SEO: Create A Google Sitemap

Google rolled out their Sitemaps service last year, and if you haven't checked it out, you're missing something really cool. If referrals from organic search results are an important part of your online business, you need to use this service.

If you wonder why so many people think Google is really cool, take a look at what they give webmasters for free, and compare it to what you pay for with Yahoo's site match program. Google kicks butt. They've got developers working on making cool tools for webmasters. They've got employees writing blogs to help us do a better job with our sites. That rocks.

What do you get with Sitemaps? You get stats, you get your robots.txt file checked for free, you get to give Google a list of URLs from your web site. You can even set up a sitemap for your mobile device content. The stats alone are worth the minimal effort required.

Did I say minimal effort? Yes, I did. Google offers a sitemap generator script that requires the Python scripting language, installation on your web server, etc. but there are a lot of free and paid 3rd party sitemap tools available.

One that's very easy to use is the Autositemap service. You just include a tracking image on every page of your site, and they do the rest. With a well-designed site, this could be as simple as modifying one file. If it's harder than that, go yell at your webmaster or site designer, and tell 'em I said it was OK. The Autositemap service automagically creates a sitemap file for you as people browse your site.

How you can help me: I need a good PHP script that will let me create RSS feeds from several other feeds - an aggregator. Ideally, we would be able to pull in the RSS & Atom feeds we specify, remove some items, and edit the summary/description if we want to. Then spin it all out as RSS & Atom feeds. The result will be something cool that we can all use to make our SEO/SEM lives better.

New coaching group starts June 2, only 25 seats available so sign up soon. You get 2 group training sessions per month, for 3 months, with a full year's access to our private site with video recordings from our advanced SEO & SEM training classes. The price? Just $295 for 3 months. Participants can also purchase additional one-on-one consulting time at my lowest available rate. Click here for more information and to register.

Sorry for the recent absence all, I've been sick, and busy enough teaching classes. There may be a few extra posts over the next few days as I clear the backlog.