• Understanding The Difference Between an XML and an HTML Sitemap  •
• And … What Pupose Do They Serve? •

I’ve previously posted about how my friend’s mini-site was holding a top-ten Google ranking within 24-hrs after I submitted an XML sitemap to Google. That situation just proved to me once again that an XML sitemap can be a real benefit to help kick-start the Google spiders to come and visit. Now of course the ranking position was the result of my keyword research and SEO optimization I performed on her pages. She could have been #100. The point I am making is that the XML sitemap got her spidered and indexed quickly.

Anyway let me get back to discussing XML versus HTML sitemaps and the differences between the two. As a website owner, you should understand what they are, and that each one serves a very different purpose for your site.

HTML Sitemaps

An HTML Sitemap is normally a contextual hyperlink listing of the information architecture of your website. In other words, it is a listing of every page found on your site, composed of clickable links that point to every page on your site.

Most people use the Title tag for the hyperlink listing of each page. In addition, some people make theirs more like an index in a book (an A-Z listing); other people may set theirs up with brief explanations after each page listing. I kind of fall inbetween, in that I try to alphabetize the listings since it helps keep a clean format, but I also come up with creative one-line explanations that may not necessarily be the exact page title.

Let me stress that I adhere to sound SEO principles in that I utilize the keyword phrase of each page in my listings. To see what I am talking about, take a look at the sitemap I put together on my SEO consulting website: SEO-Innovation.com Sitemap

An HTML sitemap certainly helps facilitate the navigation process for the visitors to your website. Although an HTML sitemap enhances the user-friendliness of your site, it also helps the spiders that come crawling to index your site. The HTML sitemap really is like a roadmap of your entire site that you’ve kindly stuck under their noses.

Don’t ignore the effectiveness of placing a sitemap on your site. Not only does it help a bit in your rankings by providing internal cross-linking of your site, but it also helps your visitor find a page they can’t find via your navagation links, etc. and again helps the spiders know about every page on your site.

Be aware that 100 hyperlinks is the maximum for a webpage, so if you have a 300 page site, then at a minimum you’d have a three page sitemap. If it was me … I’d break it into at least 5 pages, making it easier for the human visitor and I think that an alphabetical listing would really be important, again to facilitate your visitor sifting through everything to find the page they were looking for.

XML Sitemaps

XML sitemaps are used to faciliate the indexing process of your website.  At this time, only Google and Yahoo! allow a unique XML file to be placed in your site’s directory to help with their indexing. Each search engine has instructions as to how to generate the uniquely named file, where to place it, and then how to notify them that you have carried out the procedure.

To learn more about XML sitemaps and how to go about making an XML file and submitting to Google, Yahoo and MSN, please refer to my post: Submitting XML Sitemaps

Understand this important point: Having an XML Sitemap for your site will not guarantee that your web pages will be indexed in search engines (showing up in the SERPs); nor will an XML sitemap cause a higher ranking of your pages in the search engines.

In addition, I must stress that an XML sitemap DOES NOT TAKE THE PLACE of a proper SEO-friendly site structure! If your site suffers from horrible coding issues; bad information architecture; lack of keyword focused content; or any other umpteen possible negatives … don’t keep your fingers crossed that an XML sitemap, or even an HTML sitemap, will somehow “fix” things.  Because they won’t.

I Optimized A Friend’s New Mini-Site and 24-Hrs Later …
She Had A Top Ten Ranking In Google For Her Main Keyword Phrase!

You know it sure can be gratifying to see the fruits of my SEO labor almost instantly rewarded. I’m like most everyone else … we want it “now”.  No matter what it is in life. And seeing rankings zoom into the top ten literally overnight is a pretty cool thing.

I’m quite accustomed to seeing dramatic rankings results within a week or two after I perform my search engine optimization “magic” on clients’ sites, but every now and then, I get a nice surprise and find that high rankings have been achieved within a day or two.

So what caused this quick recognition from Google? First, it was proper attention to the basic SEO details: keyword focused quality content; keyword focused Title tags and Description Meta tags; my expertise … AND … I submitted an XML sitemap to Google to get the brand new website spidered immediately.

