Mild-mannered designer by day…
I don’t actually think I’m a superhero. I mean, many people have this notion that superheroes have genetic mutations and have superpowers. Neither of which I have. Unless you count being a triplet as a genetic mutation 😉
How often do I need to submit a sitemap on Shopify?
Through running JSON-LD for SEO and being a no-bs kind of person, I am often asked about sitemaps. Specifically how often they need to be submitted to Google.
Once, if you feel like it!
Oh, you want more details than this? Ok, let me expand.
Submitting your sitemap to search engines is the same as registering where your sitemap is located. It’s not to tell Google to check your site again.
Search engines like Google use the sitemap file to find and index the pages found on your site. This then helps customers find your store.
Shopify automatically creates the sitemap for every store. They use the standard location for their sitemaps (sitemap.xml) so every search engine knows where to look for the information.
Technically, you only need to submit your sitemap for two reasons. If you have a non-standard location or you want to take advantage of Google Search Consoles index tracking.
Even then, it only needs to be submitted once.
I do think it’s worth connecting your Shopify site with Google Search Console.
If you haven’t yet, you’ll want to verify and submit your Shopify store by connecting your Shopify site with Google Search Console. If you run into any issues during this process, contact Shopify for help.
Either way, Shopify keeps your sitemap up to date and continues to share the information with Google.
What about the sitemap apps on Shopify?
If Shopify gives you a good quality sitemap for free and you only need to submit the sitemap once, then paying for a tool is a waste of money.
Do I need an HTML Sitemap page on my Shopify site?
Also a misinformed method of sharing your sitemap with search engines. Every search engine knows to look for the sitemap.xml file, so they can find it automatically. The concept of creating an HTML Sitemap page on your Shopify store comes from old-school SEO gurus where this wasn’t already built-in.
HTML Sitemaps are for your users, not for search engines. So if you think the user would actually visit and use the HTML Sitemap (I highly doubt it) then go ahead and add the HTML Sitemap. Most users use the search function on the website, they aren't looking for a sitemap.
Can I delete the HTML Sitemap pages on my Shopify site?
I can’t tell you if you can delete them or not. I can say that:
- They do not tell Google to index these pages.
- These pages are an old-school SEO tactic that no customer would ever look at or find value in, which is what Google actually cares about.
- Sitemaps pages do not impact your ranking.
- They make site owners feel good because someone told them they need it.
What you do with that information is entirely up to you. Keep them or delete them it won’t matter because they don’t do anything.
Some SEO “experts” will create sitemap pages like this as a way to create more internal links and thus Google thinks the pages are important. However, Google is smarter than this and would likely ignore the links.
JSON-LD for SEO doesn’t do anything with sitemaps but I’m still asked these questions all the time. So I hope this is helpful.
JSON-LD for SEO
Get more organic search traffic from Google without having to fight for better rankings by utilizing search enhancements called Rich Results.
Linking Llama
Link discontinued products to their best substitute. Keep discontinued products published on your website and continue to benefit from traffic to these pages.