Let Search Engines Know How to Find Your Website

The whole point of having a website is to attract visitors who will, hopefully, become customers or view/click ads on a monetized blog. Before you spend a lot of time flushing out all the details on your site, you need to let search engines, like Google, know how to find your site and what’s on it. To do this, you need to submit and xml sitemap to Google Search Console (formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools). The Search Console is one of many webmaster tools offered by Google. Submitting an xml sitemap from your WordPress site isn’t as scary or difficult as it sounds.

Step One: Install Yoast

If you haven’t already, you’ll need to install the Yoast SEO plugin. This is the plugin we use for our search engine optimization clients here at Meredith Communications. To do this, go to plugins, then click “add new” and search for Yoast.

Step Two: Create a Sitemap

Once you have Yoast installed, click on SEO in your left sidebar dashboard menu and navigate to the Yoast dashboard. Click on the features tab and then enable Advanced Page Settings.

You’ll see under SEO in your dashboard menu that you now have additional options. One of these is XML Sitemaps. Click that and under the General Tab select the link for XML sitemap. This will open a new browser window or tab with your xml sitemap.

Step Three: Submit to Google Search Console

Copy the link in the browser tab or window with your xml sitemap. Then open your Search Console and select the website you’re adding the xml sitemap for. On the left-hand side, choose Crawl. This will expand that menu. Then click Sitemaps.

In the upper right corner, you’ll see a red button that says Add/Test Sitemap. Click that and paste the link you copied. Note: you’ll only need the part of the link that comes after your website name (ex. Meredithcommunications.com/sitemap.xml – the only part to be pasted in this box is the sitemap.xml)

Click submit and let Google do the rest! Google will index your site and allow you to track activity from the console.

To learn more about SEO and help understanding the activity on your Google Search Console, contact Meredith Communications for a free initial consultation.

Categorised in: Search Engine Optimization (SEO), What We Do