Is there any SEO value of an HTML Sitemap, or is it strictly UI/UX?

[Education4Life]

We have an xml sitemap that generates daily, and our site and navigation is strong. Is there any added SEO value in either the links, or content of an html sitemap?

I only see answers from several years ago so not sure if things have changed that would increase or decrease the importance.

Thanks

[PatrickDelehanty]

Hi there

From the user standpoint, it can help users understand the structure of your site more, if they click to it. From the SEO standpoint, it can help a bit with moving search and link equity through your site, but it's not a huge factor. Basically, if you have the XML setup and it's crawling fine, a HTML sitemap won't make a huge difference - Google and search engines want the XML sitemap. If you have a huge site, a HTML sitemap can be a big undertaking, but if you're site isn't that large, you have the bandwidth, and you want to create one, then feel free - it won't immensely help or hurt you.

I personally feel that XML sitemaps are more beneficial and are a better use of your time. As a user, I don't often use onsite sitemaps - I feel that if your navigation is set up properly, and you have an internal search, that you are doing the user enough justice to find your content in a quick and efficient matter that it eliminates the need. But again, it's totally upto you.

Hope this helps! Good luck!

[DirkC]

According to Google webmaster guidelines - a sitemap for users still has some value:
Offer a site map to your users with links that point to the important parts of your site. If the site map has an extremely large number of links, you may want to break the site map into multiple pages. (source: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769?hl=en)

I agree with Patrick that now most people don't bother to consult sitemaps  - if they need to consult it to find their way on your site you probably have a UX problem.
For SEO purposes - it still can have some advantages:

• it can ensure that your site becomes flatter (content is less clicks away from the homepage)
• Google wants that "Every page should be reachable from at least one static text link." .A HTML sitemap can help with that as well - especially if you have a highly dynamic site where a lot of content is only accessible by (product) search

Sites like Linkedin.com still use these HTML indexes (although they are not called sitemaps but member lists) - as you can check when you visit the site in "Incognito" mode in your browser.

rgds,

Dirk

[DonnaDuncan]

I just want to chime in on the "most people don't bother to consult sitemaps  - if they need to consult it to find their way on your site you probably have a UX problem" statement.

I agree, but a lot of sites DO have a UX problem, and for that reason I use HTML sitemaps. If you're in a hurry, and let's face it, everyone is, you can go directly to the HTML sitemap and search for whatever it is you're looking for. And yes, a lot of sites still DON'T have search either b/c they think their UX is fine and therefore don't need search. Can't tell you how many times I've had that conversation with site developers....