Is A Sitemap Useful, For A Blogger Blog?

Occasionally in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I?, we see evidence of confusion and doubt.

Do I really need a sitemap, for my blog?

This question, when asked, may help us to design our blogs better.

WikiPedia defines a sitemap as

a list of pages of a web site accessible to crawlers or users

Classically, a sitemap is a visual index, to help the people viewing a static website, to easily identify and access a specific article in the website.

A sitemap provides an alternate index, to a non Blogger website. Most websites are static, with a hierarchically accessed, single structure. A well designed sitemap allows people and crawlers to more efficiently locate specific articles (pages or posts), in a static website.

Most Blogger blogs provide much more than a hierarchical, single, static structure. By default, a Blogger blog links its pages and posts dynamically, using several alternate indexes.

• Archives (posts listed hierarchically, by date).
• Labels (posts listed hierarchically, by topic).
• Extended main page (posts listed sequentially, by "Newer Posts" / "Older Posts").

Any blog, which provides one or more of these features, is effectively its own sitemap - for viewer access.

For crawler access, the options are simpler.

• Archives (posts listed hierarchically, by date).
• Extended main page (posts listed sequentially, by "Newer Posts" / "Older Posts").

Label searches, which use a different URL structure from the base blog design, are not used for indexing a Blogger blog.

If you look at the main page of a typical blog, you can follow the "Newer Posts" / "Older Posts" links from page to page, repeatedly - and eventually, see every post in the blog. With a new blog, with few posts, and predominantly "first visit" viewer traffic, the main page makes a passible sitemap. For an older blog, with many posts, and more "repeat" viewer traffic, the main page makes a less efficient sitemap.

For crawlers, which will generally follow a limited number of links within any single blog or website, the main page makes a still less efficient sitemap. Most blogs with any appreciable search engine reputation, however, only need new posts indexed by the crawlers - as older posts are already indexed, and remain in search engine cache.

Blogger provides a good, default gadget which serves as a sitemap, on most blogs - the Archives index. Look in the sidebar of this blog, about halfway down, for the "Contents" gadget. This is an HTML based gadget, which produces a set of hierarchical, date structured links, exhaustively enumerating each post in the blog. It's an ideal structure, for search engine bots (crawlers) to follow. If your blog includes this accessory, that's probably sufficient for indexing.

Blogs which contain one or more features can provide search engine access, organically.

• Well written, regularly published posts.
• The standard Archives gadget.
• The standard "Newer Posts" / "Older Posts" links.

Such blogs may not need a sitemap, to provide good access to both people and crawlers.

Both the Archives, Labels, and "Newer Posts" / "Older Posts" links are subject, on some blogs, to customisation. A blog with Javascript driven Archives, Labels, and / or custom pagination ("Newer Posts" / "Older Posts") gadgets may not provide easy crawler access. This also affects blogs which use dynamic templates. If you tweak your blog extensively, you may want to consider these issues.

There is one special case where a sitemap is always needed. Any time the URL of your blog is changed - whether to a new BlogSpot URL, or to a non BlogSpot custom domain - prompt re indexing, under the new URL, is a necessity to regain search engine reputation. A robust sitemap set, which directly references all posts in the blog, helps the crawlers to re index each post, under the new URL, much faster.

Other than that special case, a blog with standard, well designed, features may not actually need a sitemap.

A sitemap, setup through Google Webmaster Tools - and using the blog posts newsfeed, defined through "robots.txt" - is a simple accessory to add, and requires no ongoing maintenance. Given this reasoning, most blog owners simply setup a sitemap, and don't worry about the above issues and questions.

>> Top

Renaming Your Blog Requires Choosing An Available Blog Name

Like creating a blog, the task of renaming your blog involves one very important step - choosing an available blog name.

When you rename your blog - as in change the blog address - you have to pick a name (address) that's not in use. Both creating a blog, and renaming a blog, suffer from one key detail - you can't identify an available address before you get started.

When you create, or rename, a blog, you can only get to the task at hand, and start with the best choice.

Like "Create a blog", you'll only find out about an available URL after you have successfully chosen that URL for your blog. Unlike "Create a blog", the Blog Address wizard does not verify availability in real time.

