27 Oct How to Create an SEO Sitemap on Blogger and WordPress
What is a Sitemap?
A sitemap is actually a page that becomes a blueprint or map that contains all the content on a site. As stated earlier, these pages are used by the algorithm to identify which pages within the site should be crawled and which should not.
Not all websites want all the pages in them to be crawled and appear on the Google search page. For example, online store website owners certainly don’t want their payment page to be crawled so that it can appear when internet users are browsing certain keywords.
Therefore, this sitemap page was created to make it easier for search engines to know which pages are important and which pages are not.
If explained simply, this sitemap is like a table of contents for a website.
As internet users who only enjoy content from a site, it is very rare that we need to enter the sitemap page. That’s why not many lay people know of a page like this.
Sitemap Types
There are 4 types of sitemaps that are most widely used, namely:
- XML Sitemap
- Sitemap Videos
- News Sitemap
- Image Sitemap
These four types have more or less the same function, namely so that search engines can know which content they want to crawl. But they all work differently.
For more details, the following is an explanation of each type of sitemap.
- XML Sitemap
XML Sitemap is the type most widely used by all types of sites, both from domestic and foreign sites.
As the name implies, this page is created using XML (Extensible Markup Language). With this code, a sitemap can be generated automatically, and immediately separated according to the tags or categories of each content.
A sitemap created using XML will display links from every content on the website. You can also create visually appealing designs using XML. But most website owners just make a minimalist design so that this page is crawled faster.
- Video Sitemap
As the name suggests, a video sitemap is a special page created by a website with the main content in the form of a video. That way, Google can identify what kind of content they create and display it in custom search results.
Some of you may be aware that on the Google search page, you can filter the search results for videos only. Well, this is the function of the video sitemap.
Using this type of page, content from your site can appear in the search page for that video. So that the search results are optimized especially for internet users who only want to watch videos.
- News Sitemap
News sitemap aka news sitemap also has a similar way of working with a video sitemap. The difference is that if you use this type of page, content from your site will appear on the news page in Google searches.
So that visitors who come to the website are more than people who really want to read the latest or hottest news, not people who want to read articles about tutorials or certain topics.
News sitemap is definitely used by news websites. But to appear on Google news pages, you don’t have to have a well-known news website and take care of all the formal documents as a medium. As long as the news is factual and everything written can be accounted for, then any website can enter Google’s news page using the news sitemap.
- Image Sitemap
And the last is the image sitemap for websites with the main content in the form of images. You all know that there is a special page called Google Image that only displays images.
Using the XML sitemap is actually enough to appear on the page. But if your site has the majority of content in the form of images, such as Pinterest or Pixiv, then you need an image sitemap to make the most of it.
Google has special content that explains how to create and maximize a sitemap image for websites whose content is in the form of images. In addition, they also explain what kind of image content will not be crawlable to Google Image, one of which is an image uploaded using Javascript code.
What’s the Use of a Sitemap?
As mentioned earlier, sitemaps are used by search engines to index the pages or content that you create. Therefore, with this small element, websites that have thousands of pages such as online store websites, or websites that do not have many external backlinks such as new websites will be very helpful.
This is because one of the fastest ways for search engines to index a page is if the page’s link is listed on another page that has already been crawled.
So if you have an online store website with thousands of pages in it, only pages with internal links can be indexed by search engines.
Meanwhile, if you have a new website, only pages whose links have been listed on other pages will be indexed.
Apart from that, Google will have trouble indexing your website pages. This means that the content cannot be found by internet users and no visitors come.
That’s why you need a sitemap, a page that contains links from all pages on the website.
When the sitemap page has been submitted and crawled by search engines, then all the pages in it will be indexed. So you don’t need to submit each content one by one to Google Webmaster and so on.
How to Create a Website Sitemap?
After knowing what the types and functions are, now we will learn how to make them. But this time, what will be explained is only how to create an XML sitemap.
To make it easier, the tutorial will be divided into 2, namely for WordPress and Blogger users.
How to Create a WordPress XML Sitemap
How to create an XML sitemap in WordPress is very easy, because there is already a plugin that can create it automatically. In this tutorial, the plugin that will be used is Yoast SEO. But you can also use other plugins like All in One SEO, Rank math or Google XML Plugin.
So to make it, please follow the steps below.
- Install Yoast SEO like installing a normal plugin and activate it
- Then enter the General menu and continue to Features
- Scroll down until you see the XML Sitemaps feature
- Change the feature to On
- Click Save Changes
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