The difference between an XML site map and an HTML site map

Do site optimization now! Site Map is a very important part. But is it often asked whether the site is an XML sitemap, an HTML sitemap or both?

This is an interesting and more serious problem!

First let's take a look at the differences between the two site maps. HTML site Map is a traditional site map, is written to users of the site to see. It is equivalent to a directory, to the user to understand the network structure of the entire site, not lost.

The XML site map is the real meaning of SEO domain sitemaps, is written to search engines to see, tell the Search engine which page is an important page, equivalent to the search engine a steering wheel, as well as the frequency of updates, that is to tell the search engine interval how long should visit a time; But the XML site map is also for the search engine to provide a reference, the search engine does not necessarily exactly according to the parameters you set to finalize.

Personally think that most sites should have an HTML sitemap! as to why? Two reasons: First, it helps spiders crawl your site, and the second is to make it easier for visitors to understand your site. Of course, some sites can not need, such as small web sites or online stores, users can directly find what they need, and large content sites best put an HTML sitemap, easy to find information!google recommended webmaster HTML sitemap Each page of the number of links not more than 100, But I believe that the number is not that strict, if your single page more than 100 links, and users have a lot of help? (Oh, Google should still be included in your site of the article!)

What about an XML sitemap? Personally feel less important, but also not absolute! If your site structure is very good, the number of articles and the number of records, the XML sitemap can not need, the spider or will be normal crawling your station and included articles. If your site's article has more than 1700 articles, included only hundreds of articles, it is strongly recommended that you build an XML sitemap map. You can test by site, example: site:www.***.com view included number!

I think it's best to put an HTML sitemap on an ordinary website, because it's a great help to search engines and browsers! And for XML sitemap, for search engine spiders crawl and indexed, it is very useful! So what? adding an XML Sitemap has no effect on the site, In the end where this still have to slowly groping and practice.