A client of mine (whose website I built, and who’s on one of my maintenance plans) messaged me the other week with a very reasonable question: “Helen, what’s a sitemap, and do I need to update it?”
It’s a great question, and one I get asked more than you’d think (hence this blog!). It sounds like one of those techy, behind-the-scenes things that only web developers need to worry about – jargon-packed and full of overly complicated words. It isn’t.
The quick summary…
If you want people and search engines to actually find your voiceover website, having a sitemap matters, and it’s a lot less scary than it sounds.
So, grab a brew. Let’s sort this out.
What actually is a sitemap?
Picture a flowchart of your website. Homepage at the top, with lines branching down to your about page, your services page, your gaming page, your corporate narration page and/or promo page (each with your demos), your contact page, and so on. That flowchart, in essence, is your sitemap.
Except instead of it being a pretty diagram for humans, a sitemap is a simple file (usually called something like sitemap.xml) that lists every page on your site in a format search engines can read. Think of it as handing a search engine a neat little map before it sets off exploring your site, rather than leaving it to wander around hoping it stumbles across your audiobook narration page… eventually.
You won’t normally see this file when you’re browsing a website. It sits quietly in the background, doing its job, and most website builders create and update it for you automatically. Which is actually rather helpful of them.
Why should you care?
Because search engines like Google use your sitemap to work out what pages exist on your site and how they all connect. Without one, search engines are relying purely on stumbling across your pages by following links, which is slower and a lot more hit-and-miss.
With a sitemap, you’re essentially saying: “Here’s everything I’ve got, please come and have a look.” That’s especially handy when:
- You’ve just launched a new site and want search engines to find it quickly
- You’ve added a new page (a fresh genre page, an updated blog page) and want it indexed sooner rather than later
- You’ve had a bit of a website restructure and want search engines to catch up with the changes
If you’ve read my beginner’s guide to SEO for voiceovers, you’ll know that getting found online is about a combination of factors working together. A sitemap won’t single-handedly rocket you to page one, but it’s a foundational piece that helps everything else you’re doing actually get noticed.
Do you already have one?
Almost certainly, yes. The good news is that WordPress, Wix, Squarespace and most other website builders generate a sitemap for you automatically, without you lifting a finger. Hoorah!
Want to check? Try popping /sitemap.xml on the end of your website address into your browser (so, www.yourwebsite.com/sitemap.xml). If a page loads up with a slightly baffling wall of text and links, congratulations, that’s your sitemap, and it exists – our sitemap is here. If you get an error, don’t panic, we’ll come back to where to look properly for each platform in a moment.
How to keep it maintained
Here’s the reassuring bit: for most voiceovers on WordPress, Wix or Squarespace, your sitemap looks after itself. Add a new page, and it gets added to the sitemap. Delete a page, and it drops off. You don’t need to manually edit anything.
What’s worth keeping an eye on:
- If you’re on WordPress using an SEO plugin (like Yoast, SEOPress or RankMath), double check the sitemap settings weren’t accidentally switched off at some point
- If you’ve deleted pages, it’s worth making sure old links aren’t hanging around causing “not found” errors
- After any big site restructure, it’s a good moment to resubmit your sitemap to Google Search Console (more on that below) just to nudge things along
That’s genuinely most of it. This isn’t a job that needs doing every week, or even month, more of an occasional “just check it’s still ticking along” task.
Why bother adding it to Google Search Console?
Google Search Console (GSC) is a free tool from Google that shows you how your site is performing in search: what people are searching for when they find you, which pages are indexed, and whether anything’s gone wrong. If you haven’t set this up yet, it’s worth reading my SEO guide first, as it covers getting your site verified with Google in the first place.
Once you’re verified, submitting your sitemap to Search Console means you’re actively telling Google “here’s my map, please use it”, rather than hoping it finds the file on its own eventually. It also means you can see, in plain terms, whether Google has actually managed to read it properly.
How to add your sitemap to Google Search Console
First, you’ll need your sitemap’s web address. Here’s roughly where to find it depending on your platform:
WordPress: if you’re using SEOPress, it’s usually at /sitemaps.xml. For Yoast and RankMath, it’s usually at /sitemap_index.xml. Try those first, and if it doesn’t load, check your SEO plugin’s settings for the exact link.
Wix: Wix automatically creates one at /sitemap.xml, no setup required.
Squarespace: same again, Squarespace automatically generates one at /sitemap.xml.
Once you know your sitemap’s web address, here’s how to submit it:
- Log into Google Search Console (if you manage more than 1 site, check you’ve selected the correct one from the property list in the top left menu).
- From the menu on the left, click Sitemaps.
- You’ll see a box asking you to “Add a new sitemap”. You only need to enter the last part, so if your full address is www.yourwebsite.com/sitemap.xml, you just type sitemap.xml into the box (Google already knows your domain).
- Click Submit.
- Give it a moment, then check the status. You’re looking for “Success”. If it says “Couldn’t fetch”, double check you’ve typed the sitemap address correctly, and that the sitemap page actually loads when you visit it directly in your browser.
And that’s it. You don’t need to do this daily, weekly, or even monthly. Once it’s submitted and showing as successful, Google will keep checking back on its own. It’s just worth resubmitting after a big change or restructure to your site, or if you ever notice pages aren’t showing up in search when you’d expect them to.
The bit where I mention I can just do this for you
If all of this made perfect sense and you fancy pottering about in Search Console yourself, brilliant, go forth and submit that sitemap. But if you got halfway through and thought “I would rather have a session with 3 directors, 8 clients and a couple of copywriters thrown in for good measure, than do this myself”, that’s completely reasonable and normal too, and it’s exactly the sort of thing I sort out for my 1-2-1 website clients.
That client I mentioned at the start, the one who asked the original question? Because I built their site, I set up their sitemap (plus, their maintenance plan means I keep it updated as part of their general monthly upkeep, so their site stays healthy without them having to think about it).
It’s also one of the things included via our Be Seen forum inside our Be Seen Be Heard membership, alongside a lot more support for getting your voiceover business seen and heard online. Worth a look if this kind of behind-the-scenes housekeeping isn’t really your idea of a fun Tuesday.
Either way, your sitemap doesn’t need to be a mystery any more. A small file with a big job, but one that’s simple to set up and is 95% self-sufficient.