available for crawling. A Sitemap is an XML file that lists the URLs for a site. It allows webmasters to include additional information about each URL: when it was last updated, how often it changes, and how important it is in relation to other URLs in the site. This allows search engines to crawl the site more intelligently. Sitemaps are a URL inclusion protocol and complement robots.txt, a URL exclusion protocol.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitemaps

*** A page which contains an organized listing of links to all pages within the website. Having a well structured sitemap will help a search engine spider and index the pages.

http://www.legalinternetmarketing.com/seo-glossary.html

*** A sitemap is a document detailing the various pages on a website and how they link to each other. This helps both visitors find pages and search engines to index a site.

http://www.omega2webdesign.com/glossaryofterms.html

Why a Sitemap/ Advantage of Sitemap?

Besides being economical, a sitemap serves two highly functional SEO objectives. A well-designed sitemap allows for search engines to easily locate and index all relevant pages of a website and allows for keyword reinforcement of pages through the use of descriptive linking text.

A good sitemap will include many of the same features one might see on any keenly optimized Web page. For example, clean, uncomplicated coding is ideal. Keep any Java or CSS in external files and keep tables simple, if existent at all - CSS can and should replace tables when possible. Also, using Meta, Title, and Robot Tags will provide direction and clues to help search engines index and rank a page. Most important, however, is the use of text links.

http://articles.directorym.com/The_SEO_Advantage_of_a_Sitemap-a862242.html

The Importance of a Sitemap:

A sitemap is often considered redundant in the process of building a website, and that is indeed the fact if you made a sitemap for the sake of having one. By highlighting the importance of having a well constructed sitemap, you will be able to tailor your own sitemap to suit your own needs.


1) Navigation purposes

A sitemap literally acts as a map of your site. If your visitors browses your site and gets lost between the thousands of pages on your site, they can always refer to your sitemap to see where they are, and navigate through your pages with the utmost ease.

2) Conveying your site's theme

When your visitors load up your sitemap, they will get the gist of your site within a very short amount of time. There is no need to get the "big picture" of your site by reading through each page, and by doing that you will be saving your visitors' time.

3) Site optimization purposes

When you create a sitemap, you are actually creating a single page which contains links to every single page on your site. Imagine what happens when search engine robots hit this page -- they will follow the links on the sitemap and naturally every single page of your site gets indexed by search engines! It is also for this purpose that a link to the sitemap has to be placed prominently on the front page of your website.

4) Organization and relevance

A sitemap enables you to have a complete bird's eye view of your site structure, and whenever you need to add new content or new sections, you will be able to take the existing hierarchy into consideration just by glancing at the sitemap. As a result, you will have a perfectly organized site with everything sorted according to their relevance.

http://www.newbedfordinternet.com/articles/2/1/Why-a-web-site-map-is-important/Page1.html

List of Some Free Sitemap Generator Tools/Sites:


www.freesitemapgenerator.com


www.sitemapxml.net


www.sitemaps-builder.com


www.sitemap-generator.net


www.sitemapbuilder.net


http://www.sitemapdoc.com


www.xml-sitemaps.com


http://xmlsitemap.com


www.g-sitemap-generator.com/en


www.auditmypc.com/free-sitemap-generator.asp


http://code.google.com/p/sitemap-generators/wiki/SitemapGenerators


https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/.../sitemap-generator.html


http://www.rorweb.com/rormap.htm


http://www.brighthub.com/internet/web-development/articles/98627.aspx


http://forums.seo.com/showthread.php?5677-15-Free-XML-Sitemap-Generator-Tools


www.sitemapwidget.com


www.xml-sitemaps.com/standalone-google-sitemap-generator.html


http://www.freesitemapgenerator.com/quick-sitemap.html


www.freesitemapgenerator.com/quick-sitemap.html


For More about Sitemap Visit:


http://www.etechbuzz.com/sitemap-file-for-faster-crawling-and-indexing-of-site


http://www.etechbuzz.com/sitemap-file-for-faster-crawling-and-indexing-of-site