It is important to let Google know all the pages of your site. This is done using an XML sitemap which lists all the URL’s within your site and then notifies Google. As new pages are created, the sitemap XML file is automatically updated so that Google easily find them.

Getting started with Webmaster Tools

The first thing you will want to do is login to your Google Account and travel to Webmaster Tools. When you first arrive you will want to add your site’s domain.

Verifying your site

Next you will need to verify that you are the owner of the domain by either adding a meta tag or load an HTML file. I prefer the upload process. Just FTP the file to your www root and click Verify.

Creating an XML sitemap file

If you are a WordPress user I suggest using a plugin called XML Sitemap Generator. If your not a WordPress user check out the Google Sitemap tool.

Insert XML sitemap into Webmaster Tools

Once you have a verified you have a valid XML file you will need to copy it’s URL. Then explore to Sitemaps within Webmaster Tools and in the box provided simply paste the location of your sitemap.xml file then Submit Sitemap.

SEO sitemap accomplished!

Now sit back an wait. In less than a few days Google’s bots will crawl your sitemap.xml and index all the pages on your site. Once this has happened, its status will change to OK. Under Diagnostics | Web Crawl, you can see if there were any errors indexing your site, then fix them as needed.