1. Paste or type the desired blog name (Only the "yyyyyyy" in "yyyyyyy.blogspot.com").
2. Hit Save.
3. If the name was available, you'll be looking at the initial Blog Address display, with the new address "yyyyyyy.blogspot.com" identified - and "yyyyyyy" will now be unavailable.
4. If the name is not available, you'll get the sad news

   Subdomain: yyyyyyy is not available.

   And now, go back to Step #1, and try again.

If you want to do the rename with the least stress, you make a list of possible choices before you start, and sort the list in decreasing preference. Decide which names you like the most, before you start. Then start the above process with Step #1, and your top choice. If you end at Step #4, pick the next choice in the list, and go to Step #1, again.

As with "Create a blog", you should plan to go through your list as promptly as possible. Hesitate too long, when making the next choice, and your alternate choices could be unavailable.

If your choice of name will affect design work on the existing blog, yet you wish to change the blog design before renaming the blog, setup a stub blog - and pick the best available name for the stub blog, now. Once that's done, make the necessary design changes on your current blog - then swap names between the stub blog and your current blog. You'll likely use the stub blog, later.

As with creating a new blog, please note that addresses previously taken will not be reissued to you by Blogger - a 10 year old blog remains valid, whether published once daily for 10 years, or once 10 years ago and never again.

And as soon as you get the new name successfully chosen, be prepared to continue the renaming process, as promptly as possible.

>> Top

Clear, Or Set, The Post Feed Redirect

One of the most mysterious settings, in our blogs, is the ability to redirect references to the blog feed.

Some people use the "Post Feed Redirect" setting improperly. When this is done, the problems created can be easily solved, by clearing the setting.

1. Go to the dashboard menu Settings - Other - Site feed.
2. Look at the entry for "Post Feed Redirect URL".
3. If that option is incorrectly set, click on "Remove".
4. Click on "Save settings".
5. You're done.

If you actually need this setting, it's similarly simple to set it.

1. Go to the dashboard menu Settings - Other - Site feed.
2. Look at the entry for "Post Feed Redirect URL".
3. If that option needs to be set, click on "Add".
4. Paste or type the correct URL, into the box.
5. Click on "Save settings".
6. You're done.

The setting, for this blog, for instance, is:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/Nitecruzr-Blogging

Just understand what the setting does, how to enter the setting, and when you should use it.

>> Top

If You Are Not Planning To Renew Domain Registration, Publish Back To BlogSpot Now

One of the saddest answers given in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken starts with the naive query

My domain registration expired last month, and my blog is now offline. How do I redirect the domain back to the blog?

The answer here is simple, and does not provide a lot of promise, to the blog owner.

If possible, you may be able to publish the blog back to BlogSpot - but the blog will have to be re indexed from the beginning.

Once the domain registration expires, you cannot use the domain address for reputation or traffic source. Any search engine hit entries, to the domain URL, will be 404 - and there is nothing that you can do, if you no longer own the domain.

If your blog depends upon reputation, or search engine listings, for reader activity - and you are contemplating changing from a non BlogSpot domain address back to a BlogSpot address - you need to plan this change, before you start.

A successful change, back to a BlogSpot URL, starts before the domain registration expires - while you can use the domain to provide reputation, and search engine hits, to the BlogSpot URL. I like to advise people to allow at least a month for any blog to be fully indexed by search engines, when a blog is new.

If the blog is mature, and is indexed under a non BlogSpot URL, the process of re indexing under the BlogSpot URL may be only slightly briefer. A mature blog will have one thing going for it, that a new blog won't - inherent reader reputation.

Unfortunately, reader reputation will be good for one thing, when re indexing your blog under the BlogSpot URL - links on the readers blogs, to your blog. If your blog has readers who don't publish blogs, or their own reader list, publicly - or if you let the domain registration expire before starting the process of re indexing the blog - you won't gain a lot from reader reputation. All of the links on your readers blogs, just like all of the links in the search engine result pages, will be

404 not found

This sight will not provide you with reader traffic, or with any reputation.

