A Google Sitemap is a very simple XML document that lists all the pages in your website, but the Google Sitemaps program is actually much more important than that. In fact, the Sitemaps program provides a little peek inside Google’s mind – and it can tell you a lot about what Google thinks of your website!

Why Should You Use Google Sitemaps?

Until Google Sitemaps was released in the summer of 2005, optimizing a site for Google was a guessing game at best. A website’s page might be deleted from the index, and the Webmaster had no idea why. Alternatively, a site’s content could be scanned, but because of the peculiarities of the algorithm, the only pages that would rank well might be the “About Us” page, or the company’s press releases.

As webmasters we were at the whim of Googlebot, the seemingly arbitrary algorithmic kingmaker that could make or break a website overnight through shifts in search engine positioning. There was no way to communicate with Google about a website – either to understand what was wrong with it, or to tell Google when something had been updated.

That all changed about a year ago when Google released Sitemaps, but the program really became useful in February of 2006 when Google updated it with a couple new tools.

So, what exactly is the Google Sitemaps program, and how can you use it to improve the position of your website? Well, there are essentially two reasons to use Google Sitemaps:

1. Sitemaps provide you with a way to tell Google valuable information about your website

2. You can use Sitemaps to learn what Google thinks about your website

What You Can Tell Google About Your Site

Believe it or not, Google is concerned about making sure webmasters have a way of communicating information that is important about their sites. Although Googlebot does a pretty decent job of finding and cataloging web pages, it has very little ability to rate the relative importance of one page versus another. After all, many important pages on the Internet are not properly “optimized”, and many of the people who couldn’t care less about spending their time on linking campaigns create some of the best content.

Therefore, Google gives you the ability to tell them on a scale of 0.0 to 1.0 how important a given page is relative to all the others. Using this system, you might tell Google that your home page is a 1.0, each of your product sections is a 0.8, and each of your individual product pages is a 0.5. Pages like your company’s address and contact information might only rate a 0.2.

You can also tell Google how often your pages are updated and the date that each page was last modified. For example your home page might be updated every day, while a particular product page might only be updated on an annual basis.

What Google Can Tell You About Your Site

Having the ability to tell Google all this information is important, but you don’t even need to create a sitemap file in order to enjoy some of the perks of having a Google Sitemaps account.

That’s because even without a Sitemap file, you can still learn about any errors that Googlebot has found on your website. As you probably know, your site doesn’t have to be “broken” for a robot to have trouble crawling it’s pages. Google Sitemaps will tell you about pages it was unable to crawl and links it was unable to follow. Therefore, you can see where these problems are and fix them before your pages get deleted from the index.

You can also get information on the types of searches people are using to find your website. Of course, most website analytics tools will give this information to you anyway, but if the tool you use doesn’t have this feature, then it’s always nice to get it for free from Google.

But the best part of the Sitemaps program is the Page analysis section that was added in February of 2006. This page gives you two lists of words. The first list contains the words that Googlebot associates with your website based on content on your site. The second list contains words that Googlebot has found linking to your site!

Unfortunately, Google limits the number of words in each list to 20. As a consequence, the inbound links column is partly wasted by words such as “http”, “www”, and “com” – terms that apply equally to all websites (hey Google, how about suppressing those terms from the report?). That said, this list does provide you with a way to judge the effectiveness of your offsite optimization efforts.

When you compare these two lists, you can get an understanding of what Google thinks your website is about. If the words on your Site Content column are not really what you want Googlebot to think about your site, then you know you need to tweak your website’s copy to make it more focused on your core competency.

If, on the other hand your inbound links don’t contain any keywords that you want to rank well for, then perhaps you should focus your efforts in that direction.

Above all else, you really want these two lists to agree. You want your inbound linked words to match up to the site content words. This means that Google has a clear understanding of the focus of your website.

Additional Benefits of the Sitemaps Program

Google has even started notifying Sitemaps-participating Webmasters if they are breaking any of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. This can be very valuable information if your site suddenly becomes de-listed on Google and you don’t know why.

Only Sitemaps participants can get this information, and it is only provided at Google’s discretion. In fact, Google will NOT notify you if you are creating worthless websites that offer no original content, or if you are creating thousands of doorway pages that are redirecting to other web sites. Google doesn’t want to give the sp@ammers any clues as to how to improve their techniques.

How Do You Get Started with Google Site Maps?

The first thing you must do is obtain a Google Account. If you already have a Gmail, Adsense, or Adwords account, then you are all set. If not, you can register an account by visiting the Google Accounts page (https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount).

