Editing A Sitemap
-
Would there be any positive effect from editing a site map down to a more curated list of pages that perform, or that we hope they begin to perform, in organic search?
A site I work with has a sitemap with about 20,000 pages that is automatically created out of a Drupal plugin.
Of those pages, only about 10% really produce out of search. There are old sections of the site that are thin, obsolete, discontinued and/or noindexed that are still on the sitemap.
For instance, would it focus Google's crawl budget more efficiently or have some other effect?
Your thoughts? Thanks! Best... Darcy
-
Hi Darcy
Looking at what has been mentioned previously I would agree with the train of thought that a more focussed sitemap would generally be advantageous.
Andrew
-
Hi Dmitrii,
Always fun to watch Matt's Greatest Hits, in this example the value of making things better.
I guess the make better or delete seems super black and white to me.
Economically, who is able to make thousands of pages dramatically better with compelling original content? So, instead, the only other option is apparently radical elective surgery and massive amputation? I guess I'd choose the chemo first and don't really see what the downside is for noindex/follow and exclude from the sitemap.
Anyway, thanks again! Best... Darcy
-
- I really read the above linked post differently than Google saying "just delete it."
Well, here is a video from Matt Cutts about thin content. In this particular video he's talking about websites, which already took hit for thin content, but in your case it's the same, since you're trying to prevent it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3-obcXkyA4&t=322So, there are two options he is talking about: delete or make it better. From your previous responses I understand that making it better is not an option, so there is only one option left
As for link juice thorough those pages. If those pages have good amount of links, traffic and are quite popular on your website, then surely DON'T delete them, but rather make them better. However, I understood that those pages are not popular or have much traffic, so, option two
-
Hi Thomas,
Thanks for the message.
To answer your question, part of the reason is link juice via a noindex/follow and then there are some pages that serve a very very narrow content purpose, but have absolutely no life in search.
All things being equal, do you think a smaller, more focused, sitemap is generally an advantage? In the extreme and on other sites I've seen sitemaps with noindexed pages on them.
Thanks... Darcy
-
Thanks for the suggestion, Andrew.
With setting priority or not in a sitemap, do you think a smaller, more focused, sitemap is generally an advantage?
Thanks... Darcy
-
Thomas & Dmitrii,
Thanks for the message. With all do respect, I really read the above linked post differently than Google saying "just delete it."
Also, I don't see how deleting it preserves whatever link juice those pages had, as opposed to a "noindex, follow" and taking them out of the sitemap.
Finally, I don't necessarily equate all of Google's suggestions as synonymous with a "for best effect in search." I assume their suggestions mean, "it's best for Google if you..."
Thanks, again!
Best... Darcy
-
You misunderstand the meaning of that article.
"...that when you do block thin or bad content, Google prefers when you use the noindex over 404ing the page..."
They are talking about the walk around the problem of blocking pages INSTEAD of removing them.
So, if for whatever reason you don't want to delete a page and just put a 404 status on it, it's worse than putting noindex on it. Basically, what they're saying is:
- if you have thin content, DELETE it;
- if for whatever reason you don't want to delete it, put NOINDEX on it.
P.S. My suggestion still stays the same. Delete all bad content and, if you really want, put 410 gone status for that deleted content for Google to understand immediately that those pages are deleted forever, not inaccessible by mistake or something.
Hope this makes sense
.
-
Darcy,
Whilst noindex would be a good solution, if the page has no benefit why would you noindex instead of deleting it?
-
Dmitrii & Thomas,
Thanks for your thoughts.
Removal would be one way to go. I note with some interest this post:
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-block-thin-content-use-noindex-over-404s-21011.html
According to that, removal would be the third thing after making it better and noindexing.
With thousands of pages, making it better is not really an option.
Best... Darcy
-
Hi Darcy
I don't know about scaling the sitemap down but you could make use of an area of the sitemap to optimise and make it a crawl more efficient.
The area in question is the Priority area that basically tells the search engines which pages on your site are the most important. The theory is that pages with a higher priority (say 100%) are more likely to get indexed by the search engines than pages with a lower priority of say (10%), although not everyone in the industry agrees.
