PAS Template & SITE MAP question

[Brokerstar]

Thank you very much guys.

Dominic

[Brokerstar]

Ok I'm still having a few issues with this whole site map thing.

I've been updating the XML site map in my PAS CMS by manually entering in new URL's like so:


<url>

<loc>http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/articles/beating-tight-players-heads-up.html</loc>

<lastmod>2011-09-01</lastmod>

<priority>0.5</priority>

</url>


However when I checked my Google webmaster tools I had a ton of errors come up here:



So I just tried using on of the free tools to generate a site map and when it's finished it comes out in an XML file but now I don't know how to load that XML file into my PAS and I also don't know how to check if it's got all of my new pages as the software crawled my site and I don't want to manually read through the whole thing to see what pages it has and hasn't got.

Anyone have any simpler ways to make and maintain the XML site maps?

Broker

[JohnG]

Are you submitting the "sitemap.xml" or some other file? Because I'm not seeing the lastmod/priority tags in the default sitemap.xml.

The key to quickly getting content indexed is to ping the search engines when you add new content. You do this by re-submitting your sitemap to webmaster tools (both Google and Bing have them). You can also submit them by hitting a URL, but the webmaster tools are just good to have around anyway.

So I just tried using on of the free tools to generate a site map and when it's finished it comes out in an XML file but now I don't know how to load that XML file into my PAS and I also don't know how to check if it's got all of my new pages as the software crawled my site and I don't want to manually read through the whole thing to see what pages it has and hasn't got.

If your menu and link structure is good enough, the free tools are the best way to keep them updated. Just replace the contents of the sitemap.xml in the PAS CMS with the new contents and resubmit to Google/Bing.

[Brokerstar]

I deleted the site map with the priority tags as that seemed to be the problem and now it's all working again.

With regards to the site map the free tools generated I don't think you are understanding what the problem is. The site map it gives me just looks like a horrible, jumbled mess with no structure and I don't know how to check if it has all of my new links? See below:

http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/2011-9-5Weekly0.5 Free Heads Up Poker Training Videos 2011-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/outer_page...1-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/rakeback-o...1-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/outer_page...1-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/outer_page...1-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/outer_page...1-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/outer_page...1-9-5Weekly0.5 http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/outer_page...1-9-5Weekly0.5



In Google webmaster tools though I have submitted the site map url: http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/sitemap.xml and I have also reverted back to the original format that the standard PAS back end seemed to use:


<url>
<loc>http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/articles/calling-station.html</loc>
</url>
<url>
<loc>http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/articles/easiest-poker-sites.html</loc>
</url>
<url>
<loc>http://www.tagpoker.co.uk/articles/free-online-poker-coaching.html</loc>
</url>


I must admit that I haven't submitted anything to Bing ever so may have to look into that now.

Thanks for your help as always.

Broker

[Brokerstar]

I'm just trying to set up my Bing webmaster account but I need to 'verify' my account.

It says that I need to post this on my main page:

<meta name="msvalidate.01" content="FFD0C0B0D4325D03B230E16BF210EC6D" />

But even after I do, Bing say's that they can't find it?

Can any of the tech guys check that I have pasted this in the right place? It needs to be in the 'head section' of the page.

Broker

[JohnG]

I'm just trying to set up my Bing webmaster account but I need to 'verify' my account.

It says that I need to post this on my main page:

<meta name="msvalidate.01" content="FFD0C0B0D4325D03B230E16BF210EC6D" />

But even after I do, Bing say's that they can't find it?

Can any of the tech guys check that I have pasted this in the right place? It needs to be in the 'head section' of the page.

Broker

You need to edit the "layout" file and stick it in there. Right now you have it in the content. It's in "layout/layout.html".

[JohnG]

I deleted the site map with the priority tags as that seemed to be the problem and now it's all working again.

With regards to the site map the free tools generated I don't think you are understanding what the problem is. The site map it gives me just looks like a horrible, jumbled mess with no structure and I don't know how to check if it has all of my new links? See below:

XML sitemaps aren't meant for human consumption, so yes it will be a jumbled mess. =) The free sitemap generators will often spit out XML and HTML versions. The HTML versions typically are arranged in some sort of structure, so you can quickly look at those and see if your new content is in there. If you've linked to the new content from anywhere and have done so correctly, it'll find it.

Regarding priority/lastupdate tags in the sitemap, these aren't fully trusted by the engines anyway so they don't have to be there. Google/Bing know the important pages anyway due to where the traffic is coming and what pages people look at. People often just set the priority to the highest level for everything, and put the timestamp as it was updated recently, so the engines don't really care about them.