Building your sitemap file is pretty easy to do if you are familiar with XML, and if you aren’t you can always use a third-party tool such as the ones that are listed on Google’s website (http://code.google.com/sm_thirdparty.html). Google also has a “Sitemap Generator” that you can download and install on your server, but unless you are fairly adept at managing Python scripts, you should probably stick to the third-party tools.

At any rate, once you have your Google Account and your Sitemap file built, the rest is very easy. All you have to do is:

1. Log into your account (http://google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/siteoverview)

2. Type your website’s URL into the “Add Site” box and click on “OK”

3. Click on the Manage Sites link for the website you are adding, and add your sitemap file to your account.

Google Sitemaps – An Excellent SEO Tool

Google Sitemaps help Googlebot quickly find new content on your website. They allow you to tell Google what’s important, what’s new, and what changes often. The tools provided to webmasters through the program can play a vital role in helping you understand how the search engines (especially Google) view your website.

Using this information you can dramatically improve the position of your website and quickly clear up any issues Google finds. You can also use the tools provided by Google to gauge the effectiveness of your off-site optimization efforts so you can better focus your time and energy on activities that bring you the most success.

Matthew Coers is an Internet marketing expert. His website, ProfitChoice.com contains online courses designed to teach entrepreneurs how to build a website and make money online. Download his FREE Internet Marketing report, 7 Days to Website Success.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Matthew_Coers

It has became a virtual cash-cow for those who have
mastered Google with their marketing techniques.
They know a number one spot for a competitive keyword
or keyword phrase in Google will usually prove very
lucrative, bringing in a steady automatic income.

Regardless of what the other search engines will attest,
seasoned webmasters also know getting a top placement in
Google will usually bring more traffic than a top placement
in MSN or Yahoo combined! Getting a number one spot in
Google for a popular keyword can prove very lucrative,
earning a webmaster revenue 24/7/365.

Therefore, webmasters have to optimize their sites and
keywords for Google if they want to turn a healthy profit.
Optimizing your webpages for Google is a complete industry
in itself, what you really have to keep in mind, besides
on-page optimization like keyword density, mega tags, etc.
is that Google places a great amount of weight on off-page
links and anchor text.

Google ranks all webpages on the Internet by a scale
of PR0 to PR10, higher is better. One-way links from
high PR sites related to your keyword or website theme
is highly valued and will usually move your site up on
the SERPs (Search Engine Return Pages). This is the major
factor why ‘article marketing’ is all the rage and why
articles are great building blocks for getting top
keywords and consequently extremely important for
earning you revenue, directly or indirectly from Google.

There are countless strategies for getting those top
keyword listings in Google. But in my opinion, one of
the best experts on the net for website SEO is Brad
Callen. His ‘SEO Elite’ is top quality SEO software and
his soon to be released ‘Keyword Elite’ will greatly
impact how keywords are used by webmasters and
marketers.

Once you have gained significant traffic, you can use
Google AdSense to earn revenue from your site or blog.
Google AdSense lets webmasters and bloggers earn
advertising revenue by placing the AdSense code on
their sites. These can be text links, images, or banners.
These AdSense ads will be directly related to your
page’s keywords. Top or highest paying keywords will
naturally return more revenue. AdSense ads are
extremely targeted and is an effective way of
earning money from your site. Learn more:
https://www.google.com/adsense

One of the undisputed top experts on using Google
AdSense is Joel Comm. A seasoned marketer who has
created some well informed products on Adsense — mainly
his Google AdSense Secrets ebook and courses.

Of course, Google gives marketers another option, you
can buy your way onto Google’s first page results by
using Google AdWords. This is the popular Pay-Per-Click
advertising system offered by Google. Perfecting the
AdWord system is an art form in itself; do it right and
you can create very lucrative cash streams. Do it wrong,
and you can create your very own personal money pits!
https://adwords.google.com/select

Therefore, it is strongly advised that you learn more
about AdWords before you risk your hard earned cash.
One of the best sources for Google AdWords is still
Perry Marshall’s excellent ebook ‘The Definitive Guide
to Google AdWords’. It will give you all the basics on
Google AdWords.

Just about everyone knows about Google’s two popular
programs AdWords and AdSense, but there are other ways
marketers can earn money promoting Google products or
services. Google has started to list products that an
affiliate can promote through the AdSense program. You
can earn money by promoting the Firefox browser with
the Google search box and you can also promote Google’s
AdSense program to other webmasters and earn money by
referring new users.

