A Simple White Hat Technique To Get Indexed By Google

Everybody knows that getting indexed in Google is getting more and more difficult each day and every body is looking for that edge over the competition.

Most "white hat" SEO's frown upon methods like cloaking, blog and ping and other such "black hat" techniques and never had any special technique that they could use to help get their pages indexed better.

Well, presenting Google Sitemaps, Googles latest offering which is still in the beta stage, and which won't make the purists frown.

https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/stats

Google sitemaps is a service that allows webmasters to define how often their sites' content is going to change, which is supposed to give Google a better idea of what pages to index.

By placing a specially formatted XML file on your web server, you inform Google of whenever your pages change, and then the googlebot crawls the updated pages making the necessary updates to its database.

Google has provided the format your xml file has to be in at https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/docs/en/protocol.html

An interesting point is that the xml file has 2 tags, changefreq and priority with which you can also indicate how important each page is, and how frequently the page changes.

The valid values for changefreq are "always", "hourly", "daily", "weekly", "monthly", "yearly" and "never" and similarly the priority can vary from 0.0 to 1.0, where 0.0 identifies the lowest priority page(s) on your site and 1.0 identifies the highest priority page(s) on your site.

Once you have the xml file in place on your server, you need to inform Google about it by opening this URL in your browser

http://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/ping?sitemap=URL

where the URL part in the above URL should be the URL-encoded location of your Sitemaps xml file.

Now Google has provided an open source script that will automatically generate the xml file for you. The only drawback being its in a scripting language called Python.

There are however several Free Third Party scripts and tools available.

1)Softplus GSiteCrawler: This is a windows software and is extremely easy to use.It has been coded in Visual Basic 6.0.

http://johannesmueller.com/gs/

2)SiteMaps Pal: This is a online service that generates the sitemap for you.It has a limit of 1000 links. So if you web site has more than 1000 links, this won't work for you.

http://www.sitemapspal.com/

3)Google Sitemap Generator: This is another free online sitemap creator.This service lets you crawl sites 3 levels deep and limits the number of links to 400.

http://www.my-google-sitemap.com/

4)phpSitemapNG from enarion: This is a php script that you need to upload to the root of your web site and the script generates the sitemap file on the server.

It also lets you submit the sitemap to Google by clicking a link.

The drawback of this script is that you will need to upload it to each of your sites and it also doesn't recognize subdomains.

http://enarion.net/google/

5)Google Sitemap Generator for Dreamweaver: This dreamweaver extension by George Petrov lets you quickly create Google Sitemaps for your dreamweaver sites.

http://www.dmxzone.com/ShowDetail.asp?NewsId=10538

6)Google Sitemap Generator for WordPress: Here is a plugin for wordpress users

http://www.arnebrachhold.de/2005/06/05/google-sitemaps-generator- v2-final

7)SecretSpider generator: This is a paid software priced at $97. Its advantages are that it also lets you gzip the xml file thereby making it smaller in size.

Secret Spider generator

So, go ahead and make your website more Google-friendly.

About The Author
Satyajeet Hattangadi is the Owner of Novasoft Inc
http://www.novasoft-inc.com/products.asp, creators of Adsense Cloaker http://www.adsensecloaker.com, a unique php script that hides your adsense ads from the robots and helps prevent de-indexing by yahoo.

This article may be reprinted provided the resource box is kept intact, with the active links included.

In The News:

pen paper and inkwell


cat break through


How to Build Massive Keyword Lists

As keyword marketing becomes more and more expensive and competitive,... Read More

8 Essential SEO techniques

1) Title Tag - The title tag is the most... Read More

Is My Search Engine Optimization Working?

You've just built a website and can't wait to start... Read More

Soliciting Search Engines

As your guide operator through the web, search engines are... Read More

Search Engine Optimization For Blogs

Blogging software is really a simple Content Management System (CMS)... Read More

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Strategy - Navigating the Dark Waters of Website Promotion

Creating a well-designed website is the first step in your... Read More

Search Engine Optimization Strategies To Drive More Targeted Traffic To Your Website

Want to drive more targeted traffic to your web site?Want... Read More

Search Engine Rankings for Beginners

Search engine optimization is best left in the mystical land... Read More

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Fix Your OffPage!

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is something you should be aware... Read More

Why Articles Are Not The Route To High Search Engine Rankings

If you have any interest in getting high search engine... Read More

10 Steps To Higher Search Engine Positioning

There is perhaps no more level playing field in business... Read More

Google Sitemaps: 7 Benefits You Cant Ignore

Google Sitemaps enables Webmasters to Directly Alert Google to Changes... Read More

Good Things Come to Those Who Wait (and Other Analogies and Cliché?s for SEO)

We've all heard that familiar expression, "Good things come to... Read More

Getting Listed in the ODP, Google Directory

First of all, the Google directory is really just the... Read More

Why Search Engine Traffic Should be Your Top Priority

Most Internet marketing methods are risky and many will not... Read More

Google, Yahoo! and MSN Line up More Goodies for Internet Users

Internet users have never had it better what with Yahoo!,... Read More

Choosing your Meta-Keywords

Introduction This article assumes you already know what... Read More

Sitemaps 101 - Back to SEO School

Sitemaps are without doubt one of the most often ignored... Read More

Webmaster-Friendly Google Operators

There are a lot of operators (commands you can enter... Read More

Ten Steps To A Well Optimized Website - Step 4: Content Optimization

Welcome to part four in this search engine positioning series.... Read More

Organic SEO: Patience For Long Term Ranking Results

When does long term SEO show ranking results? It takes... Read More

The Unethical SEO Myth

"The use of black hat SEO techniques are completely unethical."... Read More

SEO and the Outsourcing of Inbound Link Building

Search Engine Optimization nowadays has a lot to do with... Read More

How To Write Effective And Unique Articles That Are Optimized for the Search Engines

It is a well known fact that writing, distributing and... Read More

Yahoo Listing Still Worth It?

In October 2002, the Yahoo! portal changed the way it... Read More

Googles Trap, DMOZs Nap, And Yahoo!s Crap

On November 16th, 2003, Google commenced an update (the Florida... Read More

Search Engines The Masters Of The Internet Universe ? Part 3

This is part three of the article series and deals... Read More

How to Get Tons of Top 10 Rankings Guaranteed

Okay I admit it. I was kidding. I can't guarantee... Read More

Google PageRank Explained

1. What is PageRank? Here is what Google says:" PageRank... Read More

Help Your Visitors Zero in with Site-Flavored Google search

As Google has gained in their search reputation the past... Read More

Search Engine Indexing - 3 Strategies Guaranteed to Skyrocket Your Success

In order to design a website that performs well with... Read More

Five Simple Steps to Getting Links to Your Site

Today if you want your site to survive in the... Read More

Building Link Popularity As Easy As 123

The most difficult area of SEO is building link popularity.... Read More