{"id":2443,"date":"2020-01-24T09:00:46","date_gmt":"2020-01-24T09:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/?p=2443"},"modified":"2021-05-19T13:34:54","modified_gmt":"2021-05-19T13:34:54","slug":"xml-sitemap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/blog\/technical-seo\/xml-sitemap\/","title":{"rendered":"What is XML Sitemap: how to generate it and send it to Google"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In this article we\u2019ll study the definition of XML Sitemap and why it\u2019s so important for your website.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019ll also see how to create it and send it to Google with the help of <strong>Google Search Console<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let\u2019s start!<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What is an XML Sitemap?<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">An XML Sitemap is a specific file where you can <strong>list all the pages of your website<\/strong>. In other words, it allows you to illustrate neatly all URLs of your site.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It also allows Google\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/blog\/seo-basics\/crawling\/\">crawler<\/a> to control in an easy way your website, to scan it and index your content.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is it important to have an XML Sitemap?<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Having an XML Sitemap helps Google to figure out how your site is structured, allowing it to reduce the time needed to index your content.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">According to Google, you should have a sitemap especially in these cases:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you have or manage a very large and complex website, composed of more than 500 pages. This, because web crawler sometimes neglects some new content on your website.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you have a new site that doesn\u2019t have an external link.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When your website has a news section or a lot of images or videos.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you\u2019re not in any of those cases, don\u2019t be afraid. Creating an XML Sitemap is always a good choice since it permits you to structure your website and make it tidier, even if it has a few pages. In the long term, it will help you.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">How to create an XML Sitemap<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Creating an XML Sitemap is a very simple process.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you normally use WordPress, there are a lot of plugins that will do this job for you automatically.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first tool to create a sitemap that we recommend to you is Yoast SEO, a free and intuitive tool. What do you have to do is just download it by clicking <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wordpress-seo\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">here<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2915\" src=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/yoast-seo-sitemap.png\" alt=\"Yoast SEO Logo\" width=\"940\" height=\"304\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/yoast-seo-sitemap.png 940w, https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/yoast-seo-sitemap-300x97.png 300w, https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/yoast-seo-sitemap-768x248.png 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 940px) 100vw, 940px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Then, you have to activate advanced settings and in the end, turn on the function XML Sitemaps.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Another plugin that we highly recommend is <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/google-sitemap-generator\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\">Google XML Sitemap<\/a>. This one allows you to generate automatically your sitemap and moreover to report immediately to the search engine all your new contents.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you don\u2019t have a WordPress website, no panic. You could use a tool like <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.xml-sitemaps.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">XML-Sitemaps<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, an online platform that helps you to create a sitemap for free.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2916\" src=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/xml-sitemaps.png\" alt=\"xml Sitemaps Logo\" width=\"1321\" height=\"239\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/xml-sitemaps.png 1321w, https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/xml-sitemaps-300x54.png 300w, https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/xml-sitemaps-1024x185.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/xml-sitemaps-768x139.png 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1321px) 100vw, 1321px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now that you possess your sitemap, you need to send it to Google. Let\u2019s see how.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">How to send an XML Sitemap to Google<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To complete this action you must use Google Search Console, a free tool that any SEO Specialist should know and master.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thanks to Search Console, you can send your XML Sitemap in 3 easy steps:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Login in <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/search.google.com\/search-console\/welcome\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Google Search Console<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and select your website<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Click on \u201cSitemap\u201d (on the navigation bar on the left)<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Digit the URL of the sitemap in the appropriate field<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now that we understood what are the right steps to follow to transmit our sitemap, it\u2019s extremely useful to know what are the different types of sitemaps.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Types of Sitemaps<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are different types of sitemap depending on what you need and who you turn to. Let&#8217;s see them!<\/span><\/p>\n<h3>XML Sitemap<\/h3>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2914\" src=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/sitemap-xml-example-seo-tester-online.png\" alt=\"Sitemap xml example\" width=\"569\" height=\"257\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/sitemap-xml-example-seo-tester-online.png 569w, https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/sitemap-xml-example-seo-tester-online-300x136.png 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 569px) 100vw, 569px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This one is the most popular today and is created to help crawlers such as GoogleBot to index your content easily. <\/span><\/span><\/span>This file allows them to &#8220;see&#8221; all the categories of your web page, as we said before. However, the Sitemap XML has some limits that must be respected.In fact, no more than <strong>50.000 URLs<\/strong> can be entered and the uncompressed file must not weigh more than <strong>50MB<\/strong>. We can find the list of URLs and other information that may be useful to you as:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Date of the<strong> last update<\/strong> of the page.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Frequency<\/strong> of update.<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>priority<\/strong> of the URL over other pages of the site.<span style=\"font-size: 1rem;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>HTML Sitemap<\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It\u2019s an example of a sitemap designed exclusively for users.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/span><br \/>\nIt contains all the URLs of the website and it can facilitate navigation for the user by mapping the structure of our site effortlessly. Unlike the XML format, the HTML sitemap is clearly readable to a normal user and has no purpose regarding the indexing of your web page.<\/p>\n<h3>News Sitemap<\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A type that can be appropriate if you have a section, on your site dedicated exclusively to news.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/span>By sending it you can improve your ranking in the Google News section.<br \/>\nIf you are wondering how to create a specific sitemap for Google News we suggest you to consult the Search Console&#8217;s Guide to this <a style=\"background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 1rem;\" href=\"https:\/\/support.google.com\/news\/publisher-center\/answer\/9606710?hl=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">link<\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3>Image Sitemaps<\/h3>\n<p>T<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">hey are sitemaps designed, as you can imagine, for images and their related content.<br \/>\n<\/span><br \/>\nThis will be useful to position yourself in the Google Images search section and to add helpful information such:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Location<\/li>\n<li>Caption<\/li>\n<li>Title<\/li>\n<li>URL<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Remember that you can list up to 1000 images per page.<\/p>\n<h3>Video Sitemap<\/h3>\n<p><b style=\"font-size: 1rem;\"><b style=\"font-size: 1rem;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Suitable to allow your potential users to find you on Google&#8217;s Video section. <\/span><\/b><\/b>It is important in this case to specify information such as:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Videos category.<\/li>\n<li>Its duration.<\/li>\n<li>Its title.<\/li>\n<li>The URL.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Have you uploaded the Sitemap correctly?<\/h3>\n<p>Now you know how to create a Sitemap, which are the different types available and how to send it to Google.<\/p>\n<p>But&#8230; have you checked if you uploaded it correctly?<\/p>\n<p>You can do so for free with our <a href=\"https:\/\/suite.seotesteronline.com\/seo-checker\/\">SEO Checker<\/a>:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Insert your website&#8217;s URL.<\/li>\n<li>Go to the &#8220;Base&#8221; card.<\/li>\n<li>Check if you uploaded correctly the XML Sitemap at the voice &#8220;Sitemap&#8221;.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/seo-checker\/\">Verify if the XML Sitemap is correctly installed on your website<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What type of XML sitemap is right for you and for your site? Find out by reading this sitemap guide!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[135],"tags":[],"acf":[],"lang":"en","translations":{"en":2443,"it":2440},"pll_sync_post":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2443"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2443"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4582,"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2443\/revisions\/4582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seotesteronline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}