Using SiteMap and MasterPages to set META Tags in ASP.NET and C#

Using the SiteMap for SEO Purposes in ASP.NET 3.5 and C#

Introduction
Especially since the introduction of Web 2.0, a new emphasis has been made on SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for our web pages. Google, amongst others, have managed to organize the world's data so well, that it is becoming more and more important to adhere to such organization techniques to gain the traffic your web site deserves.

In this article we will look at one of the ways we can use the SiteMap in ASP.NET to organize our Web Page more efficiently, and also make it easier for us to update. We will be creating a SiteMap file, which is written in XML, to define our meta Title, Description, Keywords tags as well as page Headers for each of our Web Pages depending upon their location.

What we will learn in this article:

• How to utilize an ASP.NET SiteMap to harness the power of SEO
• How to make it easier for us to maintain a multi-page Web Site using a SiteMap

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Getting Started
The major search engines rank a page against serach results based upon many factors. Having matching terms in your meta tags will rank your page higher, particularly in Title, Description and Keywords. However, when maintaining larger sites, this can be difficult to keep organized and a hefty chore to maintain and update. However, we will show how we can make it a little easier using the SiteMap.

To begin, start a new Web Site project in Visual Studio.NET - in this example, we will be using 2008, but 2005 will work just fine.
Once open, right-click your project in the Solution Explorer and choose Add New Item.. SiteMap. Leave the name as Web.sitemap and click Ok. You should have something like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <siteMap xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/AspNet/SiteMap-File-1.0" >

<siteMapNode url="" title="" description="">

<siteMapNode url="" title="" description="" />
<siteMapNode url="" title="" description="" />

</siteMapNode>

</siteMap>

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This is where we start off. But first, let's create some pages to work with. First, let's add a MasterPage: right-click your project and choose Add New Item.. MasterPage. Leave the name as MasterPage.master and then delete the Default.aspx that was added when you created the project.
Now we can add a new Web Form, making sure we check the box to select a Master Page:

[Click to view full-size]

Next, choose the MasterPage we just created:

[Click to view full-size]

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Our next step is to design our MasterPage. For the purpose of this tutorial, we will simply add a Literal control as a placeholder for the page header:

<form id="form1" runat="server">
<strong><asp:Literal ID="lit_PageHeader" runat="server" /></strong>
<div>

<asp:ContentPlaceHolder id="ContentPlaceHolder1" runat="server">

</asp:ContentPlaceHolder>

</div>
</form>

We will also add three more Web Forms to our Project, namely Page1.aspx, Page2.aspx and Page3.aspx and we will identify them in the body, and link to all other pages, like so:

<%@ Page Language="C#" MasterPageFile="~/MasterPage.master" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeFile="Page1.aspx.cs" Inherits="Page1" Title="Untitled Page" %>

<asp:Content ID="Content1" ContentPlaceHolderID="ContentPlaceHolder1" Runat="Server">

This is Page1.aspx<br />
<asp:HyperLink ID="HyperLink1" runat="server" NavigateUrl="~/Page2.aspx" Text="Page 2" /> |
<asp:HyperLink ID="HyperLink2" runat="server" NavigateUrl="~/Page3.aspx" Text="Page 3" />

</asp:Content>

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We make sure that we check MasterPage for each of our Web Forms.
The Literal control in our MasterPage is going to display the page header that we specify for each page in the SiteMap. Let's go ahead and begin our SiteMap. It will have somewhat of a hierarchical structure like so:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <siteMap xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/AspNet/SiteMap-File-1.0" >

<siteMapNode url="~/Default.aspx" title="This is the TITLE of the Default page" PageHeader="Welcome to the Default Page" description="This is the META Description tag od the Default Page." keywords="keywords, of, the, meta, tag, of, the, default, page">

<siteMapNode url="~/Page1.aspx" title="This is the TITLE of Page 1" PageHeader="Welcome to Page 1" description="This is the META Description of Page 1." keywords="keywords, of, the, meta, tag, of, page, one" />
<siteMapNode url="~/Page2.aspx" title="This is the TITLE of Page 2" PageHeader="Welcome to Page 2" description="This is the META Description of Page 2." keywords="keywords, of, the, meta, tag, of, page, two" />
<siteMapNode url="~/Page3.aspx" title="This is the TITLE of Page 3" PageHeader="Welcome to Page 3" description="This is the META Description of Page 3." keywords="keywords, of, the, meta, tag, of, page, three" />

</siteMapNode>

</siteMap>

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Notice our attributes for each page in our project. We will be using title for the Meta Title tag, PageHeader for our Literal control, description for the Meta description tag, and keywords for the Meta keywords tag.
To implement this, we will add code-behind to the Master Page:

protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{

if (SiteMap.CurrentNode["PageHeader"] != null)
{

lit_PageHeader.Text = SiteMap.CurrentNode["PageHeader"].ToString();

}

if (SiteMap.CurrentNode != null)
{

Page.Title = SiteMap.CurrentNode.Title;

if (SiteMap.CurrentNode["keywords"] != null)
{

HtmlMeta meta = new HtmlMeta();
meta.Name = "keywords";
meta.Content = SiteMap.CurrentNode["keywords"];
Page.Header.Controls.AddAt(1,meta);

}

if (SiteMap.CurrentNode.Description != null)
{

HtmlMeta meta = new HtmlMeta();
meta.Name = "Description";
meta.Content = SiteMap.CurrentNode.Description.ToString();
Page.Header.Controls.AddAt(2,meta);

}

}

}

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Now when we run Default.aspx we should be presented with the following in the Title Bar:

And we should also be presented with the Page Header from the Web.sitemap:

Also note that the META tags in the source are populated:

<meta name="Keywords" content="keywords, of, the, meta, tag, of, the, default, page" />
<meta name="Description" content="This is the META Description tag od the Default Page." />

What we have Learned

We have learned that we can use the SiteMap to easily managed and update our Meta tags for each of our pages within our site.

Here is the original link:

http://www.programminghelp.com/web-development/asp-net/using-sitemap-and-masterpages-to-set-meta-tags-in-asp-net-and-c/