How to create a sitemap people can actually use
A planning sitemap is a map of your pages and their relationships. It is different from the XML sitemap search engines read, although a clean structure helps both people and crawlers.
List pages before arranging them
Start with goals, audiences and offers. Write every possible page on a separate card or line, then remove duplicates and combine weak pages. Keep utility pages such as privacy, thank-you and 404 pages in the plan even if they are not in the main navigation.
Group by visitor logic
Group pages by the questions visitors ask, not by your internal departments. Give groups plain labels. If you cannot explain the difference between two menu items, your visitor probably cannot either.
Set the hierarchy
Place the homepage at the top, primary sections underneath and supporting pages below those. Important pages should be reachable through intentional links, not buried in a deep tree.
Test routes, not just boxes
Trace three real tasks: discover an offer, decide whether to trust it and take the next step. Add cross-links where a visitor naturally needs them, then turn the structure into navigation and page briefs.
Quick check
- One homepage
- Clear primary sections
- Descriptive page names
- Shallow routes to key pages
- Utility pages included
- Important cross-links marked
- Navigation tested against real tasks
Turn the advice into your finished website plan.
The £14.99 Website Planning Kit gives you a printable planner, editable workbook, visual planning board, completed example and your own planning SuperAgent.
See the Website Planning Kit