Why Do We Need Sitemaps?

There are two kinds of sitemaps in general. The first one uses HTML (a Hyper Text Makeup Language) to create a sitemap for easy navigation within your own website. Typically it lists all pages of your website; including categories, sections, and titles. The purpose is to help your visitors to find information easily in your website.

The second one is created using XML - Extensible Makeup Language. This is the one most people pay more attention to. Google Webmaster Tools account uses it to analyze a submitted blog/website and generate reports such as Overview, Diagnostics, Statistics, Links, Sitemaps, and Tools for it. A sample format of a XML Sitemap with one single URL would look like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9"> <url> <loc>http://www.yoursite.com/</loc> <lastmod>2007-12-29</lastmod> <changefreq>monthly</changefreq> <priority>0.5</priority> </url> </urlset>

P.S. The bolded parts you need to plot in your correct information.

Creating a Sitemap and submitting it to Google will help Googlebot to crawl your website in a timely and efficient manner. For more information on how to create and implement Sitemap with Google Webmaster Tools account, just visit Sitemap? What is it? How to add it to our website? For WordPress.com blog, follow this post How to Add Google Sitemap to WordPress.com Blog? to implement it.

Burn Feeds Using FeedBurner? RSS or Atom?

Two kinds of web feeds are commonly used; namely RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0. RSS is known as Really Simple Syndication. It is used to update frequently publish content such as blogs, newsletters, news headlines, or podcasts, etc. It provides convenience for readers to check their favorite websites in an automatic manner. Atom is developed to solve the existence of many incompatible versions of the RSS syndication format. Therefore it provides more functionality that RSS may not accommodate with.

Google aquired FeedBurner now so you can access it through your Google Account/Products/FeedBurner. It provides Free services. There are many benefits after you sign up FeedBurner,

1. you can analyze your web site traffic to learn how many subscribers you have, where they are from, and what they like.


2. you can optimize your feeds so that they are properly formatted to meet your readers needs


3. you can publicize your feeds so that your readers can easily subscribe to your content; see the graphic icons I posted on the right bar.


4. you can monetize your web site by configuring Google AdSense for Content in your feed on your blog

I set up this FeedBurner lately and I love it. Therefore I highly recommend this service to you. I bet you are going to love it too!

Updated as of 12/13/2012

Search Engine Optimization - Part 2

As my promise to you from last week, I'll cover off-page optimization in a moment. Although on-page optimization is important, the most important factor of ranking well in any search engine is the off-page optimization. If you've done properly, you will be ranged high in Google with no time. So what is off-page optimization? In order to understand this concept, just do what Brad Callen said below:

1. Get relevant websites link to you. It is best to get one-way links.
   
2. Know the number of websites linking to you.
   
3. Be aware of the Google Page Rank of the website linking to you.
   
4. Get the page title of the website linking to you.
   
5. Get the anchor text used in the link linking to you.
   
6. Get the number and type of links linking to the website that is linking to you.
   
7. Get the number of outbound links on the website that is linking to you.
   
8. Know the total number of links on the website that is linking to you.
   
9. Understand whether or not the websites linking to you are considered by Google as an authority website.
   
10. Get different IP Address of the websites linking to you.
    
11. Make links within your own website linking to each other.
    

You can get the latest Updates to Search Engine Optimization Made Easy for Free here!

Relate Article:
Search Engine Optimization Follow Ups

Search Engine Optimization - Part 1

Time flies! It has been three months now. This week I've been reading an eBook called Search Engine Optimization Make Easy by Brad Callen, who is an expert in this field. This eBook has ninety pages covering ten chapters. It provided invaluable information of how to get your new website ranked the number one in Google.

First download a free Good Keyword Tool here. You must have this tool in order to optimize your website. Second you can download Google Toolbar with Mozilla FireFox here. It is also free. With Google Toolbar you can check out any website's page rank. Using Mozilla FireFox's FireFTP you can download or upload files to your website's server.

There are two types of search engine optimization methods; namely on-page and off-page optimization. With onpage optimization you have to look out for these five key things:

1. Make sure you place your keyword(s) in a <h1> header tag.
   
2. Make sure you place your main keyword (s) in a <title> tag of your website and there should be no more than 60 to 65 characters in it.
3. Make sure you bold, underline, or italicize your keyword(s) anywhere in the body of your website.
   
4. Make sure you place your keyword(s) in an <alt> image tag if you use an image.
   
5. Make sure you place your keyword(s) once at the very beginning of your website and once at the very end of your website. Keywords should be 1% of your total content.
   

I will cover off-page optimization next week.

Related article:
Search Engine Optimization - Follow-Ups

The Eleventh Week of My Online Business

I did not do much this week. I spent most of my time to promote my new website. I added more information there. I am very careful for what I have added there. I tried to make my website look like a directory of affiliate programs, but not quite because I provided a short review for each product I posted.

I found someone to exchange links with me, but I am still waiting for his answer. According to Allan Gardyne - Owner of Affiliate Programs Directory, I should wait for three weeks before I send a brief, polite reminder to him.

In order to get more traffic to a website, I found out that using ezine(an email newsletter) and articles are two powerful tactics to achieve that. Most importantly they are low-cost effective ways of advertising.