The next logical step for Google is to offer more
products through its AdSense affiliate program. Many
seasoned marketers are promoting Google’s AdSense, it
would be counterproductive for Google not to take
advantage and offer other products/services through
this marketing system. Its own products or other
closely related third party products. Many marketers
would gladly promote products under the Google banner
mainly because any Google branded product would be an
easy sale for most affiliate marketers.

Google pays monthly but you do have to earn $100 before
they send you a check. Getting a check from Google is
somewhat special, no matter what the amount, show your
family and friends a check from Google and their eyes
will pop open! If you’re an online marketer you may get
quite a few larger checks from different online companies
but nothing will get you the respect a Google check does.
Just goes to show how much Google has permeated into our
everyday lives.

Not that you need it, but it’s just another reason to
start earning money for Google. Try some of the programs
listed above and you will be smiling all the way to… now,
where the heck is that Google Bank?

……
Everyone is profiting from Google, find out how you can too! Click here: Google Cash File

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Titus_Hoskins

To the makers of Google, it is nothing short of the fairy-tale crystal ball where they can see everything happening around in the universe. Everyone online is sort of an open book to Google whether you want it or not. And just when you thought that Google already knows too much about people; about what they thought, what they dreamed, what they pursued, what they shopped, what they searched, Google comes up with another milestone idea to get people even more personal; the ability to promote, remove search results by every individual on the planet and add unique comments to any of your preferred result. Wow, so what if you decide to promote a website from 50th page to 1st page. And let’s say you demote a top ranking result into oblivion, never to be seen on the 1st page again. So in one click did you just kill the hype and hoopla of search engine optimization?

Because the best of optimized pages could literally be gone out of your sight with this tool if you decided to have it so. And if it is really so, then this is the END OF THE WORLD. Is it the END of conventional SEO? Do i hear a pin-drop silence?

No need to panic yet. If you see the buttons then you must have noticed that they appear only when you are logged in to your Google account, and the reprise is that they only affect the results that you see, not what the world does. Do i hear a sigh of relief? If you want to skip my detailed analysis and description of this feature, you may straightaway read the conclusion at the bottom.

How does Google promote/remove actually work? A specific example.

To check the same, simply log in to your account, let’s say you do a Google search for the keyword phrase “webkinz dollar store”, and click on the promote button next to a result in a subsequent page. You will immediately see it magically go to the topmost SERP in the 1st page. If you click on ‘promote’ for another “webkinz dollar store” search result, it will move into the second place on the 1st page itself. You can move the second web page to the first position by clicking “promote” on it again. Now Log out and search again for the same keyword, you will see your selected pages dropping back to its original ranking position. Login again and you will notice your chosen pages are back to your promoted order. If you click remove on any of your promoted website, it will return to its previous place in your Google search results. But If you click remove randomly on any un-promoted website, it will be permanently removed from any results. Of course you can get it back to the search results by clicking on restore at the bottom. The results are associated with your Google account only so they will be constant across any computes of you account logs.

At first instance it is bound to give the webmasters a cold feet with the thought that Google has handed over the fate of search engine results to people and everything about SEO goes to the dumps. It convincingly looks like, as if now people are to alter, improvise the worldwide top results for each search term. But it certainly isn’t the case. It’s only for your own Google account, for your own personalized result page order. And it is important to know that every new search term will have entirely different promoted and removed results than the other.

I’m sure even the biggest of SEO experts, guides and critics must have lost their nerve for a second with their first experience with Google promote and remove feature just as much as I did. So the big question still remains, is this the end of our struggle and success with SEO? Is it really all up to searchers and surfers to decide the ranks of our web pages? Are we supposed to watch helplessly all the big and popular web pages get to the top, while the smaller ones vanishing away? Thank the stars that it isn’t the case.

What is Google promote / remove system called?

It’s called SearchWiki. SearchWiki lets users have their own order of promoted and removed results, and leave comments on specific links. Google thus remembers changes that are made by the account holder to the organic search results pages, and subsequent searches will then be displayed as per the user’s customisations and notes. And most importantly, users will also have the option of seeing how other searchers have rated and reordered search results and view their notes as well, making search results a innovative community based initiative.

Who does searchwiki help?

In course of time, it will surely make a huge impact on how SEO affects a site in my opinion. Prior to this feature, a webmaster was the only individual who had an influence on the SEO aspects but now each and every Google user has the ability to decide where that site should be listed, making search engine results a different concept altogether. It may even revolutionize the idea or existing technology like browser bookmarks and RSS readership.

Customized search result page? Is it happening?

The way it stands now, it isn’t a possibility e.g., a specific page could be pushed to the top result for everyone just by getting shoppers or enthusiasts to ‘promote’ that site a million times. Neither can your competitors outrank your site by clicking on removal link a thousand times.

