sitemap problems

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  catwoodsporchparty · Member · Jul 29, 2013 at 9:33 pm

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  Near the end of June I verified my blog with Google.
  I then submitted the WordPress sitemap to my Google Webmaster Tools page from instructions on this forum. The link I pasted in does lead to the sitemap, but when displayed in their information it appears with a slash / mark in front of it and there is also an error noted. It is still “pending” and has not been “indexed”.

  I cannot get their Help forum to answer as to why. Can anyone here tell me why and what I need to do to correct this, in easy steps for persons not tech-savvy?

  When I go to the sitemap it says at the top, “This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below.” Could this be the reason the sitemap is not accepted?

  What is style information? Can WordPress fix the lack of it, or if I need to fix it myself, can someone here advise me as to how, again in easy step-by-step terms?

  Thank you for your assistance.

  The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

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  timethief · Member · Jul 29, 2013 at 9:52 pm

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  WordPress.com provides the search engines with a sitemap for your blog http://en.support.wordpress.com/sitemaps/ and pings the search engines every time your publish and edit. It takes time for Google and the other search engines to index your content. http://en.support.wordpress.com/webmaster-tools/

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  catwoodsporchparty · Member · Jul 29, 2013 at 10:14 pm

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  Thank you for your reply. I’m still confused and I ‘m sorry, I know these questions are basic. Are you saying it isn’t necessary to submit the sitemap to the Google Webmaster Tools site after verifying one’s blog? That would be great if no further action was needed! I submitted because that site information indicated the sitemap hadn’t been submitted.

  Or are you saying that they will still index the sitemap submission to Google Webmaster Tools in the future and that the error message doesn’t mean it won’t be indexed?

  The lack of “style information” isn’t important?

  Thanks!