How to Submit the Sitemap of Your Blogger Blog to Google

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Quite a lot of beginners are looking for advice on how to submit a sitemap of their Blogger blog to Google. Although this is surprisingly easy to do there is very little documentation available on how to go about it. That is the reason why I decided to write this post. It provides a set of simple step by step instructions to guide you through the process of adding a sitemap of your Blogger blog to Google. By following the steps lined out in the tutorial you will be able to add the sitemap of your blog to Google in about five minutes.

Why Add a Sitemap to Google?

Because Google owns the Blogger.com platform most blogs are automatically indexed by Google. However, you might find that the process of indexing does not always run as smoothly or as quickly as you might like. Manually adding a sitemap to Google has a number of distinct advantages:

• More likely to have timely indexing of your blog
• More likely that all URLs on your site will be accessed
• More frequent updating of your blog index in response to new posts
• Increase in site traffic as a result of all your pages being indexed

Guide to Submitting the Sitemap of Your Blogger Blog to Google

1. Sign in to Google Webmaster Tools

Once set up, this site will provide you with a detailed analysis about how Google indexes your blog. The easiest way to access the Google Webmaster tools is by clicking on My Account on the Blogger Navbar and then choosing Google Webmaster Tools from the list. Or go directly to this address: http:// www.google.com/webmasters/tools/

2. Add Your Blog to Webmaster Tools

Under the caption “Sites” you will find a button that allows you to add a site. Click once inside the box to remove the default text. Now enter the full URL of your site in the box including the prefix http:// and click on the "Continue" button. For example to add this site - "Eblogger Tricks.com" you would enter: http://www.ebloggertricks.com/

3. Verify the Ownership of Your Blogger Blog

Next, you will be asked if you want to verify your blog right away or at a later time. I recommend doing it right away. At this point you will be given 2 options: one to verify your site by uploading an HTML file and the other by inserting a meta tag into the HTML code of your blog template. As you do not have access to the server on Blogger.com you will need to choose the second option. To do this select “add a meta tag” in the dropdown menu entitled “Choose Verification Method”.

Once you make this choice you will be presented with a couple of lines of text which you will need to copy (Ctrl + C) to the clipboard of your computer.

4. Go to Blogger Layout Tab of Your Blog in a New Window

Open Blogger in a new tab or window and sign in if you are not already signed in --> Dashboard --> Layout. If you have created more than one blog make sure that you click on the appropriate title of your blog.

5. Edit the Template of Your Blog in Blogger

Layout --> Edit HTML. At this point you need to search in the code of your template for the first “head” tag. This should be somewhere between line 7 and 10 from the top. Once you have located the correct spot paste the code for the meta tag you created in Step 3 directly into the template. Take care not to overwrite any existing code! Click on Save Template to update your blog.

If you wish to err on the side of caution you might consider backing up your template before you make any changes to it however as long as you are careful this precaution is probably not necessary.

6. Return to Webmaster Tools and Verify Site

Once you have saved the changes to your template return to Webmaster Tools and click on the “Verify” button. You will then receive coonfirmation from Google that your site has been verified.

7. Navigate to Webmaster Tools Dashboard

If all went well you will now see your site in a list below the "Add Site" box. Click on your site in the list and you will be taken to your “Dashboard”. It is easy to check you are in the right place as your site name will be shown in the blue bar on top of the page.

On the Dashboard page you will find details about Google´s current indexing of your site. If Google has not as yet indexed your site you will see the message “No pages from your site are currently included in Google´s index” displayed. Alternatively, if Google has already discovered your site then you will get the following message: “Pages from your site are included in Google´s index.”

8. Navigate to Sitemaps in Webmaster Tools

Once your site is verified you can move on to adding your sitemap. To do this follow the “Submit a sitemap” link in the bottom right corner. This will take you to the “Sitemaps” page. There you will find a button labelled “Submit a Sitemap”.

On the Sitemaps page in Webmaster Tools type either atom.xml or rss.xml into the box provided to extend the displayed URL and click on the “Submit a Sitemap” button. Using the same example as before http://www.ebloggertricks.com/ becomes

either

http://www.ebloggertricks.com/atom.xml

or

http://www.ebloggertricks.com/rss.xml

All going well Google will then display a symbol indicating that your sitemap submission is pending. No need to worry, it can take some hours for your sitemap to be fully updated by Google. At that point you will be able to see the number of URLs identified by Google and the time of the last download. This is useful information as it will help you keep tabs on the pages of your Blogger.com blog site and identify any URLs that may be missing. Now that you have your sitemap in place you can look forward to increased traffic as more visitors will now be able to find your site.

 

Read the Following If Your Feed is Being Redirected

If you are redirecting your feed because you are using Feedburner for example you will need to add a query parameter to stop the redirect so that it will act as a sitemap.

Therefore instead of adding atom.xml or rss.xml you will need to add atom.xml?redirect=false to the site URL in the "Submit Sitemap" box.

Thus http://www.ebloggertricks.com/rss.xml 

becomes

http://www.ebloggertricks.com/rss.xml?redirect=false

If you have a lot of posts it would be worth your while adding the following parameter to have all your posts included: rss.xml?redirect=false&start-index=1&max-results=100

In the above example Google will index your first 100 posts. If you have more than 100 posts you can create another sitemap in which case you would start your index at 101 instead of 1.

This post has guided you through the process of authenticating your Blogger blog at Google Webmaster Tools and adding a sitemap to ensure better crawling and indexing of your website.

Good luck!

 

Technorati-Tags: submit sitemap,webmaster tools,seo,more traffic