Did you just publish a blog post or launched a new website recently? Still can’t find your pages on Google?

Fret not. This is the bane of almost all websites that are new. 

Today I have a few smart solutions to share with you to get pages indexed on Google within a few hours, if not instantly after hitting the publish button. 

Here is a quick video about the solutions listed in this article:

As you know, Google is beating all other search engines out there!

The latest report suggests that Google has over 86% share of the overall search traffic.

Find more statistics at Statista

So, as a website owner, ignoring Google is definitely not a good idea. This is the platform your target audience uses the most.

But before all this, Google needs to index your pages.

How can you submit individual URLs to Google so that it indexes these pages as quickly as possible?

This article only talks about how to get your URLs indexed on Google. If you want to rank those pages, just contact us online or hit us on the live chat below.

1. Build a Sitemap

One of the most widely used methods for submitting URLs to Google is using a sitemap.

Since the search console was introduced, Google has been requesting the webmasters to submit the sitemap for better indexability and crawlability.

A sitemap can be created using three different formats.

XML Sitemaps

XML is one of the most commonly used formats for creating a sitemap.

The abbreviation XML stands for Extended Markup Language, and it is easy to create.

You don’t even need professional help to create one.

If you are running a WordPress website, all you need to do is install the Yoast SEO plugin.

It automatically creates an error-free sitemap with all the URLs you need Google to Index.

In case you don’t want to do this, you can use any of the online sitemap generator tools to create a sitemap for your website.

Just upload the sitemap on your server, and done.

RSS, mRSS, and Atom 1.0 Sitemaps

If you are a publisher with a lot of content added every day, the best format for you would be these.

Just enable the RSS feeds on your website and submit the URL to the Search Console sitemap.

Google News publishers are already using this feature.

Google wants publishers to submit RSS feed URLs in the News Publisher Central so that the pages are indexed as soon as they are made live.

Plain Text Sitemaps

This is possibly the easiest way to submit your URLs to Google for indexing.

You just need to create a .txt file with each URL you want to index.

Ensure that you are adding just one URL per line.

Once you have all the URLs, submit them on the sitemap section of the search console.

Keep these in mind while creating your Plain Text Sitemap.

• Use UTF-8 encoding while saving the file.
• Ensure that there is nothing other than the URLs in the file.
• There are no constraints with the file name. However, ensure that the extension is .txt
• Different Types of Sitemap Extensions

If you want to know more about sitemaps and the importance it has on SEO, read our in-depth article.

Submit XML Sitemap To Google Search Console

If you have created a new website, Search Console is the best free URL submission tool at your disposal to give a heads-up to Google that you exist.

To use the Search Console, you have to first verify your website by placing an authoritarian code.

Consider this as the first thing to do after the site launch.

Here are a few steps for submitting bulk XML URLs through Google Search Console

Step 1: Add Your Website on Google Search Console.

Step 2: Create a sitemap for your site (XML, RSS, or Plain Text).

Step 3: Upload your sitemap to Google Search Console.

Step 4: Fix errors, if any, and resubmit if necessary.

2. Use URL Inspection Tool 

Consider that you have already submitted the sitemap on Google, and most of the pages are indexed.

You published a new page that has time-bound information.

You cannot wait for Google crawlers and need immediate crawling and indexing.

That’s when you can use yet another handy feature within the search console – URL Inspection Tool.

If you have used the old search console, it had a “Submit URL” feature.

However, when Google updated the search console in 2018, it integrated this feature with the URL Inspection Tool.

The URL Inspection Tool allows you to check whether a URL has been indexed in Google.

Additionally, you can also check for various other important details, including the Schema enhancements and indexability of the URL.

You can submit the new URL by hitting the Request Crawl button.

Steps for Submitting a New URL Using URL Inspection Tool

Step 1: Log in to Search Console.

Step 2: Selected URL Inspection Tool from the Left Navigation Tab.

Step 3: Enter the URL you want to submit.

Step 4: Request Index.

NB: The Request Index feature of Google doesn’t guarantee immediate crawl and index. It may take a few minutes before you see the new URL added to the index. Again, this feature comes to use only if you want immediate indexing. Google’s crawler does a good job most of the time by indexing pages quickly.

How to Submit an Updated Content to Google

In case you made some significant changes to the content within a URL and want Google to reflect those changes ASAP, this tool is again going to make your life much easier.

Just click on the Request Recrawl option, and your new version will get added to Google’s priority list.

Step for submitting URLs using Inspect Element tool

Step 1: Log in to Search Console.

