Today there are several SEO techniques that help you to optimize your site, but one trick whose importance is undervalued at times is a Sitemap. A Sitemap is a page on your website that indicates the entire structure of your site including different sections, links between them, and so on. In short it gives a detailed listing of your website layout. Sitemaps are very helpful as they make site navigation easy for the visitors and also help search engines index the site.

Sitemaps generally fall into two categories. One is a HTML version which is for human visitors and helps them navigate through the entire site and find the information they are looking for. The other Sitemap is an XML version which is meant for the search engine to know about all the pages on the website including all the URLs that may go unnoticed by the search engine spidering the site.



Sitemap Benefits

There are many advantages of using sitemaps which are listed below:

Easy Navigation

A sitemap helps a visitor know where to find particular information he is looking for on the site. It acts as a guide to enable easy navigation through the site without wasting time to find information.



Search Engine Indexing

Sitemaps help search engines know about any updates that you make on your site. It is not guaranteed that the search engine bot will immediately index the updated pages, but, the changes will surely be indexed much faster compared to when there isn’t any sitemap.

New Site

If you have a new site with very few links in it, sitemaps can be very helpful. This is because the search engine spider crawls through documents by following links from one page to another and if your site does not contain proper links, it would be difficult for the bots to index them.

Broken Links

If you have a site that contains a lot of content pages which are not properly linked to each other or have broken links then using sitemaps will help search engine bots to index your pages better.

Dynamic Content on Site

Sitemaps are also very helpful if you have a site where your content is updated or changed frequently. The search engines can be immediately informed of this change through your sitemap. However, this will not assure you that your changed pages will be indexed right away.

Sitemap Process

To create a Sitemap for your website there are a few simple steps that you need to follow. First, a Sitemap has to be generated after which it needs to be uploaded to the site and then finally Google needs to be notified about it.

Sitemap Generation

A sitemap can be generated in two ways. One is by using an online tool that can help you generate the sitemap and the other is by downloading and installing a sitemap generator.

The first option is much easier compared to the second one as there are several online sitemap generation tools available free of cost that make your work simpler. The second option of downloading and installing a sitemap generator is a little difficult but enables you to gain a better control of the output.

Uploading and Submitting Your Sitemap

Once your sitemap is created, it has to be uploaded to your website and Google needs to be notified about it. In order to notify Google you have to add your site to your Google Sitemap account. However, if you don’t already have a Google Sitemap account, this is the time for you to create one. Also, it is important to know that adding a sitemap to your account requires a verification indicating you are the legal owner of the website.

It is also important to know that Google does not guarantee that all the URLs in your sitemap will be spidered and indexed. For instance, if there are any image URLs in your sitemap, these will not be crawled and indexed. However, your sitemap can help the search engine to know more about your site layout which will help it to crawl your site better and faster when compared to not having a sitemap. Webmasters usually benefit from submitting sitemaps and will not be penalized for it.



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The domain name for your business is your online identity. You should be very careful about choosing a domain name that is memorable, scores quite well with search engine listings, has a trust factor attached to it, and commands a brand value. A domain name is quite important for your business correspondences and emails. A long one can cause problems in communication, especially if the domain name seems complex. Here are some tips in choosing a well-meaning domain name that captures the essence of your brand image or business:

1. Keyword oriented or a unique domain name? If your website is going to have a crucial role to play in your business, then it is important to have an adequately researched keyword incorporated within the brand name. Use the most searched-for term in search engine queries, within your domain name. Prior to launching your online business, you should do some research through website tools to find out which keywords register the most number of traffic during a month. For example, if you want to make a website based on advising people, you will find that the keyword help is normally typed in the search engine query window a lot more frequently than the word aid. If your domain name includes targeted keywords, than you will get higher rankings in the search engines like Google and Yahoo. You should bear in mind that, apart from having the targeted keyword in your domain name, you should also have keywords in other parts of your site as well.

