Search Engines Agree on Single Sitemap FormatThe three largest search engine companies (Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft) have recently agreed to adopt the same xml sitemap format. A sitemap is a file that contains a list of all URLS on a website. Making a sitemap available on a given website ensures that the search engine knows the location of all files on that site. Although there is no guarantee every URL in a sitemap will be indexed by the search engines, it is certainly more likely.
For online retailers, this is significant for two reasons. Up until now, Yahoo has had a different sitemap format than Google. Merchants that wanted to submit sitemaps to both locations had to create to distinct files with different formats. Additionally, Microsoft has not had a sitemap concept in place. It has relied entirely on its spiders, which crawl the web by finding links on web pages.
Yahoo and Microsoft have agreed to use the existing Google sitemap format. This is convenient for merchants that already generate Google a sitemap. The file format for the sitemaps can be found at www.sitemap.org. Once you have created a sitemap and loaded it on your website, how do you let the search engines know about it? Follow these instructions:
Google
1. Sign into Google webmaster tools with your Google Account.
2. On the My Sites page, type the site URL in the "Add site" field. Make sure you type the entire URL, such as "http://www.YOURDOMAIN.com/".
3. Click "OK."
4. Click "verify your site".
5. Choose a verification method and either add a META tag or file to your site.
6. Once verified, click the "Sitemaps" tab.
7. Click the "Add a Sitemap Link".
8. Select "Add General Website Map".
9. Submit the sitemap URL (ie http://www.YOURDOMAIN.com/sitemap.xml).
Yahoo
1. Sign into Yahoo Site Explorer with your Yahoo Account.
2. Type the site URL and click the "Add My Site" button. Make sure you type the entire URL, such as "http://www.YOURDOMAIN.com/".
3. Click the "Authenticate" button in the Status Column for your site.
4. Download the authentication key and upload the file to the root directory of your website.
5. Once uploaded, click the "Ready to Authenticate" button. Yahoo will now authenticate your site. It may not happen instantaneously, so be patient.
6. Click the "Manage" button to the left of your URL.
7. Submit the sitemap URL (ie http://www.YOURDOMAIN.com/sitemap.xml).
Microsoft
Rumor has it that Microsoft is still testing their sitemap service internally. We will update this edition of the Nexus once it's available.
Using sitemaps is a good practice and it's great to see the big three agreeing on a common standard. Now, imagine if the shopping comparison engines also agreed on a common format.
