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Three things tell a search engine how to classify your shop: a sitemap lists which addresses exist, the robots.txt restricts which of them should not be looked at, and with a separate mobile subshop, two entries in the page head ensure that the mobile and desktop versions are understood as the same page.

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Sitemaps

The TopRank Manager automatically generates a sitemap in XML format that all common search engines can evaluate. Whether an address is then actually visited and indexed is decided by the search engine itself. A sitemap is a notification, not an instruction. If you operate a mobile shop as a separate subshop, you need separate sitemap files for it. Guide: Configuring and activating TopRank, section “TopRank XML sitemaps” · Configuring and activating TopRank, section “Mobile sitemaps”

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The robots.txt

The robots.txt is a plain text file in the root directory of the domain. It conveys to search engine crawlers the request not to retrieve certain pages, directories or file formats. In addition, it holds further control instructions, for example for delaying access, and it announces content, such as the sitemaps from the TopRank Manager. When a WEBSALE V8s shop is set up, it is automatically created with this entry:
This means: the entire shop may be visited without restriction. Technically, the same would be achieved with an empty file or no file at all. The file is created nevertheless, because an existing and deliberately set robots.txt is good practice and because it is the place where later restrictions go.
The robots.txt is not the right place for controlling individual pages; the robots entry in the page head is. It is set automatically by the shop and can be adjusted manually in the TopRank Manager for each category and its products. Automatic control is recommended in any case.

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Registering sitemaps in the robots.txt

In the TopRank Manager, the option “Register in robots.txt” belongs to the option “Generate sitemaps”. If it is active, TopRank itself enters the addresses of the sitemap files in the robots.txt, and the search engines find them without any further action.
This is how TopRank proceeds: the existing file is loaded, all existing Sitemap: lines are removed, and the current ones are appended at the end. If no file exists yet, it is created first.
All other instructions in the file are retained. You can therefore safely maintain your own rules in the same file.
Guide: Robots entry in the HTML head · Configuring and activating TopRank

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Mobile subshops

The templates of the delivery shop are fully responsive. If you additionally operate a separate mobile subshop under its own address, three points must be observed.

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Checking whether the shop is suitable for mobile devices

Google’s mobile-friendly test gives a first indication. It lists deficiencies and explains how to fix them. Your shop should meet these points:
  • the text is large enough and easy to read
  • the content is adapted to the screen width, horizontal scrolling is not necessary
  • the links are far enough apart so that the neighboring one is not hit by mistake
  • frequently used buttons such as “Add to basket” are sufficiently large
  • the viewport is defined
  • there are no pop-up advertising banners and no full-screen overlays
If the shop turns out to be unsuitable, contact your representative at WEBSALE AG.

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Defining the viewport

Without a viewport specification, a mobile device renders the page at a typical desktop width and then scales it to the screen. The result is only readable with zooming. The specification belongs in the head of every page:

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Connecting desktop and mobile addresses

In the subshop concept, there is an associated mobile address for each desktop address, for example www.example.de and m.example.de. So that search engines recognize that they are the same page, two entries belong in the head of the pages. On the desktop page, a reference to the mobile version:
On the mobile page, a canonical pointing to the desktop version. With WS-RobotCanonical, the shop generates the canonical of the mobile subshop, that is with the mobile address and mobile subshop ID. For the output, both are replaced:
The two replacements contain your own domains and subshop IDs. The values in the example are placeholders and must be adjusted, otherwise the canonical contains someone else’s address.
Without WS-DisableXSSProtectionOnce, the special characters of the address would be output masked and the canonical would be unusable. The tag only affects the output immediately following it.
Reference: DC-FP1…5 · DC-FP1…5_set · DC-FP1…5_reset · DC-FP1…5_replace() · WS-DisableXSSProtectionOnce
  • Guide: Robots entry in the HTML head
  • Guide: Generating a canonical instruction in the head
  • Guide: Configuring and activating TopRank