The What and Why of Site Maps

June 18, 2008
 

Our hosts start the show by talking about a few of the recent search headlines. Virginia, Robert and Bruce look to Matt Cutts’s post on Improved SEO Documentation Galore! to see what definitions and guidelines Google has updated, including robots.txt and nofollow documentation, along with further-clarified quality guidelines and the definition of a doorway page. They also talk about the recently passed Unfair Commercial Practices Directive in the UK and the fact that Google search results no longer offer the “watch video” feature.

Then Bruce interviews one of the newest members of Bruce Clay, Inc., Chris Hart, Director, Eastern Region Operations. Chris will be heading the newly opened East Coast office of Bruce Clay, Inc. in New York City and has 12 years of experience in the online publishing industry. The new office will help expand the offerings of high-quality SEO and SEM services by providing increased availability to clients across the country.

And finally, although a basic tenant of SEO 101, it’s not uncommon to see a site map missing from a Web site. The hosts discuss what a site map is, why it should be implemented, and tips for creating a site map. Along with improving users’ navigation of a site, site maps are also used by search engines to ensure more-complete crawling and indexing of a site. Including an XML Sitemap, intended only for search engines, is also recommended.