Sitemaps good or bad

[alexo]

I have been experimenting with Google sitemaps for 3 months now and have seen my numbers go down since using the sitemaps. Also, my new pages have not been getting indexed by Google. These new pages were not being indexed before I started using Google sitemaps, this is the main reason that I started using Google sitemaps. Why are the sitemaps not helping me?

This brings me to my main question, Google sitemaps good or bad?

 

[Amnezia]

sitemaps only help to tell google where your pages are located. they do not help with the number of crawls or the indexing speed. quality in bound links will help with indexing, the higher pagerank you have the faster google indexes your pages.

 

[peter phillips]

Sitemaps are beneficial in situations when it is difficult for users to access all areas of a website through the browseable interface.

 

[Barrucadu]

Sitemaps are good, they provide links to every page on the site, so visitors dont have to go through lots of pages to get somewhere.

 

[alexo]

Sitemaps are good, they provide links to every page on the site, so visitors dont have to go through lots of pages to get somewhere.

check please first post: Google sitemaps (not website sitemaps)

don't think that G sitemap can be useful for users

 

[apexad]

I've noticed the same thing. Google Sitemaps seems good in theory, but all in all, I don't think they really effect indexing or search results.

 

[Millar]

Well, I was about to add one but I thought, no, because, you say when a page was last updated, now if you don't keep updating it saying the page is updated, maybe google won't reindex that page. I also thought, Google might not be so keen to search for links on my site, it might just use the sitemap, so if I dont add a page to it, it might not find it, even if you can locate it via the site.

 

[Amnezia]

Well, I was about to add one but I thought, no, because, you say when a page was last updated, now if you don't keep updating it saying the page is updated, maybe google won't reindex that page. I also thought, Google might not be so keen to search for links on my site, it might just use the sitemap, so if I dont add a page to it, it might not find it, even if you can locate it via the site.

that is why you dynamically generate your site map, so each time google visits it automatically shows the latest links and information.

 

[Ash]

I havnt seen much of a difference in using sitemaps but i guess it is better... and cant do any harm.

 

[apexad]

that is why you dynamically generate your site map, so each time google visits it automatically shows the latest links and information.

This is easy on wordpress blogs as plugins do it. I use it on apexad.net, but could you give any reccomendations on how to do it on a normal site? (dynamically creating sitemaps, that is)

 

[StudioWorks]

Well sitemaps are of course very good, google can locate your pages easier, however the sitemaps dont help your SERP's rankings or positions or pagerank or whatever. I have seen good results by using google sitemap's.

All the best,

SW

 

[majorkontrapelo]

guys, to follow-up the first query...what's the best sitemap generator for you and why?

 

[bluearrow]

Is there a way or a tool to dynamically creat sitemaps ? i mean update when pages added or removed.

 

[weblord]

for me i like a1 site mapper
http://www.micro-sys.dk/products/sitemap-generator/

Generate sitemaps for your website, be that HTML, ASP.Net or XML Google sitemaps. Rich template support for generating sitemaps and near-endless scanning options. The scanning engine stores vast amounts of data so that you can, among other things, view full report on broken and redirected links (wherefrom and whereto). This data is e.g. used when generating Google XML sitmaps (e.g. when defining priority). Bonus tools include an integrated FTP client. This allows you to FTP upload your sitemaps. It is possible to automate and control program through the command line. This means you can have a task scheduler (e.g. scripts or batch files) to launch program at given intervals. You can automate tasks such as scan website, build sitemap and FTP sitemap upload.

i like the deep crawling of folders in your directory and can generate .xml, or even .csv or .htm sitemap and also best specified for google sitemaps protocol.

guys, to follow-up the first query...what's the best sitemap generator for you and why?

 

[Yamynte]

I don't use sitemap, it cuts your pagerank in half and its a lot of time consuming to update everytime the sitemap especially if you've lots of sites. Not all sites have a sitemap so google must figure out a way to index all the sites even if the so called site doesnt have any sitemap (lots of sitemap words lol).

I like the tool suggested by weblord !

 

[Templatechicken]

google sitemaps is actually a lot of rubbish.
Your site should be crawled within 2 weeks after launch.

The 'service' google is providing just makes it easier for google to see what's on your pages...

In fact you're just helping google out, google's not really aiding you ...

cheers,

Marien

 

[UCmEbUtuJuStdOnTCaRE]

I consider sitemap page may boost the crawling speed and thus ranking effectiveness of documents at a website. They do influence the crawl speed and depth, giving your documents a better chance of receiving boosts for fresh content or timely, relevant content to a searcher's query. So for me, sitemap has a good points both for the user and computer expert as well.

 

[garpiya]

Sitemap is a great thing helping visitors to orient better on the site as well as SEs IMO.

 

[dynamiteweb]

If you use it properly, a sitemap is beneficial. Especially now that Google, Yahoo and MSN have initiated the standardized sitemap. It is intended to help the search engines accurately index all the pages on your site. It DOES affect the crawl rate. It does NOT cut your pagerank in half. It has no affect on PR.

 

[Puneet_Seo]

Sitemaps are important for ranking in se's and get indexed soon and also good for the visitors to find your website well.

Its easy to create one sitemap and no negative points from it so just go for it and have your sitemap online.


Puneet M