What are XML site maps and how to get your website indexed quickly
If you’re new to SEO you probably won’t understand or even know that XML site maps exist, but believe me these files are essential to your success online. The internet exists of millions, probably even billions, of websites and in order for your website to be displayed by a search engine it needs to be indexed. The most popular search engines out there are first and foremost Google with Bing following slightly behind, Yahoo, Yandex (Russian) and the some other lessor known ones.
I’m no expert programmer so I don’t understand every little part of Google’s algorithm and XML site maps. However I do know that an XML site map is essentially a list of all the URL’s in your website. Google started implementing site maps as early as 2005 and today once logged into your Google Webmaster Tools section you can add your sitemap link so that Google’s bots will crawl your website easier and help it get indexed in the search engine quicker. Bing also has a webmaster tool section where you can add you site map. Most WordPress SEO plugins create an XML site map for your website automatically so I’m not going to go into detail about that.
Simply adding your sitemap to your webmaster tools section won’t guarantee that your website gets indexed in mere seconds. I imagine that Google puts some kind of crawl schedule on these bots so they don’t always immediately visit your website after adding a sitemap. Fortunately there are some other ways to index your website faster.
The two methods I use is submitting my URL directly to Google or launching the website with some rich media and having Google’s bots crawl your website.
Submitting your URL to Google
Simply put visit this link, submit your website, wait a few minutes and chances are you’re website will be indexed in Google.
Google XML Sitemap for Videos
For this technique to work you need to build your website on WordPress and install the plugin called Google XML Sitemap for Videos. For each page you want indexed I advise you to add a small bit of text and embed a video. Embedding the video is crucial as this plugin creates a video site map and then pings Google to come and visit your website. Your website then gets crawled and indexed almost instantly.
I usually use the second technique first and if it doesn’t work I know there is something really wrong with the website. The first technique works great for helping websites that aren’t WordPress hosted to get indexed.
Find more SEO tips for beginners and veterans at SEO Magic Me or find out which tools you need as an SEO at our 5 SEO Tools experts can’t do without post.