If you must move from a non BlogSpot URL back to a BlogSpot URL, the time to start is a month before the domain registration expires. This is one of the few times when I will tell you to use domain forwarding. Use the Domain Manager wizard, hopefully provided by the registrar, and setup a "301 Moved Permanently" redirect to the BlogSpot URL - if the domain host allows this.

You'll also want to add a notice on the blog, announcing the change - again, well before the domain registration expires. An HTML / Text notice, visible on all pages, would be best.

This blog will move back to a native BlogSpot URL on (date). Please update your bookmarks now!

Plan the migration, and keep your readers - and maybe your readers readers, who use the links on your readers blogs to find your blog.

If you wait until the domain registration expires, you'll have nothing to do but publish your blog with new content - and hope that the search engines will continue to pick up the new content under the new URL - the old BlogSpot address. And maybe your current readers will find your blog. Maybe.

Blogger Magic - Republishing A Custom Domain Published Blog

Sometimes, when you have a Blogger blog, published to a non BlogSpot URL, you may need to repeat the publishing process.

Maybe, you want to change the BlogSpot or domain URL - or maybe the previous publishing did not complete, properly. If the blog is currently published to a non BlogSpot URL, you can't just publish it, again. You have to start by publishing the blog back to a BlogSpot URL, before you can again publish the blog to a non BlogSpot URL.

Given the right planning, and understanding of the tasks involved, you can do all of this in 5 minutes - less time than it will probably take you to read these instructions.

The republishing process is not complicated.

1. Publish the blog back to BlogSpot.
2. If necessary, make any necessary changes in BlogSpot.
3. Publish the blog to a domain URL.
4. If necessary, enable the domain root redirect setting.

To publish the blog back to BlogSpot, you'll use the Blogger dashboard Publishing wizard, at Settings - Basic.

• Look at the Publishing display.
• If the blog is published to a custom domain, click on the "X".
• If the "X" is not visible, you'll need to know where it should be - and you can click where it should be visible.
• If the blog is currently published to a BlogSpot URL, you may skip this step.
• If the final objective was to return the blog to BlogSpot, you are now done.

While the blog is (temporarily) published to BlogSpot, make any necessary changes. Maybe, change the BlogSpot URL.

To publish this blog (or another Blogger blog that you own) to a domain URL:

• Return to the Publishing wizard, for the blog in question, and click on "Add a custom domain".
  • Publish the blog back to an already purchased or used domain URL, by clicking on "Switch to advanced settings".
  • Alternately, purchase a different domain, using "Buy a domain for your blog".
• If you use the most common DNS addressing, aka "asymmetrical DNS addresses", be sure to only publish to the "www" alias.

Use the available and working redirect setting, to enable the domain root redirect, if necessary.

When you publish to a domain URL, you may have to add domain ownership verification. In this case, you'll need access to the Zone Editor wizard, provided by the registrar. If you originally used "Buy a domain" to purchase the domain, you'll need access to Google Apps, to access the registrar login instructions.

Other than the domain ownership verification, the republishing process is just a matter of 1 - 2 - 3 (maybe - 4). Having done this, be aware of the possible search engine relationship issues.

>> Top

Redirecting Any URL In Your Blog, To Another URL In Your Blog

Several months ago, Blogger Engineering gave us a new Blogger feature - the ability to redirect any URL in a blog, to any other URL in the blog. Like any feature, we found an immediate use for it - something much requested, for a good while.

Other people have found more uses for the redirection feature - and still others have found confusion. The syntax used in the redirection "From" and "To" values is not always obvious - and occasionally there is confusion about what can - and can't - be done with redirection.

This is the URL of this post.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2012/12/redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html

Using the redirection feature, I can redirect another URL in this blog, to this post - or conversely, I can redirect the URL of this post to another URL, in this blog.

Both the "From" and "To" values in "Custom Redirects" accept any static blog URL, less the base URL of that blog. You cannot specify the base URL - so all redirections will be within the blog itself. You also cannot use a dynamic URL (containing a "?") in a redirect.

The initial use for the redirection feature (at least, for me) was to replace the Home page of the blog, with another page or post - possibly, this post.

