XML Sitemap Question!
-
Hi All,
I know that the sitemaps.xml URL must be findable but what about the sitemaps/pageinstructions.xml URL?
Can we safely noindex the sitemaps/pageinstructions.xml URL?
Thanks!
Yael
-
In regards to an "XML site map"- it's essential to have a site-map on your company website, that's because it makes it much easier for a Google Bot, to find the pages/ blog posts to crawl and index these if you have a XML site map.
We added a Yoast SEO site map to our Bristol Garden Room company website, in Bristol to ensure that all the blog posts / main pages were getting indexed.
-
Yes, you can noindex practically anything using the robots.txt file
-
Hey
Yes, you can safely do that. In the end, you mostly want to make sure that the right pages are being Crawled > Indexed. If that requires certain (XML) files to be no-indexed, then that's the way you want to go.
Martijn.
-
Hey Yael,
You should be able to. If it's being indexed, you can request removal via Bing Webmaster Tools and Google Search Console. You can also update your robots.txt file to disallow the page "http://www.robotstxt.org/robotstxt.html"
I hope that helps!
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
-
Why do people put xml sitemaps in subfolders? Why not just the root? What's the best solution?
Just read this: "The location of a Sitemap file determines the set of URLs that can be included in that Sitemap. A Sitemap file located at http://example.com/catalog/sitemap.xml can include any URLs starting with http://example.com/catalog/ but can not include URLs starting with http://example.com/images/." here: http://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html#location Yet surely it's better to put the sitemaps at the root so you have:
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | McTaggart
(a) http://example.com/sitemap.xml
http://example.com/sitemap-chocolatecakes.xml
http://example.com/sitemap-spongecakes.xml
and so on... OR this kind of approach -
(b) http://example/com/sitemap.xml
http://example.com/sitemap/chocolatecakes.xml and
http://example.com/sitemap/spongecakes.xml I would tend towards (a) rather than (b) - which is the best option? Also, can I keep the structure the same for sitemaps that are subcategories of other sitemaps - for example - for a subcategory of http://example.com/sitemap-chocolatecakes.xml I might create http://example.com/sitemap-chocolatecakes-cherryicing.xml - or should I add a sub folder to turn it into http://example.com/sitemap-chocolatecakes/cherryicing.xml Look forward to reading your comments - Luke0 -
Old sitemaps after site migration.
Hi, I was wondering if it's safe to remove all the sitemaps from the old site in search console? It's been 3 months since site migration from http://sitea.com (301 redirected) to http://siteb.com. Therefore, can I delete the old sitemap from the http://sitea.com from search console? Thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ggpaul5620 -
Pop up question and link flow?
Does a pop up like the one on this site www stressfreeprint co uk (top left corner about us, who we are) count as an external link or would link juice not flow to it. I like to have a few pages that i don't want to waste link juice on but would still like to have them and hope this is the answer.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BobAnderson0 -
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 -
XML Sitemap Indexation Rate Decrease
On September 28th, 2013 I saw my indexation rate decrease on my XML sitemap that I've submitted through GWT. I've since scraped my sitemap and removed all 404, 400 errors (which only made up ~5% of the entire sitemap). Any idea why Google randomly started indexing less of my XML sitemap on that date? I updated my sitemap 2 week before that date and had an indexation rate of ~85% - no I'm below 35%. Thoughts, idea, experiences? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RobbieWilliams0 -
Paging Question: Rel Next or Canonical?
Hi, Lets say you have a category which displays a list of 20 products and pagination of up to 10 pages. The root page has some content but when you click through the paging the content is removed leaving only the list of products. Would it be best to apply a canonical tag on the paging back to the root or apply the prev/next tags. I understand prev/next is good for say a 3 part article where each page holds unique content but how do you handle the above situation? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Bondara0 -
Microsite question
Good morning, I have a client who is a local realtor www.chantre.com and they have several locations in their region. We created individual sites for their locations that are linked from their main site (on the left bottom). I need some advice and guidance... Are the location sites a good consideration as microsites? I know we should include the rel=canonical tag and are in the process of doing so, but any comments on this would be appreciated I know the answer to this one, but the client insists on continually asking about it...would it be better to have the location sites linked from the main site as subdomains? Any other suggestions to either prove or disprove our technique in breaking out the location sites, whether it's a good idea or if we are harming their SEO is appreciated THANKS!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | gXeSEO
Darlene0 -
Merging several domains into one, a redirection question
Hi, We have a client who recently acquired a bunch of domains in all kinds of niches, each domain has a WordPress site on it, with content and backlinks. Clients wants to "merge" all these domains into categories in his "main website", moving content and "moving" backlinks as well. The syntax we came up with is the following: (sample domains of course)
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MandLoys
potatomixers.com will be updated with .htaccess 301 redirect:
Redirect 301 /fastpotatomixer.htm http://www.mainwebsite.com/home-appliances/fastpotatomixer 1.) I'm not sure about the domain's root though. Where would I redirect potatomixers.com, to mainwebsite.com/home-appliances? Won't that be a problem that the new one is a "larger" category that has other posts as well, not only potatomixers? 2.) If this gets into the .htaccess (with several other lines for the other content as well of course), won't the first line "override" all the other ones? Redirect 301 / http://www.mainwebsite.com/home-appliances/
Redirect 301 /fastpotatomixer.htm http://www.mainwebsite.com/home-appliances/fastpotatomixer
Redirect 301 /easypotatomixer.htm http://www.mainwebsite.com/home-appliances/easypotatomixer etc. Thanks!0