The HREF XML Sitemap builder is a scalable tool for developing Search Engine Compliant HREF XML sitemaps to designate the various language and country versions of your site.  One of the biggest challenges is matching URLs to each other.  Currently, we have been able to account for 87 of the nearly 100 or so most common problems associated with correctly building XML sitemaps.

Localized Directory Mapping

One of the biggest challenges for multilingual site owners is mapping localized directories and URL’s.   We have built in two different mapping features into HREFLang Builder.  The first you can upload a table of mappings or select and match directory names to a common classification.  The tool will then find all of those directories and map them together.   This is great for translated product categories and when the URL is the same in all countries.  For those with more complicated structures where we can map to a meta element in the page or from a database.

This newest feature is not available in any other tool, allows us to match translated directories to map them to ensure you have the complete set of matched URL’s.  For more information please review our Mapping Translated Directories FAQ.

Dynamic URL Matching and Mapping

The real challenge in building an HREFLang XML sitemap is mapping the alternative URL’s to each other.  All the other “free tools” force you to align the URL’s in CSV and then once the hard, and manual sorting is done, upload them to assemble the files.  We do all of that for you.   All we need to understand is how your URL’s indicate the country and language of each page.   While this can seem complicated we allow you to pick the format that matches your site and we do the rest.  We have accounted for over 100 different URL formats including subdirectories, subdomains and even ccTLD’s.   For more information please review our HREF Builder URL Mapping FAQ.

Our newest feature, that is not available in any other tool, allows us to match translated directories to map them to ensure you have the complete set of matched URL’s.  For more information please review our Mapping Translated Directories FAQ.

Multiple Source File Loading Methods

The first step of building out any XML site map a list of your URL’s that may be in many formats.   We allow you to upload many different formats including existing XML Site Maps, Excel/CSV files and even exports from Screaming Frog and Deep Crawl.  For more information on the import types we support please review our HREF Builder Import Formats FAQ

Dynamic HREFLang XML File Creation

We have integrated the ability to auto-generate new HREFLang XML files on a weekly or monthly basis.  Larger companies point HREF Builder to their dynamically updated XML files, XML export from Adobe AEM or a FTP and we import them, update the HREFlang XML.  Once completed we can FTP them back to a secure drive or email them to your designated contact.  We have also added email updates giving you error status, new or removed source files and country/languages to monitor the quality.

Third Party XML File Hosting

A big challenge for a number of companies is updating the XML files.  We have had some clients who’s IT teams need 45 days to update the files and another client’s files are 6 GB in size making traditional uploads a problem and giving direct access is a security risk.  The answer is to create a dedicated location either with subdomain or a dedicated site to post the files directly from HREFLang Builder and then use cross-domain verification protocols to connect the sites.  This completely eliminates the need for any handling of the files outside of the tool.  For more information on this feature please review our Missing Page Identification FAQ.

Missing Page Identification

This was one of the most requested features by clients for both validating alternate URL’s but also ensuring complete country matches after localization projects.   We can quickly show you in a single, downloadable table, all of the pages missing for each country or language version.  Most of the time, it is a problem with how the site is generating your source files or pages that were never localized.  For more information on this feature please review our Missing Page Identification FAQ.

Redirect, Canonical and Robots Directive Checking

HREF Builder is the only HREFLang tool that has built-in validation for redirects, 404, canonical and robots directives.   The goal is to produce 100% error free XML sitemaps that ensure you maximize your crawl budgets.

Every redirect, canonical or robots block is a wasted request from the search engines.   The search engines have stated no more than 1% of your submitted URL’s should have errors and if they encounter more hey will slow or stop indexing your site and sitemaps.  Why should they waste their time getting bad data?  For more details on what we check and how we enable you to report these errors please visit our Redirect, Canonical and Robots Checking FAQ for more information.