XML Reference Guide

InformIT Articles and Sample Chapters

Before you even attempt to get your site indexed by Google, you will want to make sure that it's worth the effort. Before you even start building, it's a good idea to read "Search Engine Optimization: What to Know Before You Build", by Shari Thurow. This sample chapter from Search Engine Visibility (New Riders, 2002, ISBN: 0735712565) explains how understanding how search engines work, how your target audience searches, and how best to design your site from the onset can save your company thousands of dollars in time and expenses. In the same vein, "How to Make Your Web Site More Effective, by Michelle Johnston gives you some solid strategies for attracting and retaining visitors.

Once you've been indexed, you will, of course, want to make the best showing possible. Dave Taylor has two pieces to help you, "How Does Google Figure out What Pages are More Relevant? Pagerank" and "Three Ways to Adversely Impact your Google Pagerank".

Finally, before you go about creating a sitemap that tells Google about every page you've ever created, check out Johnny Long's "Google Hacking Mini-Guide", which explains how, using search engines such as Google, "search engine hackers" can easily find exploitable targets and sensitive data. This article outlines some of the techniques used by hackers and discusses how to prevent your site from becoming a victim of this form of information leakage.

Books and eBooks

Before you submit your site, you'll also want to have a really good understanding of how search engines work. Web Search Garage, by research whiz Tara Calishain (Prentice Hall PTR, 2004, ISBN: 0-13-147148-1), gives you a really good grounding in search in general and how you can find information on ... well, just about anything. (Read this book online)

If you're not particularly technical, you'll also want to familiarize yourself with Google in general. Easy Google, by Shelley O'Hara (Que, 2004, ISBN: 0789731045) and Google and Other Search Engines: Visual QuickStart Guide by Alfred Glossbrenner, Emily Glossbrenner, and Diane Poremsky (Peachpit Press, 2004, ISBN: 0321246144) are good ways to do that.

Specifications and Implementations

The official Google Sitemaps Protocol is of course maintained by Google. Google also provides a Sitemaps generator, but you have to have Python installed to use it. You can generate them manually, of course -- they're just XML, after all -- but Google also provides links to third party programs and websites, including code snippets in various programming languages, as well as plugins for various content management systems. Note that at the time of this writing, the list of supported software is growing very quickly; every time I check it they've added a few more entries.

You can also check out the Sitemaps FAQ, or log in to your Google account to add a new sitemap or monitor those you've already submitted.

Finally, two utilities you may find useful are the W3C's XML Schema validator, which enables you to check the validity of your sitemap by simply entering its URL, and this URL encoding converter, which helps you convert your sitemap URLs for submission via HTTP.