Importance of Sitemap for SEO

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A sitemap is crucial for SEO as it allows for better indexing and monitoring of indexed pages by search engines. It provides search engines with the structure of the site, making them aware of potential updates and changes. While a sitemap itself doesn't directly impact rankings, it helps crawlers find relevant content and understand the general structure of the site more efficiently.

Scott and Wes break down the importance of sitemaps for SEO. They dive into the different file formats, essential fields, and common pitfalls to avoid when creating and submitting your sitemap to search engines.

Show Notes

00:00 Welcome to Syntax!
- New Swag Coming Soon.
- Tolin.ski.
02:09 Brought to you by Sentry.io.
02:39 Sitemaps.
04:36 Why do you need a sitemap?
06:34 Sitemap file formats.
- 08:31 Choosing a file format.
- 09:17 Site map file size limits.
- 10:32 Fully-qualified URLs.
10:50 Fields and metadata.
- 10:58 What fields matter for SEO?
14:20 What to avoid in your sitemap?
- 14:23 Dynamic user pages and account pages.
- 14:43 Parameter-based URLs.
- 16:01 Redirects, duplicates or disallowed pages.
- 16:11 Unlisted pages.
17:07 How do you make a sitemap?
20:06 What to do once you have a sitemap.
- 20:08 Validation.
- 20:20 Submit to search engine.
  - Bing Webmaster Tools.
  - Google Search Console.
- 22:11 Cache them!