Yesterday I spoke on what exactly a sitemap is when it comes to your website and today I will go into detail on why exactly sitemap’s are truly needed. There are some things that websites do not necessarily need. A sitemap isn’t one. So the question is why exactly is a sitemap needed? A site map is not JUST for users but rather for search engine crawlers.
A crawler aka ‘bots’ if you didn’t know is something the search engines (Google / Yahoo / MSN / Ask / etc) send out on the web and…well, crawl your website. They look for relevant information – keywords / phrases and hundreds of other things. This is why SEO people are in demand (again, feel free to hit me up if you have any questions on it). These bots instead of going through every single page – which can be pretty long depending on the size – while having a sitemap will help speed along the process.
{click to enlarge}
So, why the big deal? Well, as seen to the left you are able to see if your website is ranking high on certain keywords/phrases as well if there are errors that might be found on the site. Google Webmaster allows An error could be something along the lines of a page that was published a year ago and you have deleted it since – it happens.
Why the black out outs?
The last thing I want to show off is one of my projects that is not 100% complete…plus, you never know the competition could be watching.
Nonetheless by being able to view this data it can gain new insights into not just those viewing your website but your customers.
Top Search Queries
How are people finding your site – did they search “niche product” or “product niche”? As simple as it would seem it opens up the doors between you and those finding your website.
Crawl Errors
Is there a problem with how bots are seeing your site? If so, this could be why your site isn’t getting indexed by them.
Links to your site
Whose linking to your site – which content is highly linkable. Helpful for updating your website.
Keywords
You have a niche on say knitting but your site’s keywords aren’t centered around yarn, stitching, and overall knitting. It’s time to change things…NOW!