What is an XML sitemap? Briefly, an XML sitemap is a file that lists the URLs available on a site. The aim is to help site owners notify search engines about the URLs on a website that are available for indexing. The sitemap lets the spiders know what is available on a website. Google paved the way with utilizing this XML protocol, and now Yahoo and Ask also accept XML sitemaps. There are a number of things you have to understand about this subject, and I will be discussing sitemaps in another post. This post is not intended to teach you all the ins and outs.

So, by “manually” loading an XML sitemap into the root directory of my friend’s new mini-site, and then going into her Google Webmaster account to fill out the information that says “yes … a sitemap has been uploaded into this website’s root directory”, I alerted the Google spiders that it was time to come and visit her website.

Now, there is a lot of talk amongst SEO professionals as to the need for, use of or value of submitting an XML sitemap. However, I am of the feeling that at least in the very beginning stage(s) of lauching a new website or blog, that an XML sitemap is of value. Why wouldn’t it be? It instantly alerts Google that you’re ready to be spidered. You don’t have to sit there, wondering when the spiders are going to come crawling your way.

In addition, in instances like what happened within 24-hours to my friend’s site, it PROVES to me the value of submitting a sitemap to Google (or the other search engines that allow the same).

So, if you have a brand new site, I would suggest you submit an XML sitemap to help move things along and to let the spiders know you want them to come and visit for awhile.  Plus you never know, you might be in a position like my friend that you will be able to quickly grab a great ranking position.  (Of course ranking positions depend upon the niche, the competition, and all that other ’stuff’ we have to take into consideration.)

To learn more about Google’s requirements and what you need to do, go to Google’s Webmaster Tools Home Page, login to your account and look for the Sitemap information section. (Sorry but for some reason my Wordpress template is blowing out an https link otherwise I’d have taken you right to the section you need to read.)

• Passwords & Logins Were Overtaking My Mind! •
• This Free Password Software Saves Everything For You & More! •

Ok … I admit it. I am antiquated in some of the things I do when running my online marketing and SEO consulting businesses. I tend to be hesitant to buy this or that “next great” piece of software that claims it will make my life easier. Yup, I am a skeptical person by nature.

But I bet you are like me (or you will soon be) if you are pursuing a career in online marketing, especially if you are adding affiliate marketing into the mix. Is your brain getting so full of passwords and logins that you are starting to forget them? My brain sure was! Do you have a dog-eared handwritten list of all the logins that you’ve had for years and years?? I do!

Yes, I was using the favorites/bookmarks feature to keep track of the sites and URL’s that I constantly visited, so that system worked OK for me. And as I mentioned, my trusty handwritten list helped me out when I couldn’t remember the logins.

• But One Day I Caused A Stupid Computer Mishap •

It is said there is a first time for everything and OH YEAH! That sure applied to what I did in December 2007. Let’s just leave my mishap to me being somewhat “computer technically challenged”, OK? Well, I caused a complete LOSS of all my archived Outlook emails and addresses, and all my bookmarks. Yes, yes … stupid, stupid … why hadn’t I backed up everything like I was supposed to?

Side note: I’m not THAT bad … I did have everything else protected in a separate hard-drive from my C-drive.

So there I was … I had so much lost information that it wasn’t funny. My tech-savvy biz-partner Damian said, “Claudia, you have got to use a password manager!” He was right, it was time to get streamlined as far as passwords and login management was concerned. He recommended RoboForm.  So, I gave the free download a try.

I LOVE this password manager! Honestly. I’m not one for buying lots of software gizmos for my computer, but after I tried the free RoboForm download for just one hour (really – I am not kidding), I was absolutely convinced to purchase the very affordable full version. But I’m not trying to sell you.  Test it for yourself. See if what I’m telling you is true.

It’s GREAT! I don’t have to try and remember my passwords and logins anymore.  I don’t even need to remember website URL’s either. I find the website name in the RoboForm interface and with one click it not only takes me to the correct website, but it also automatically fills in the correct login and password and bingo!  I’m inside the website within seconds. 

It also functions as a kind of self contained filing system for everything that requires a login and password, which is of course almost all of my internet marketing sites, my banking and bill payment sites, etc.

So, I’ve streamlined a part of my online marketing business with a nifty little password manager piece of software. And I purchased an external hard-drive to help me really protect everything else stored on my computer. This old Dell desktop is on it’s last legs, but that’s a post for another time.