Tips For Your Shopify XML Sitemaps for SEO
You need a sitemap for your Shopify store’s SEO, period! Luckily, Shopify is awesome for creating your sitemap! But, you need to audit it and make changes to tailor your SEO strategy.
I want to share with you the importance of Shopify’s XML sitemap and how to optimise it for your store. By following our comprehensive guide, you will be able to better visibility, traffic, and sales by controlling how search crawlers interact with your website via the sitemap.xml
What is a Shopify XML Sitemap?
Good question lol!
A Shopify XML Sitemap is a file that contains a list of all the pages, products, collections, and blog posts on your Shopify store.
It helps search engine crawlers like Googlebot discover and index your pages more efficiently. It also provides valuable information about the content on your site, such as the last modified date, priority, and frequency of updates.
What is the Default Sitemap on Shopify?
So, the platform generates the default sitemap on Shopify, and you can access it by appending “/sitemap.xml” to the end of your store’s URL. It includes all your pages, collections, products, and blog posts, plus any other public pages.
But, let’s be honest, it may not include everything you want it to, especially if you have a large, fancy website. If that’s the case, you might want to use a third-party Shopify app like “SEO Manager” or “XML Sitemap & HTML Sitemap” to generate a more comprehensive sitemap that includes everything you need to rock ‘n’ roll!
Just remember, the default sitemap might not be enough to get you the SEO results you want. So, you should optimise it by using juicy titles and descriptions, prioritising your key pages, and getting rid of anything that’s just taking up space.
Why is Shopify’s XML Sitemap Important for SEO?
Having a Shopify XML Sitemap is important for SEO for several reasons:
- It helps search engines find and index all the pages on your site, especially those that are not easily discoverable by links or navigation menus.
- It allows you to prioritise and give more weight to the pages that are more important or frequently updated.
- It helps you identify and fix any crawl errors or broken links that can negatively impact your rankings.
- It helps you track your site’s performance and identify areas for improvement.
By optimising your Shopify XML sitemap, you can make your site easier to find, easier to crawl, and more relevant to the people you want to see it. This can lead to higher rankings, more traffic, and ultimately more sales.
How to Create a Sitemap for Shopify?
Try the 13 steps to create your Shopify sitemap:
- Log in to your Shopify account and go to the “Online Store” section.
- Click on “Preferences” and scroll down to the “Search engines” section.
- Under “Search engines”, click on the “Create XML Sitemap” button.
- Shopify will generate a sitemap for your store automatically, which you can access by adding “/sitemap.xml” to the end of your store’s URL.
- Check your sitemap for errors or warnings using a tool like Google Search Console or Bing Webmaster Tools. These tools can alert you to any crawl errors, missing pages, or other issues that can affect your SEO.
- If there are any errors or warnings, you should fix them and resubmit your sitemap to ensure that all your pages are indexed correctly.
- If you have a large or complex site, you may want to use a Shopify app like “SEO Manager” or “XML Sitemap & HTML Sitemap” to generate a more comprehensive sitemap. These apps can provide more options and customisation for your sitemap, such as excluding certain pages or collections.
- Once you have generated your sitemap, you should optimise it for search engines
- Include all the pages, products, collections, and blog posts on your site.
- Use descriptive and keyword-rich titles and descriptions for each page.
- Prioritise the most important or frequently updated pages by setting their priority and frequency higher.
- Use canonical URLs to avoid duplicate content issues.
- Remove any unnecessary or irrelevant pages that can dilute your sitemap.
How to Optimise your Shopify XML Sitemap?
Now that you understand the importance of Shopify’s XML sitemap, let’s dive into the steps to optimise it:
Step 1: Generate your Shopify XML Sitemap
Shopify automatically generates a basic XML sitemap for your store, which you can access by adding “/sitemap.xml” at the end of your store’s URL.
However, this basic sitemap may not include all the pages or collections on your store, especially if you have a large or complex site.
That’s why I recommend using a Shopify app like “SEO Manager” or “XML Sitemap & HTML Sitemap” to generate a more comprehensive sitemap.
Step 2: Check for errors and warnings
Once you have generated your Shopify XML sitemap, you should check it for any errors or warnings using a tool like Google Search Console or Bing Webmaster Tools. These tools will alert you to any crawl errors, missing pages, or other issues that can affect your SEO. You should fix these errors and resubmit your sitemap to ensure that all your pages are indexed correctly.
Step 3: Optimise your sitemap structure
Follow these best practices to optimise your Shopify XML Sitemap:
- Include all the pages, products, collections, and blog posts on your site.
- Use descriptive and keyword-rich titles and descriptions for each page.
- Prioritise the most important or frequently updated pages by setting their priority and frequency higher.
- Use canonical URLs to avoid duplicate content issues.
- Remove any unnecessary or irrelevant pages that can dilute your sitemap.
Step 4: Submit your sitemap to search engines
After optimising your Shopify XML sitemap, you should use Google Search Console or Bing Webmaster Tools to send it to search engines. This will ensure that your site is indexed quickly and accurately. You should also update your sitemap regularly, especially when you add new pages or products to your site.
Final thoughts on Shopify sitemaps
Hey! So, it’s clear that optimising your Shopify XML sitemap is essential for helping crawlers. By following our detailed guide, you can make sure your sitemap is complete, free of any mistakes, and geared towards your target audience.
So, don’t ignore this with your SEO strategy, as it can have a significant impact on your site’s visibility, traffic, and sales.
Oh yeah.
Please, keep an eye on your sitemap on a regular basis and update it as needed to ensure your site is always optimised for search engines.
Useful guides:
