We’ll show you how to submit your website ? to the major search engines:
But first, let’s talk about whether or not you even need to submit your site to search engines.
Do I have to submit my website to search engines?
Search engines use crawler bots to search existing websites for new links. When a bot finds a useful link, whether that’s a specific page on a website or a wholly new website, it adds the link to the search engine’s index. This process is constantly happening, which means that search engines should find your website on their own.
However, there are a couple of reasons to submit your website manually to search engines:
- You control what search engines learn. Manually submitting your website means that you can make sure search engines get important information about content updates and other website changes.
- You ensure that search engine results reflect your most recent content updates. Sitemaps are also checked more frequently by bots than regular website pages, so submitting your sitemap ensures that content updates will be indexed in a timely fashion.
- You get more opportunities to improve your site. When you register your website with Google or Bing, you’ll gain access to tools that can help you improve your site.
What’s more, the process takes only a few minutes, which makes it one of the easiest ways to boost your SEO.
Submitting your website to search engines: step-by-step tutorials
Now let’s take a look at how you can submit your website to the most popular search engines:
How to find your sitemap
In order to submit your website to search engines, you’ll need to have your sitemap link ready to go. If you’re using WordPress, the default location for this is https://yourdomainname.com/wp-sitemap.xml or https://yourdomainname.com/sitemap.xml. Simply add the /wp-sitemap.xml extension to your homepage URL and you’ll find it.
Some plugins, such as Yoast SEO or Rank Math, can change the location of your sitemap to improve security and SEO. If you’re using one of these plugins, you can typically find the sitemap in the plugin’s Settings area. Some plugins may also have a separate location called Sitemap Settings.
How to submit your website to Google
Step one: sign up for Google Search Console
The only way to submit your website to Google manually is to use the Google Search Console. You can sign up for this by going to the Google Search Console website and clicking Start Now:
If you’re not already logged into Google, you’ll be asked to sign in. You can use an existing account for this or create a new one.
Once you’ve signed in, you’ll be prompted to enter your domain (without prefix) or URL (with prefix). We recommend entering the full URL as it’s easier to verify.
You’ll then be required to verify ownership of your site. The easiest way to do this is with an HTML tag.
Step two: submit your website to Google
Next, click the Sitemaps link in the sidebar of your Google Search Console account and enter your sitemap URL into the area provided. Click Submit to submit your sitemap to Google officially.
