Sitemap.xml

[Richard555]

Hi guys

I read the seomoz article about sitemap.xml dated 2008. Just wanted to check views on:

1. Is it worthwhile using the 'priority'
2. What if everything is set to 100%
3. Any tips to using the priority

Many thanks in advance!

Richard

[TomRayner]

Hi Richard

My advice would be not to worry about it too much, which is based on what John Mueller of Google said in 2011: http://www.seroundtable.com/google-sitemaps-priority-13936.html Some analysis and comments in that article too.

If everything was set to 100%, then it would negate any effect the protocol would have, so I'd avoid this.

I'd have your more important pages more heavily weighted, such as product pages, sale pages etc, in addition to having these pages higher in the sitemap.  This might give a slight nudge to Google on which pages to crawl first.  If you have a regularly updating page as well, this might be a high priority candidate.

But all in all, I wouldn't worry about using it too much.  The reason that there's not many more articles on it is that there's not really much to say about it - a sitemap alone will suffice.

Hope this helps!

[Richard555]

Hi Tom

Many thanks for the quick reply, it's much appreciated.

All very clear, thank you!

Cheers

Richard