Yes, you can now customize your search results with the organic rankings, deletions, leave notes against each page for future reference and see how other Google users have tailored their searches. SearchWiki notes will be visible to other users, identified with your Google Account nickname.

What are the implications of Google searchwiki on SEO?

It is like an alarm bell for everyone to straighten up their act, specially thin affiliate sites, spammers or the ones resorting to black hat stuff. Yes sooner or later there will hardly be a scope for anyone to deviate even by an inch from the core of search engine fundamentals. That is relevance and accuracy.

Yes, many things will be affected from sales to delivery and reporting. SEO won’t be dead but it will have evolved and more oriented towards content than techniques .

Google has been remarkable in preventing spam and this new tool on the prima-facie would not only generate more direct data for Google analysis but would also also initiate a mass spam removal movement worldwide. As far as promoted and removed data is concerned, Google obviously is wary of SEO masters using proxy servers running multiple alias sites and redirect pages and unethical methods that can easily used to promote a single page. Hence they will never make a mistake of simply considering all the votes gained for a page to it’s ranking algorithm for organic searches without due verification. All of this will give Google a whole new perspective to search user habit and patterns by allowing the user to mix and alter the organic results itself. Unthinkable but true that it is already happening.

What if Google decides to apply the promotional and removal data to page ranks? Dooms day?

Top 10 ranking results will be flooded with the sites that the majority of people prefer. The hottest and most popular existing pages will fill up the top slots overnight, for every imaginable keyword search phrase. The scope for newer, smaller, unpopular websites will virtually perish with no place in the top noticeable positions. As a result it will hardly ever gain a promotion. And slowly it will stand as good as removed even if it is not.

It might be great to force people to look at the most popular websites, but the small ones which are less marketed or are comparatively of less value or quality will never stand a chance. Lesser traffic can never be the final diagnostic indicator.

But look at this from the perspective of a person who’s looking to find something out. If I need to learn about the “webkinz dollar store”, I don’t frankly care whether that comes from a small blog or a an unknown forum page, as long as I find the info I need, and its reliable. And I can always find them right where i need from anywhere in the world.

For those concerned about SEO.

The agony or the anxiety about it’s effect on SEO and rankings could be erased in a second just by reminding ourselves of the one and only governing factor about search engines, that their existence itself depends and will always be on it’s ability to offer accurate and relevant information to the users and not anybody else. Even searchwiki, this new Google tool is intended with no other intent but relevance. Isn’t it so common find relevant content even after page 10 at times? ( I don’t know about you, but I do search deep when I need information ). In such a case one would either bookmark that page or copy the content for future reference. I always sympathize with quality web pages nowhere near to the top ranking positions. That proves that just great content alone can not guarantee top ten results. A multitude of factors like SEO, backlinks, sandbox are responsible to drive a page to the top. And the process itself is slow.

Relevance will now be “of the search (Google), by the search (Google) and for the search (Google).” Sounds quite like a democratic definition of a search engine.

Not so long ago when webmasters saw the immense potential in harnessing people’s bookmarking habits, the craze of social bookmarking sites diggs, del.ico.us erupted overnight giving search relevance a completely relative meaning.

Things will now change. What better to bookmark a page from within the searches in just one click with no further accounts to log in to.

Backlinks and quality links are still the driving forces behind a websites rise or fall. It is equated as votes earned from other sites. As far as Google’s stand point is concerned, a natural promotion of a webpage from different un-suspicious IP addresses can count as votes of relevance for a search phrase.

Scientists are maybe still trying to unify the forces of nature into one formulae, but looks like Google almost successfully unified the world.

Welcome to Google monopoly. Look how it gets bigger by the day.

One Account: Where your world converges.

(Oh if you haven’t got a Google account yet. You will be compelled to have one sooner or later)

One Search Engine: The keyword manufacturing unit. Keyword demand supply chain. Unlimited Manpower at work for the biggest keyword market. From where internet business and ecommerce are governed.

One Search Tool (External keywords tool) : Manufactured keywords put on window display. Who does have a better authority to declare than Google itself, about what people are exactly searching for? Take it or leave it.

One Traffic Estimator: (Google lets you judge the cost of your keyword too) Window shopping for keywords.

One AdWords: Ok so interested parties can shop for keywords from the keyword store.

One AdSense: Auctioned keywords recycled back to the people (searcher) working in the keyword factory.

One Webmaster Tools: The manufacturers of keyword money are now the safekeepers of all your keyword rich belongings.

One Analytics: Realtime live tv telecasting keyword news to keep the buyers and sellers interested.

