How to Fix Orphaned Pages in Sitemaps

If you’re managing a website, you might have encountered the term “orphaned pages.” These pages on your site are not linked to any other page, making them difficult for users and search engines to find. It becomes essential for you to link to other pages if these pages are super-rich with content. You can quickly identify this error by using SEMrush. Leaving orphaned pages can be problematic for your site’s SEO and user experience. 

Here’s a simple guide on identifying and fixing orphaned pages in your sitemaps.

What are Orphaned Pages?

Orphaned pages are web pages with no internal links pointing to them. This means visitors cannot easily navigate these pages, and search engines might not crawl them, leading to poor indexing and lower search rankings. Let’s say you have created a page but forgot to link to any page, like the menu, footer, or other pages. 

Why Orphaned Pages Are a Problem

1. Poor User Experience: Users can’t find these pages quickly, which might contain important information.
2. SEO Issues: Search engines rely on links to discover and index pages. Orphaned pages might not get crawled, leading to lower visibility in search results.
3. Wasted Resources: Valuable content on orphaned pages needs to be noticed, reducing the overall effectiveness of your site.
4. Search Console: It leads the search console to show an error. 

How to Identify Orphaned Pages

1. Use Website Analytics Tools: Tools like Google Analytics can help you find pages with low or no traffic, which might be orphaned.
2. Check Your Sitemap: Compare the pages listed in your sitemap with those accessible through internal links.
3. Use Crawling Tools: Tools like Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, or SEMrush can crawl your website and identify orphaned pages.
4. Google Search Console: Check page issues.

Steps to Fix Orphaned Pages

1. Update Your Sitemap:
   • Ensure that all necessary pages are included in your sitemap.
   • Use a tool like Google Search Console to submit your updated sitemap.
2. Create Internal Links:
   • Identify relevant pages where you can add links to the orphaned pages.
   • Use contextual links within the content to make them more natural and valuable for users.
3. Revise Navigation Menus:
   • Include links to critical orphaned pages in your main or footer navigation menus.
   • This makes them easily accessible from anywhere on your site.
4. Utilize Blog Posts and Articles:
   • Write new blog posts or articles that reference and link to the orphaned pages.
   • This can drive traffic and improve SEO.
5. Conduct Regular Audits:
   • Regularly audit your website to ensure there are no new orphaned pages.
   • Set a schedule for these audits, such as quarterly or bi-annually.

Example Scenario

Imagine you have a website publishing many pages. You might have published a page about the disclaimer. If this page isn’t linked anywhere else on your site, it becomes an orphaned page. Here’s how you can fix it:

1. Update the Sitemap:
   • Add the “disclaimer” page to your sitemap.
2. Create Internal Links:
   • Add links to the “disclaimer” page from your homepage, product pages, and blog posts.

Conclusion

Fixing orphaned pages is crucial for improving your website’s SEO and user experience. By updating your sitemap, creating internal links, and auditing your site, you can ensure all your content is accessible and valuable to users and search engines. Start implementing these steps today and watch your website’s performance improve!