-
"There are old sections of the site that are thin, obsolete, discontinued and/or noindexed that are still on the sitemap."
Why not remove these from the site?
I personally believe that it'll have a positive impact, as you're submitting this sitemap to Google, you're giving it a way of going through your whole site, so why would you give it low quality pages. You want to provide Google (and your users) the best possible experience, so if you've got out of date pages, update them or if they're not relevant delete them, a user who lands on this page anyway would just bounce because it's not relevant anymore.
If these out of date pages can't be found by crawling, then 100% it's best to craft your sitemap to show the best pages.
-
hi there.
Of those pages, only about 10% really produce out of search. There are old sections of the site that are thin, obsolete, discontinued and/or noindexed that are still on the sitemap.
Have you considered removing those pages/sections, rather than altering the sitemap? It would make more sense I think.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
URL indexed but not submitted in sitemap, however the URL is in the sitemap
Dear Community, I have the following problem and would be super helpful if you guys would be able to help. Cheers Symptoms : On the search console, Google says that some of our old URLs are indexed but not submitted in sitemap However, those URLs are in the sitemap Also the sitemap as been successfully submitted. No error message Potential explanation : We have an automatic cache clearing process within the company once a day. In the sitemap, we use this as last modification date. Let's imagine url www.example.com/hello was modified last time in 2017. But because the cache is cleared daily, in the sitemap we will have last modified : yesterday, even if the content of the page did not changed since 2017. We have a Z after sitemap time, can it be that the bot does not understands the time format ? We have in the sitemap only http URL. And our HTTPS URLs are not in the sitemap What do you think?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ZozoMe0 -
What is optimal sitemap for large website
My website is having more than 3500 posts. Please let me know what sitemap plugin I need to use for the website and what is the best practice for it?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Michael.Leonard0 -
Xml sitemap only shows up sometimes (magento)
Hi Moz community, I'm using Magento platform. I can generate a sitemap using their xml generator, but it will only pull up sometimes in web explorers, the rest of the time it will show a 404 page. GWT also tells me that I get a 404 error when testing the sitemap, but sometimes it will acknowledge that it's there. Anyone had this problem before or know how to help. sitemap= www.ice.com/sitemap.xml Let me know what other information I can provide to help. Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | IceIcebaby0 -
Sitemap Submission
I was wondering if anyone has any insight into Sitemap submission with Google. I submitted a XML Sitemap for my new site at the end of October. Since then GWT says it is pending. l have made a few changes to the site and added some new pages so l decided to submit an updated XML sitemap. This was about a week ago and is also still pending. Does anybody know how long this process should take and if it is the reason why the site hasn't started ranking for any of our targeted search terms as yet? The site is www.theremovalistsguide.com.au
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RobSchofield0 -
Bing Webmaster Tools failed to reach sitemap any suggestions?
My sitemap has been submitted to Bing webmaster tools well over a year ago and I have never had any problems. Starting last week it showed failed, for some reason it can't reach it. I have resubmitted several times and it fails every time. I can go to the url with no problems, and Google Webmaster Tools does not have any problems. We have made no changes in over a year to how the sitemap is made and submitted. Anyone have any ideas?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | EcommerceSite0 -
Sitemap.xml
Hi guys I read the seomoz article about sitemap.xml dated 2008. Just wanted to check views on: Is it worthwhile using the 'priority' What if everything is set to 100% Any tips to using the priority Many thanks in advance! Richard
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Richard5550 -
How to format a video sitemap for GWT using Vimeo iframe code
I noticed a thread on this forum about using the old embedd code from vimeo for videos, although I can't see this option in Vimeo in 2013. My Question is I have Iframe embedded videos from vimeo, How do I format a google video site map accordingly? or do I need a custom media player instead?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | robertrRSwalters0 -
Old deleted sitemap still shown in webmaster tools
Hello I have redisgned a website inl new url structure in cms. Old sitemap was not set to 404 but changed with new sitemap files,also new sitemap was named different to old one.All redirections done properly Still 3 month after google still shows me duplicate titile and metas by comparing old and new urls I am lost in what to do now to eliminate the shown error. How can google show urls that are not shown in sitemap any more? Looking forward to any help Michelles
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Tit0