There are two types of sitemaps – a HTML page or a XML file. A HTML sitemap is a single page that shows visitors all the pages on a website and usually has links to those pages. The XML type of sitemap is used by search engine crawlers to find out what pages are present and which have recently changed. A XML sitemap isn’t meant to look pretty for the website visitor.

XML-Sitemaps is a free sitemap generator. XML-Sitemaps will index your website and create a XML file that you can upload to the root directory of your website. There is nothing to download or install. Just use the XML-Sitemaps website and they will do all of the work.

4 Easy Steps for Creating a XML Sitemap

1. Go to xml-sitemaps

2. Enter your full website URL. Choose your other options:

- Enter the frequency your website is usually updated from the drop-down list.
- Choose an option under ‘Last modification’. This is the time the URL was last modified.
- Leave the Priority at Automatic.

3. Click ‘Start’. Wait while your sitemap is being generated.

4. Click the link to download the .xml file.

Now you can upload the sitemap.xml file to the root directory of your website and you can submit your sitemap URL to Google Webmaster Tools.

Webmaster Tools:

As a Webmaster, maintaining and observing my pages, is fundamental. My core web sites that I use on a Daily and Weekly basis are as follows…

Google Analytics – The free and ultimate Webmaster tool for all types of site analytics, including: visitor information, traffic sources, pages and everything in between

Feedburner – This is the ultimate user tool for Bloggers to optimize and analyze the blog’s feed. Feedburner Medic included free (thanks to Google’s Purchase) maintains a daily report of your feed’s status. Note: Should use a Feedburner plugin (Like Feedburner FeedSmith) to make sure the Feedburner Feed is the main feed

WordPress.com Stats – Using this plugin in conjunction with a WordPress.com API Key (you’ll need a WordPress.com account), you will be able to monitor visitors and site statistics from within your WordPress installation.

Google Webmaster Tools – Includes diagnostics, abilities to include your feed and sitemap, monitors Google Page Rank and lists all external links

Yahoo Site Explorer – Not the best, but monitors your sitemap, Pages, Links and Subdomains

So, nothing tricky or complicated above, just the basics. Why use anything else? Is there some ultimate tool I should be using?

This post was posted by our guest writer Adam Hirsch from TheFattyTalks