Choose what belongs in search
Identify approved public pages with useful content and a clear canonical URL. Keep draft, duplicate and private material out of the public sitemap. Do not treat sitemap inclusion as a guarantee that a page will be indexed.
Sitemap processing status
The submitted sitemap’s processing result and discovered-page count.
Check access separately
Review robots.txt for crawl restrictions and page-level directives for indexing instructions. A blocked page may prevent a crawler from seeing its noindex directive. Sensitive information needs access control, not just a crawl instruction.
Verify the generated output
Check that sitemap URLs resolve correctly and match the intended domain. Remove old preview hosts and redirected destinations. After launch, use available search reports to investigate discovery or indexing issues rather than repeatedly resubmitting an unchanged file.
Put the guidance to work
Capture your starting point, assign an owner to the next action, and decide what evidence will confirm that it worked.
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