Should canonical links be included or excluded in a sitemap?

[WebRiverGroup]

Our company is in the process of updating our sitemap. Should we include or exclude canonical links.

[Morningside]

Include everything. You want Google to spider everything.

Let's take an example:

Two pages which talk about Llama Grooming, one which focuses on Llama Fur Enhancement, and the other that focuses on Llama Fur Lustre.

The content for both pages really is the same, just the SEO is a little different for each.

Your main page: www.llamas.com/lfe.com (Llama Fur Enhancement) has all the copy SEO'd for Llama Fur Enhancement.   Your "alternate" page has the same copy, but optimized for Llama Fur Lustre with a Canonical REL tag back to the original page.  If you omit the second page from the Sitemap, it doesn't get spidered, then what's the point?  Both need to be spidered, but the Canonical REL tag tells it which is the "official" page so you don't get dinged for duplicate content.

Capice?

Jim

[WebRiverGroup]

So if I understand correctly, Our Sitemap.xml should only have the "original" page, not pages that have a canonical link.

Thank You for your assistance

[irvingw]

You mean in your sitemap.xml?

The canonical tag is a tab that goes on pages to let the bots know which URLs you want to get credit for content. So theoretically, your sitemap.xml file URLs should be very similar to your canonical links you are declaring in your metas.