I always create an html site map for every site I build. It helps search engines index all the pages of your site. This is especially important if your home page does not contain a lot of text ie has a flash introduction, includes many images, uses javascript or is a
database-driven site.
The search engine spider will find all the other pages of your site (besides the home page) by following the links that link from the html site map link on the home page.
The Google XML Site Map
This sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with additional metadata about each URL:
* when it was last updated
* how often it usually changes
* how important it is, relative to other URLs in the site
This site map also makes it easier for the search engine spiders to index all the pages in your site. You can submit the Google site map by creating a Google Site Map account.
The New Site Map Protocol
The four big search engines Google, Yahoo, Live/MSN and Ask can now automatically index your Sitemaps file if you add a link to your Sitemaps file in your robots.txt file.
These major search engines will regularly check the robots.txt of your website.
How to create the new Site Map Protocol
You first need to create your XML site map then add this file to the robots.txt file.
How to create your XML site map
1. Go to http://www.sitemapspal.com (a free online xml site map generator) and enter your site’s
address.
2. Copy the code that it generates for your site and paste it into notepad.
3. Save the text file as sitemap.xml
4. Create your robots.txt file.
This file is called robots.txt because and it tells the search engine spider, which web pages of your site should be indexed and which
should be ignored.
The robots.txt file is a simple text file (no HTML), that must be placed in your root directory, for example:
http://www.yourwebsite.com/robots.txt
5. Add the following line to your robots.txt file:
Sitemap: http:/www.yoursite.com/sitemap.xml
6. Upload this file to the root directory (same place as
your home page) of your web server.
7. Inform Google and Yahoo about your Sitemap file
You will need to create Google and Yahoo Site Map accounts if you want to add the XML site map to them as well.
This is not possible with Live/MSN and Ask.
Conclusion
The new Sitemap protocol does not guarantee your web pages will be included in the search engines, but helps web crawlers do a better job of crawling your site. It will not help your site attain higher search engine rankings.
If you wish to improve your search engine rankings concentrate on adding quality content and getting lots of high quality inbound links that are related to your site.
Resources
More information about the new sitemaps standard can be found on the official sitemaps web site.
Thanks for the tips
Thanks for the feedback.
Be sure to return for more tips I add every week.