Major Search Engines Collaborate on Web Index Tool - What is Sitemaps.org?
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Sitemaps.org is an outgrowth of Sitemaps 0.84, a tool originally released by Google in June of 2005. The original release gave webmasters an easy way to tell Google about new content. Basically, a Sitemap is an XML file that webmasters make available to search engine spiders on their web sites. In the file, webmasters list all of their URLs along with optional meta data (such as frequency of page updates, or the last time a particular page changed). In short, the Sitemap lets webmasters help the spiders crawl their sites more effectively.
The Sitemaps protocol benefits both webmasters and search engines in a number of distinct ways. First, it helps to keep search engines informed of freshly updated content in a timely manner. Second, it improves the comprehensiveness of the crawl, allowing webmasters to include all of the pages they want indexed to make sure that none are missed. Third, it lets the spider ignore pages that haven't been updated since the last time it visited a particular site, increasing its speed and efficiency and saving bandwidth.
From the very beginning, Google encouraged other sites to adopt its Sitemaps protocol, and it has received widespread support. As you might expect, it has been particularly helpful to web sites that manage lots of pages with dynamic content - in fact, if your web site is large enough to require a content management system (CMS), it doesn't make sense NOT to use Sitemaps. Also, since many sites that use a CMS carry out ecommerce, keeping search engines updated as to fresh content increases traffic to their sites, which is good for business.
Sitemaps.org gives visitors a complete explanation of all the features of the protocol and what they need to do to submit a Sitemap. The site itself contains nothing to indicate that any of the search engines are specifically involved with it - no logos or branding. In fact, it looks fairly bare and non-commercial, and is likely to stay that way. In the WebProNews video interview, Fox noted the significance of the .org suffix; it's historically been used to indicate not-for-profit organizations. She said that there would be no advertising on Sitemaps.org, "no AdSense on the side."
So Sitemaps.org isn't commercial; it's worth noting what else Sitemaps.org isn't. As Yahoo notes in its blog post on the subject, "you don't need to worry about the three search engines merging and not being able to use your favorite anymore." It also isn't a sign that the search engine spiders will start getting "lazy" and only crawl sites with Sitemaps or pay attention only to Sitemaps. Both Fox and Mayer gave assurances in the video interview that their search engines' spiders would continue to crawl web sites as expected.
Next: A Quick Visit to Sitemaps.org >>
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