How to generate Google sitemap in PrestaShop 1.7
First of all, what is a sitemap?
Sitemap is a file in which you provide information about the pages, videos, and other files on your site, and the connections between them. Search engines like Google read this file to craw your site smartly. A sitemap is necessary to increase the indexing speed of your website. To create a PrestaShop sitemap in PrestaShop 1.7, you will have to install and configure a special “Google Sitemap” module.
Install Google sitemap for your PrestaShop store
Google Sitemap module helps you build a map of your PrestaShop store and update it after that. To expand the speed of site indexing by search engines, it is critical to have a sitemap, which is basically an XML file listing all the products and pages of the store. Using this file, search engines effortlessly index all pages of a website. From that point forward, the products on these pages can be shown in search results when a user makes a search query.
You can download this Google Sitemap module for your PrestaShop store from GitHub.
Note: after the download is completed, the folder name must match the name of the module: “gsitemap”.
Log in to your store back office and go to Modules > Modules and Services. Search for “sitemap” module and install it.
Select “Installed modules” > “Google sitemap” > Click on “Configure” button to open module configuration page.
You will see these following settings on “Configuration” page:
In “Configure your sitemap” form, you can mark the categories that will not be included into the sitemap. Usually, you should check the authorization page, shopping cart, personal page, history of orders and others, where the same information is displayed for each visitor at the same address. Moreover, you do not need to include service pages like the 404 page in the sitemap.
You can start the creation of the file using the “Generate Sitemap” button.
When the process completed, you will receive sitemap URL (for example, http://localhost:8080/prestashop_1.7.4.4/1_index_sitemap.xml). Save this URL in your Google Webmaster account and “robots.txt” file.
Google Sitemap module will display the file size and the number of indexed pages. Please remember to update the file on a regular basis, so that the search engines could make a full indexation of your site.
On the last block of the configuration page – “Information”, you will see a “cron job” link. A good sitemap is a consistently updated sitemap. If you don’t feel ready to constantly press the “Update the sitemap file” button, let your server do this task for you.
Are you ready for your own sitemap now?
I hope you enjoyed our tutorial and ready to install Google Sitemap into your PrestaShop store! An XML sitemap is a must for every store owner who is serious about their SEO and SEM efforts. Though it doesn’t guarantee better SEO rankings, a sitemap can help search engines like Bing and Google crawl and index your website better.
Since it’s really easy to set up and configure, let’s go create one for your online store! And if you have any question, don’t hesitate to ask them in the comment section below, I will try to answer as soon as possible!
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