From: /
To: /2012/12/redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html

I could change the Home page of this blog, to start all new readers on the Topics Index page.

From: /
To: /p/topics.html

If I was to change the Title of this post, when re published, the URL would not change. If I wanted to change the URL of this post, I could redirect the desired URL, to the actual URL.

From: /2012/12/redirecting-any-urls-in-your-blog.html
To: /2012/12/redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html

If I want to allow this post to be accessed from a shorter URL, I can do that. If you click on the shorter URL (below), you will note that you still see the longer URL in the browser address window!

From: /redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html
To: /2012/12/redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html

I recently created a shortcut to my Topics index, as "blogging.nitecruzr.net/topics".

From: /topics
To: /p/topics.html

To get the "From" and "To" values for any redirection, I simply take any two URLs in the same blog. Choose any two examples - one for "From", the other for "To".

• The Home page: http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/
• A post: http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2012/12/redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html
• A static page: http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/p/topics.html
• A label search: http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/search/label/Redirecting
• A shortcut URL: http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/topics

And drop the base URL: http://blogging.nitecruzr.net

Giving:

• The Home page: /
• A post: /2012/12/redirecting-any-url-in-your-blog-to.html
• A static page: /p/topics.html
• A label search: /search/label/Redirecting
• A shortcut URL: /topics

Having developed the proper "From" and "To" values, adding a "Custom Redirects" entry is simple enough.

Having setup a useful complement of Pages, and redirected the Home page, you may wish to remove the "Home" page tab. Just edit the Pages gadget, using the dashboard Layout wizard, or the on blog quick edit icon - not the dashboard Pages wizard - and de select the "Home" page.

A simple example, showing the result, may be seen in my demonstration blog, Home Page Redirected To Label Search.

From: /
To: /search/label/Home%20Page

You may also wish to remove the "Showing posts with label ..." notice, if you like a cleaner display. In my demonstration blog (mentioned above), I did not do this - to make my examples more obvious.

The possibilities here are endless. Just use common sense - and again, note the limits on redirection.

Click here, for instructions. Note again, that the actual address, displayed in the browser address window, will not change.

>> Top

Redirecting The Traffic From Your Blogger Blog

Some Blogger blog owners are confused about their ability to redirect traffic to, or from, their blogs. Sometimes this leads to problems, as in the need to report a problem with spam classification, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken

Why was my blog just deleted, for "Malicious JavaScript"?

Other people will want to know why, after renaming their blog, all the search engine references now point to a dead URL. Still others may want to rename specific posts, and yet have the post URLs match the new titles.

Blog URLs, and Post URLs, are complex details, for Blogger blogs. By default, both are managed for you. Not everybody understands how to manage blog and post URLs, when necessary.

Not every blog owner understands that ones readers are not possessions, to be manipulated at will. Many spammers would love to use various Blogger blogs as gateways, redirecting their readers either to other Blogger blogs, or to non Google controlled websites. In order to discourage spamming activity, neither type of redirect is permitted, by the Blogger spam classifier.

Even if automated redirection was permitted, many redirection techniques may not work for everybody. Modern browsers, designed to prevent abusive activity like hacking and spamming, may have filters which explicitly block DNS settings, and scripts, designed to redirect traffic from one website to another. If you design your URL migration strategy to require automated redirection - and even if Blogger / Google does not delete the blog for abusive technique - you may still not see a consistent transfer of existing traffic, to your new URL.

You can redirect a Blogger blog, to a non BlogSpot URL, using properly setup custom domain publishing - "CNAME" referral. That is the only valid way to redirect a BlogSpot URL, to a non BlogSpot URL. Any other method will eventually leave you posting, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken

Why was my blog just deleted, by Blogger?

If you rename your blog - and publish to a new BlogSpot URL, your only recourse is to publish a "stub" (empty) blog to the old URL, and visually redirect your readers.

This blog is now published as "blogger-status-for-real.blogspot.com". Please update your bookmarks.

You can, if you wish, redirect the blog feed, after renaming the blog - but this should be done only when necessary.

There are several specific cases where the blog feed should not be redirected.

