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Robots.txt File: How To Benefit From It Most

February 9th, 2010

Robots.txt File: How To Benefit From It Most

In the web you will find many types of websites in which you can get the information that you need. You can simply search the web engine and there are already lists of website pages that may match your needs. Anyone can also have their own site and put all the necessary contents that they want to share to other people. However there are a number people who make some web pages but they do not intend that it would be search for others. Thus they use the robots.txt file.

One may have some websites in which they do not want others to view it because it is not yet finished or that there are a few information that may be irrelevant to most people. Thus you can use the file and keep others in opening the webpage.

The search engine crawler generally follows this robots exclusion protocol or robots.txt file if it is present in the server. The main use of this file is to determine which sites or pages in a website are to be accessed by the search engine and which are not. This will keep the Web robots from crawling in certain pages that may have sensitive contents that is not intended for other viewers. However this file only prevents the access into the web pages but it does not keep the site from being indexed.

There are some people who tend to have problems when their sites are not listed in the search engine. When this is the case most blame the wrong use of the robots.txt file. The file prevented the users why certain sites are not listed in the search engines or some cannot access the whole site. When you fixed the problem regarding the file the site will then be indexed and it will soon have a better traffic.

When a person does not use the file correctly or put codes the wrong way there result would definitely the other way around. Thus they should be able to know the use of the file and how it should work according to your needs. There are some people who want their website to be viewed by others so they must not use the robots.txt file. However for some who may want certain unfinished or confidential pages not to be indexed the proper use of the file will be a big help for them.

There may be a number of problems with the robots.txt file since there is no way that you may be able to stop other sites to link into your site. However in some way the robots.txt file help in making the person protect the search engines from gaining access to some web pages or your whole website but the site is still available only not from the search engines. Still a careful use of the file should be done so that the results will be according to what you want.

About the writer: The article was written by Leia Mahalo a freelance SEO and SEM specialist working for itrepreneur.com. If you wish to contact Naomi please visit Internet Entrepreneur Blog.