Step 2: Selected URL Inspection Tool from the Left Navigation Tab.

Step 3: Enter the URL you want to resubmit.

Step 4: Request Reindexing.

5. Create Noise

Ok. This one is a bit controversial, but the truth is it has worked for us here in Stan Ventures. 

As soon as you hit the publish button, try to create a lot of noise around the article. Share it on multiple social media platforms including reddit, quora and other discussion forums that are getting huge attention from Google. 

When you have the URL mentioned on multiple platforms, there are higher chances of Google’s bot finding any one of it and adding it to the index. 

6. Fixing Found But Excluded Pages

Did you stumble upon an error in the search console that says URLs discovered but excluded. It’s a quite common issue among websites. 

There could be multiple issues leading up to this error. You can check for this error by going to the search console and clicking on the coverage report. 

Here you can find the list of pages that haven’t been indexed due to specific issues. Fixing the errors can pave the way for these pages to Google’s index. 

Why is it Important to Have a Page Indexed?

So, I guess you have already made your website live.

Great!

Are you unable to find the pages on Google? That’s the last thing you want.

Don’t worry. Most new websites face the same hardship.

But this has straightforward solutions.

This is exactly what I’m going to discuss in this article.

RIP Google URL Submit Tool! No More Bulk URL Submission to Google

Earlier, Google offered the “Submit a URL” option for all its users to enable faster indexing of websites and URLs to its search index.

The “Submit URL” option was widely used by blog managers, webmasters, and outsourced SEO experts to push pages of client websites for faster indexing.

It was easy as webmasters could save the time spent asking clients their search console details to submit URLs through the “Fetch as Google” option.

However, Google’s URL submit tool is now dead!

This was confirmed after the search engine giant pulled the plug on one of its widely used services.

Why Google Killed the URL Submit Tool?

SEO experts, who were using this tool for submitting backlinks and for faster indexing, will face the heat as they are currently left with no other option other than waiting for their links to be crawled by Google naturally.

The submission of URLs was possible even for users who didn’t have to sign in.

It is possible that Google detected webmasters using the service for adding bulk URLs for indexing, which could have prompted them to discontinue it.

“We’ve had to drop the public submission feature, but we continue to welcome your submissions using the usual tool in the Search Console and through sitemaps directly,” announced Google, through its official Twitter Google Webmaster account.

We've had to drop the public submission feature, but we continue to welcome your submissions using the usual tool in Search Console and through sitemaps directly.

— Google Search Central (@googlesearchc) July 25, 2018

The Submit URL option was added to Google search back in 2008 and later added it to its Classic Webmaster Account in 2012, with a few minor design changes.

Since then, the feature was part of Google Webmasters and later the Search Console.

The removal of the ‘submit URL feature’ from the Google search console has globally come to effect.

The page now displays a message that reads, “To submit a URL to the Google index, either submit a sitemap or use our new URL Inspection tool.”

Cling on to Fetch as Google and Sitemap, says Google:

With the elimination of Google’s free URL submission tool, webmasters will now have to use the “Fetch as the Google” option in the Search Console to make indexing faster. This latest move of the search engine giant has once again stressed the importance of having sitemaps. “Want to let us know about new or updated pages quickly? Use Search Console’s Fetch & Submit for individual pages, or have your CMS tell us directly with a sitemap file or feed,” Google tweeted.

What John Mueller Said About the URL Submit Tool

Over the last few months, webmasters have been noticing Google being fussy to index URLs that were submitted through the public URL submission tool.

With this announcement, it seems like the strategic move to kill off the tool, which has allowed users to submit URLs without signing in to the search console, was well thought out.

Earlier, John Mueller, the Senior Webmaster Trends Analyst – Google, had said that the URL submit tool need not be used if your content is well written with added value during one of his webmaster sessions.

He also identified a few scenarios wherein the tool might become handy for webmasters.  “…The one time I would recommend using the submit URL tool is when you have, like, real issues on your website that you urgently need to fix and you will urgently need to have Google reflect that in the search results. So, for example, you removed something private that you actually published. That would be a good candidate for this tool. Maybe, you had this wrong phone number in your title in your search results and people were calling up someone else accidentally. That would be something that you’d want to get re-indexed and want it processed as quickly as possible.”

While it is a good practice to submit URLs to Google for indexing, it doesn’t guarantee that your webpage will rank in the search engine. Crawling and indexing websites are a part of SEO. To ensure that your site ranks well on Google, you have to consider other essential factors like site speed, quality of content, and keywords used. By implementing the right SEO strategies, your content will have a greater potential to rank high on Google.

 

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