One Web history: Refined fuel for the keyword engine machinery. Everyone’s web habit and online track records are well kept with Google. They exactly know geo-specific, cultural specific keyword needs. Well who better to assign a price-tag to a keyword up for auction?

One Homepage (iGoogle): If all these have become second nature to you, then iGoogle is the way to stay hooked. You will get a handful on your finger tips.

And Now Google searchwiki: Google taking control of what you thought is best for you.

It is like, you have helped manufacture some great and moderate keywords so far, so why don’t you manufacture some great result pages with your click votes too. After all there are a free gazillion keyword workers (search engine users) in the factory (Google) at any given point in time. Keep working a bit extra and Google shall know what exactly the gazillion wants to see or not see. The fairytale crystal ball is for real now.

Where do you stand? Your best kept secrets are the best resources to the Google rulers. Google knows what buyers want, what sells most. Google knows what sellers want, what buyers are willing to pay, how much are they willing to pay for, where do best buyers come from and the sellers too. The world wide web is not so entangled for the big G anymore. They conquered the world faster than Alexander.

Everyone’s Top 10 Pages will look different for the same search phrase. Scary to even think about it.

Google has gotten perfect at eradicating it’s imperfections. And if you thought you had a reason to point a finger at them due to erroneous relevant results, they gave the baton to you to improvise. Google may use 20 million algorithms in a millisecond to offer what is relevant. But now they will have a gazillion more from an entire planet to vote for and review their own definition of relevant searches.

Conclusion.
What are the future projections and it’s impact on SEO practices?
1. Analysis of top ten projections and reporting is likely to change based on a world consensus.

2. The definitions for pagerank and rankings for single phrases and e-commerce variables could change. If a considerable number of people are not seeing a particular result in the first pages because they have it custom configured for a particular phrase with pre-selected results crowding the top, then definitely there would be lesser click-throughs as even the top sites will be pushed back further. Thus resulting in lesser visitor count for subsequent pages and affecting pagerank algorithms.

3. Marketers and SEO experts will have to look at a bigger picture than being obsessed with pagerank and rankings for single phrases.

4. Google AdWords will become more eminent as an assured method for topping the results with paid rankings, even if the user’s result page is highly customized. This means more revenues for Google.

5. When everyone starts to promote their favorite sites, the quality of content will definitely become even more undeniable (as it should be), and “classic” SEO techniques will need a complete re-orientation.

6. Marketers and SEO industry now thriving on Google, will be more proactive on Yahoo, Quil etc as alternative options.

7. Since this feature is only for Google user accounts. As of now the page rank and result pages outside logged Google accounts will very much be based on the organic SERPs. Especially given the fact that yahoo still owns more account user bases than Google. But eventually they will dominate even more with search engine market share, because of their unlimited customizable features.

8. As this Search Wiki tweak can be highly prone to spams, we won’t really see any sea change in the PR status radically soon until the rest of the planet not on Google account register and start using the feature.

9. Analytics will be even more laser focussed. Google will harness immense amount of personalized data and use them to improve relevance of results. You now will have to option to know your promotion vs removal ratio for every indexed page. You will soon know your popularity rank as much as your PR rank.

10. You will soon be presented with realtime reviews on your web pages moderated or not moderated by Google.

11. Websites with genuine content and relevance will now be a super must to even fair anywhere near.

12. SEO will spell “Authority pages” more than “Optimized pages”.

13. Survival of the fittest will be the new Google theory.

14. All onsite testimonials and reviews on products, services often clinically engineered or manipulated will matter less because you will have realtime online reviews even before you land on that page. (Google comment feature = Realtime reviews)

Millions of webmasters and people must still be biting their nails, trying to figure out what is wrong or right with our big Google. How is it likely to affect the already established businesses, websites and SEO? But I hope this article gives you enough insight about our fate or growth on Google in near future.

Another search engine revolution has begun with Google Promote, Remove and Comment Feature. Are you ready for the change?

Krsna Solo

I believe, if internet marketing had a generic signature line, it would read, “try this at home”. And you don’t even need an expert license to build an affiliate empire. All you need is experience and more experience.

Funny how making money online could be so easy and illusive at the same time. I learnt the secrets and techniques from my experts when i began. Now I love to share what i have learnt over years. Gain from my experience on internet marketing, affiliate business, keyword research, SEO and profit form it.

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“Statutory Warning”

Affiliate marketing has serious occupational hazards like voluntary submission to amnesia and (OIC) obsessive internet compulsion. But sleep can wait till mustaches turn Grey. What if you already have one? Then you have slept enough. Take a leap with me.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Krsna_Solo