Should xml sitemap be included in website design?

[Holly Ursula]

I know a designer that gives people an xml sitemap for free with the website design. I know another one that charges for the sitemap etc. that has to do with SEO.Do people expect the xml sitemap to be included or is it ok to charge for that?

[icecape67]

depends on the complexity of the website. If it's a simple website with a few pages then you can even get free tools that will do it for you, if it's a dynamic website then it can be much more complex

[romaniya]

Yes you should a sitemap for your website in XML that sits on the server. While a sitemap.xml file is important it is also important that you have this file updated regularly. This can be accomplished using sitemap generators that run automatically on your website or manually using XML sitemap generators on the web.

Here are some examples of Sitemap Generators:
- Free Online service up to 500 pages: http://www.xml-sitemaps.com
- Low priced sitemap generator: http://www.smartfindsmarketing.com/xml_s…
- For a free one for Microsoft hosting servers: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/SitemapWr…

This process is a one time setup and should be included in your fees from a web development firm. If a sitemap generator is installed there may be a fee for the generator program but that is within $50 as you can see from the above links. There is no need to charge for this beyond the one time setup.

Google, Yahoo and Microsoft came to an agreement about Sitemaps back in 2005 and formed an organization called Sitemaps.org. You can read more about sitemaps at their website http://www.sitemaps.org/

[mickeyy]

Yes you should coz xml sitemaps helps both visitors and search engine.. sitemaps are like table of contents with all of your site pages are on it, which make easy for SEs bot to crawl.
Apart from that, Sitemaps would inform search engines immediately about any changes on your site. Of course, you cannot expect that search engines will rush right away to index your changed pages but certainly the changes will be indexed faster, compared to when you don't have a sitemap.

[ashwinth]

creating site map is very important because your website pages are quickly indexed when you have a site map on you home page and when google crawl you home page it automatically take in to account other pages of your website and they will indexed quickly also.

[charlieangles]

XML sitemaps are really important for the new web sites. Sitemaps play an important role in optimizing the site. Sitemaps are an easy way for webmasters to inform search engines about pages on their sites that are available for crawling. In its simplest form, a Sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with additional metadata about each URL (when it was last updated, how often it usually changes, and how important it is, relative to other URLs in the site) so that search engines can more intelligently crawl the site.

[Vikash]

Yes xml sitemap should be included in website design.

[mrgaretdonald]

If you want to more detail about xml or creating website design then google is very good source of e-books. Here I listed books related to creating wesites with xml which I use to develop my wesites.
website design in 30 days - Swith Nesnal
Website with xml - Mathew Hidden
5 things must create in sites - Copper John

[zabreeds]

if you have time i will show you how to do it. very easy with proper tools