2. Use a company name only if you are famous: That is right. If your company name overwhelms the basic product name, then by all means go for the company name as your domain name. For example, people normally use the term Xerox rather than photocopy and if you are Xerox, then you should go for Xerox as a domain name because of the sheer popularity of the brand name. This is usually not the case, so using a keyword-rich domain name is a better move for most people. To be on the right side of balancing your business well, you should buy a set of two domain names, one that represents your business/brand name, and another that represents keywords or key phrases.

3. Keep your domain name short: The shorter your domain name, the more memorable it is. If your domain name has an every-day lingo, the better it is! More often than not, you may find that a simple two-word domain name is already taken. The alternative in this case, is to put a hyphen (-) to your targeted keyword and then add the other word. SEO experts are of the belief that hyphenating two or more words makes a long domain name more search engine friendly. The flip side is that people do not tend to write words with hyphens naturally, and there is a chance that if someone has recommended your site to a friend, the friend may find himself going to a competitor’s site. So one has to understand and undergo a lot of study while choosing a domain name. After all, it is one prominent thing that can dictate the flow of your business. Also, you should avoid putting numbers like 4 instead of for in your domain name. It will only lead to confusion.

4. Dot.com only: If you intend to have a website for commercial or business reasons, then by all means go for a website which ends in extension .com. The domain name companies will market other options like .org, .us, .net, etc. However, by all means try stick to .com for better mass appeal.

5. Register similar domain names: If you believe that in the future you are going to have a huge amount of people visiting your website through word-of-mouth advertising, then you should consider registering similar domain names that direct to your main URL (e.g. www.datinginformation.com and www.datinginfo.com). There are cyber-squatters who register domain names in the hope that they will be selling them for a profit to someone who really needs that domain name. Before they do this, you should register the domain names if you think that such a possibility can occur.

6. Be patient: You should not choose a domain name in minutes merely just to get it done and over with. A hasty decision may cost you a lot. It is better to invest time in research and arrive at the right kind of domain name. You should also discuss the comprehensibility and usage of the domain name with friends, neighbors and well wishers to find how simple and commonplace it really is.



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When it comes to hosting a website, many individuals are torn between whether to use collocated servers or dedicated servers. In fact, many individuals do not know the difference between the two. There are several differences to be found between collocated servers and dedicated servers and the different functions of each may make an option more or less attractive to the website developer.

There are many companies that will offer their customers the use of either a dedicated or collocated server and there are several advantages and disadvantages to each type of service. Ultimately, the decision rests with the website developer and their needs for the website.

The main difference between a collocated server and a dedicated server is the ownership of the server. With a dedicated server, the user is provided with exclusive use of a server that is owned by another entity, generally the hosting provider A collocated server is owned by the user and is housed in a rental space along with the servers of many other companies and individuals. In other words, with a dedicated server you rent the server and with a collocated server, you rent the space to house your server. Each option is more cost effective than purchasing and housing the server on your own, but there are major differences in what you can and cannot do with the equipment.

With a dedicated server, the individual has exclusive access to the server and can place any software, content, or applications on the server that they wish. Websites that use dedicated servers also have a higher reliability and can handle a great deal more traffic than sites that are hosted on shared servers. With a dedicated server, any issues that arise with the server are the responsibility of the company that the individual is renting the server from, which could be a good or bad thing. One of the biggest disadvantages to a dedicated server is that the individual only owns the data on the server, not the server itself, so if they are dissatisfied with the service they are being provided, they have little recourse until their contract expires.

One of the biggest advantages of a collocated server is that the individual owns and has full access to the server at any time. The applications can be run from a remote location while the server is housed in a secure facility with an uninterruptible power supply, internet connectivity, and increased security features. Allowing the server to be collocated frees up valuable space in the home or business that would be needed to house the server and allows the individual to split the cost of utilities between all the individuals with servers housed in the area. The biggest disadvantage to collocated servers is that all issues, maintenance, and needed repairs to the server must be handled on your own.



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