Blogger recently provided us the option to redirect traffic from one blog post to another - but the syntax used by the custom redirects wizard explicitly prevents redirection outside the base blog URL. That said, we have seen some imaginative redirections, between different URLs in the same blog.

Use of the custom redirect feature can generate interesting problems, not all of which can be prevented, easily. You can redirect some URLs - but you need to understand what you can, and cannot do - and why you cannot do everything that you would like.

>> Top

Custom Redirects Let You Modify Pages Or Posts, And Publish Different URLs

We've been asking for the ability to have post URLs that differ from the post titles, for some time. Now, we have the Custom Permalinks feature, available in the New Blogger GUI Posts Editor, for new posts.

Some people would like to use custom permalinks for existing posts - and for pages. We can do that, too - but not by using Custom Permalinks. Custom Permalinks only works for new posts - and not for pages.

To change the permalink for existing pages and posts, we use the Custom Redirects option, in the "Settings" menu under "Search preferences".

This post was published as

blogging.nitecruzr.net/2012/07/custom-redirects-let-you-modify.html

If I had used the "Permalink" option before publishing, I could have entered

new-blogger-gui-gives-us-custom

and published

blogging.nitecruzr.net/2012/07/new-blogger-gui-gives-us-custom.html

If I want to change the URL of an existing page or post, I would use "Custom Redirects".

To address this post as

blogging.nitecruzr.net/2012/07/new-blogger-gui-gives-us-custom.html

instead of

blogging.nitecruzr.net/2012/07/custom-redirects-let-you-modify.html

I would use "Custom Redirects", and

1. Enter "From:" as "/2012/07/custom-redirects-let-you-modify.html".
2. Enter "To:" as "/2012/07/new-blogger-gui-gives-us-custom.html".
3. Select "Permanent".
4. Click the "Save" link.
5. Hit the "Save changes" button.

Note that Custom Redirects, unlike Custom Permalinks, lets you change the published month and year ("/2012/07/"), and the extension (".html"). If you use Custom Redirects, do this carefully.

>> Top

Before Changing Your Custom Domain Published Blog, To Another Custom Domain, Do Some Research

As custom domain publishing becomes more popular, and becomes simply one more feature to add to your Blogger blog, some blog owners decide that the domain that they are using, right now, is not to their liking. Fortunately, with a Blogger blog, the process of changing your domain to another is not complicated - hoping that you have the right tools, and make the right decisions.

• Publish the blog back to BlogSpot.
• Use "Buy a domain" (if possible), and publish the blog to the new domain (as available).

All that being possible, there is a third step which many blog owners manage to overlook - until long after they have completed Step #2.

Since one of the features of custom domain publishing is to increase page rank / reputation / visibility by publishing the blog to a non BlogSpot URL, the vast majority of all Blogger blog owners, when changing the blog from one custom domain to another, will do well to plan a third step.

• Forward the current domain to the new published URL.

Too many times we see the plaintive cry in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken.

I just bought a new domain for my blog - but the previous URL is now 404!

This is a common complaint, for some blog owners who do not think the process through, before starting the domain swap.

For too many blog owners, the third step is not, at all, obvious.

But how do I forward the domain?

Too many custom domain owners don't know how to use the Domain Manager wizard provided by the registrar - or (in the case of "Buy a domain" customers) have not even setup the Google Apps domain manager desktop account, which provides access to the Enom or GoDaddy Domain Manager.

For these blog owners - and any blog owners contemplating a domain change - I'll add a fourth step to the process.

• Do some basic research - find out how to access, and how to use, the Domain Manager wizard.

And do this new First Step before you need to report

I just bought a new domain for my blog - but the previous URL - and all my search engine hits - are now 404!

and preferably before starting

• Publish the blog back to BlogSpot.
• Use "Buy a domain" (if possible), and publish the blog to the new domain.

After you properly complete the above procedures, don't expect to see an immediate transfer of page rank, reputation, and visibility to the new published URL. You need to plan ahead, and consider the issues, when changing domains - just as you would plan the rename of the blog, and as you would plan the custom domain migration. You'll find that changing the custom domain published URL involves issues from both of the latter changes.

>> Top