How to Optimize Your Blogger Sitemap for SEO

Creating a sitemap for your blog is probably one of the best ways to give your blog much better SEO, therefore making the content on your blog better searchable by search engines.

In most blogging platforms, such as WordPress, this is pretty easy and there are built-in plugins or options to do so. However, in Blogger-which is Google’s blogging platform sitemap is somewhat more involved to set up.

Read More: How to Install WordPress on Localhost?

In this article, we are going to explain in detail the importance of a Blogger sitemap, how it works, how to create and submit one, and eventually improve your blog’s visibility.

What is a Sitemap?

A sitemap is organized in a list or a map of pages on a website that indicates how search engines understand and crawl the structure of a website. The XML format of the sitemap file includes the URLs of your site’s pages, posts, and other types of content. With this roadmap, you’re giving search engines like Google directions to find their path and index your blog content, therefore increasing the chances of your blog showing up when results come through.

A sitemap is important in Blogger because this can help override some SEO limitations of the site having a plugin system, for one. A good, well-structured sitemap acts like an index of your posts and pages, helping search engines prioritize the most relevant content of your blog.

Why is a Sitemap Important for Your Blogger Blog?

Search engines, especially Google, rely on sitemaps to efficiently crawl and index content. Here’s why a sitemap is essential for any Blogger blog:

1. Improved Indexing: A sitemap ensures that all your posts, even the oldest or least visited, are indexed by search engines. This maximizes the chances of your content appearing in search results.
2. Enhanced SEO Performance: Sitemaps help search engines understand the structure and hierarchy of your blog. This means search engines can prioritize certain posts over others, improving your blog’s overall SEO.
3. Faster Updates to Search Engines: When you publish new content or update old posts, a sitemap can help search engines discover those changes quickly.
4. Ensures Complete Crawling: Without a sitemap, search engines may miss certain pages, especially if they are not well-linked or buried in your blog archives. A sitemap guarantees that all your posts are accessible.

Types of Sitemaps for Blogger

There are two types of sitemaps commonly used for Blogger blogs:

• XML Sitemap: This is the most widely used type of sitemap, specifically designed for search engines. It lists URLs, includes metadata like last update times, and helps search engines understand which pages to crawl.
• HTML Sitemap: Unlike XML sitemaps, HTML sitemaps are designed for users rather than search engines. They provide a complete index of all blog posts in a format that visitors can browse, which can improve user experience.

For SEO purposes, creating an XML sitemap is essential, but having an HTML sitemap can also benefit users and enhance on-site navigation.

How to Create a Blogger Sitemap?

Blogger doesn’t automatically generate an XML sitemap, but it provides ways to create one with minimal effort. Here’s how:

1. Using Blogger’s Default Sitemap

Blogger does offer a default sitemap, though it’s somewhat limited. By default, your blog will have a sitemap at the following URL:

https://yourblog.blogspot.com/sitemap.xml

Replace “yourblog” with the actual name of your blog. This default sitemap lists the 26 most recent posts on your blog. For smaller or newer blogs, this default sitemap can be enough, as it allows search engines to index recent content. However, if you have more than 26 posts, this default option doesn’t include all of them, so a custom sitemap is recommended.

2. Creating a Full Blogger Sitemap for Larger Blogs

If your blog has more than 26 posts, you’ll need a custom XML sitemap that includes all URLs. Here’s how to create one:

1. Go to your Blogger account and navigate to Settings.
2. Under Crawlers and Indexing, ensure that the “Enable custom robots.txt” option is enabled.
3. Once enabled, you’ll see a box to add custom code. In this box, enter the following:

   User-agent: *
   Disallow: /search
   Allow: /
   Sitemap: https://yourblog.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default?orderby=UPDATED

4. Replace “yourblog” with your blog’s name. The code provided tells search engines to ignore the “search” pages on your blog and focus on the main content instead.

This code essentially converts your RSS feed into a sitemap that includes up to 150 posts. If you have more than 150 posts, you can modify the code to split the sitemap into multiple parts to accommodate all your content.

3. Using a Third-Party Sitemap Generator

For larger blogs, you may want to use an online sitemap generator. Simply:

1. Go to a free sitemap generator website, such as xml-sitemaps.com.
2. Enter your blog URL and follow the instructions.
3. Once generated, upload the sitemap file to Google Search Console (we’ll cover this step next).

How to Submit a Blogger Sitemap to Google Search Console

Now that you’ve created a sitemap, it’s time to submit it to Google. This step will ensure Google is notified of all your posts and updates.

1. Go to Google Search Console: If you haven’t already, sign up for Google Search Console using your Google account.
2. Add Your Blog: In the Search Console, add your blog as a new property by entering the blog’s URL.
3. Navigate to the Sitemaps Section: Once you’ve added your blog, go to the Sitemaps section on the left panel.
4. Submit Your Sitemap: In the “Add a new sitemap” field, enter the URL for your sitemap. For example, if you used the default Blogger feed, you would enter:

https://yourblog.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default?orderby=UPDATED

Or, if you used a custom sitemap generator, enter the URL where your custom sitemap is hosted.

5. Click Submit: After entering the URL, click on the Submit button. Google will then process your sitemap, which may take a few hours to several days.

Once submitted, check back in Google Search Console to ensure that Google has successfully crawled your sitemap. You’ll also be able to monitor any crawling issues from this dashboard.

Tips for Optimizing Your Blogger Sitemap

A properly set up sitemap is only part of the SEO equation. Here are some additional tips to optimize your Blogger sitemap:

• Regularly Update Content: Keeping your blog posts updated with fresh information not only helps readers but also encourages search engines to crawl your site more frequently.
• Optimize Your Post Titles and Descriptions: Each post should have a unique, descriptive title and meta description, as these are crucial for search engine ranking.
• Ensure Clean, Readable URLs: Blogger automatically generates URLs based on your post titles, but ensure that these URLs are concise and descriptive for better indexing.
• Use Internal Links: Linking to other blog posts within your content helps search engines and readers discover related content on your site.
• Monitor in Google Search Console: Periodically check your sitemap in Google Search Console to monitor indexing errors or issues, which can indicate areas for improvement.

Conclusion

A sitemap is one of the must-have tools if you are serious about raising the visibility and SEO performance of your Blogger blog. By default, Blogger doesn’t create a comprehensive sitemap, but you can create your own and submit it with a few easy methods.

Using the steps above, you’re guaranteed your blog content will be well-accessible to search engines, improving your ranking in the search results. Keep your sitemap updated regularly to keep the search engines in touch about the recent content published on your site.

Note that SEO benefits don’t have a scope of their own in keeping your sitemap as fresh as the day it was published.