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overlooked in search engine marketing strategies, a sitemap
can not only help your visitors navigate your site more
effectively, it can also be a guide to search engine spiders.
There are ways that a sitemap can be structured to work
to your SE marketing advantage, which we will discuss in
this edition of Traffic Talk.
The purpose of a sitemap is to create an "index"
or "table of contents" of your site. With this
in mind, create a new page of your site and list each page
by section using strong keyword phrases as descriptive text
links found on the page being linked to. For example, if
you have a links page to promote the affiliate program of
your site or programs used on your site, name the link to
that page on your sitemap "Gambling Webmaster Affiliate
Programs Links Page" (and make sure the page is optimized
for the keywords you use to link to it).
Using keyword text links in your sitemap, as well as when
linking to pages within your site to other pages within
your site, will help lend more keyword relevance to the
pages being linked to. Even more important is designating
early a specific way for other sites to link to you and
formulating keyword rich descriptions and titles for use
when submitting to (Gambling) search engines and exchanging
links with other sites. This is often why sites with their
primary keyword in the standard title of their sites tend
to rank higher and higher over time in the search engines.
Recognize and decide early what your primary keyword for
your site are/will be and formulate your linking titles
from there.
An Index for Indexes
Back to creating sitemaps, if you create a table in an html
page with 4-5 columns, begin with the main sections from
left to right. These will be your first navigational options
when entering your site. Expand in the next column the sub
section link options and move right one column per click
represented. Soon you should have user paths outlined and
duplicate/cross links represented from within your site.
But what about the pages, such as doorways, that are only
used for marketing? These should also be included, linked
using keywords, and listed however you feel are appropriate.
If you have yet to uncover the awesome search and replace
features in Dreamweaver and/or NoteTab Lite, I highly recommend
you check and test them out, it is a huge timesaver when
maintaining all the pages of your site. Here is an example
of a sitemap I have created.
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