A Sitemap is a webpage that contains links to every other page in the website. Sitemaps, often hierarchical, help visitors navigate large websites by displaying the entire structure in an easy to follow manner. Sitemaps are great for customers, but there is a hidden benefit to sitemaps that webmasters may not be aware of. Sitemaps are an outstanding tool for search engine optimization! A proper sitemap will have a clear and defined series of links to every page within the website which is very easily traversed by search engine spiders. General rule: If the sitemap is easily navigated by the user, it will be easily navigated by the search engine spider.

A sitemap is essential in ensuring all of your WebPages are indexed for inclusion in search engine results. Sitemaps are even more important for webmasters that use JavaScript or flash for their menu system, which some engines have a difficult time crawling. With added benefit to users AND search engine spiders, there is absolutely no excuse and no reason to NOT create a sitemap and add it to your website. You'll be doing your customers, search engines spiders, and yourself a favor by adding one.

Note that a webpage sitemap is not the same as an XML sitemap. In part 4 of this guide we'll take a look at XML sitemaps and the process of submitting them to Google.

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