A website nobody can find isn't doing its job. Search engines discover sites by sending out programs called crawlers, which visit pages, follow links, and add what they find to the search index. Most website builders leave the plumbing that helps crawlers to you — files with names like sitemap.xml, settings you've never heard of, and dashboards you have to sign up for.
Ullbek does that part for you. You don't need to know what any of it is called, and there is nothing to switch on. It happens every time you press Publish — on your free ullbek.site address and on your own domain alike.
What happens when you publish
Each publish takes care of five things before your site goes live:
/about and /menu — the addresses search engines see, list and link to.None of this touches your preview or your work in progress. Search engines only ever hear about the site you've published.
Your sitemap
A sitemap is a plain list of the pages on your site, kept at yoursite.ullbek.site/sitemap.xml (or yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml). Crawlers read it to make sure they haven't missed a page that nothing links to yet.
Ullbek writes yours fresh on every publish, from the pages that are actually there. Add a page and it appears; delete one and it's gone. It always uses your site's current main address, so connecting your own domain or renaming your free address never leaves an out-of-date sitemap behind. Your 404 page is left out, as it should be.
You don't need to write one, and you shouldn't: a hand-made copy would be ignored in favour of the one Ullbek generates.
Your robots.txt
robots.txt is a short file crawlers read before anything else. By default, Ullbek's version says "everyone is welcome" and points to your sitemap.
Sometimes you'll want rules of your own — for example, keeping AI training crawlers out, or hiding a private page from search. Just ask in the chat. Ullbek writes your rules into the file, and publishing keeps them exactly as you asked, adding only the line that points to your sitemap.
Instant notice to Bing & more
Normally a search engine finds out your site changed only when its crawler happens to come back — which can take days or weeks for a new, small site. That's a long time for a new menu, new prices or new opening hours to sit unseen.
IndexNow is an open standard that fixes this. Instead of waiting to be visited, a site sends a short notice saying "these pages just changed", and the search engines know straight away. One notice reaches every engine in the program:
- Bing — whose results also feed Microsoft Copilot, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo and ChatGPT search
- Yandex, Naver, Seznam and Yep
- Amazon
Every Ullbek site sends that notice automatically, the moment a publish is live:
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Your first publish announces every page
A brand-new site introduces all of its pages at once.
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After that, only what changed
Edit two pages and publish, and only those two are announced. Removed pages are announced too, so they drop out of results sooner. Publishing again with nothing changed sends nothing.
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A new address announces every page again
Connect your own domain or change your free address, and every page is announced at its new home.
There's no account to create and nothing to verify. Ullbek proves to the engines that the notice really comes from your site, on your behalf.
The notice makes sure search engines know your pages exist and when they change. Each engine still decides when to visit and where your pages appear in results. Nobody can promise you a position on page one, and you should be wary of anyone who does.
What about Google?
Google doesn't take part in IndexNow, so the instant notice doesn't reach it. Google finds your site the usual way: by following links to it and by reading your sitemap, which Ullbek keeps up to date and points to from your robots.txt.
If you want to speed Google up and see how your site is doing there, use Google Search Console. It's free, and it's especially worth it once your site is on its own domain:
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Add your site
Go to search.google.com/search-console, sign in, and add your site's address.
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Prove it's yours
Google offers a few ways to verify. The simplest is the HTML file option: download the small file Google gives you, attach it in the Ullbek chat, and ask Ullbek to put it on your site and publish. Then click Verify.
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Submit your sitemap
Under Sitemaps, enter
sitemap.xmland submit. Google will check back on it from then on.
You don't need Bing Webmaster Tools for the instant notices — they already work. Sign up only if you'd like to see Bing's reports. It can import your site straight from Google Search Console.
The parts only you can add
Being found is half of it. What people see when they find you, and whether they click, comes from things only you can supply:
- Words people actually search for. Say what you do, where, and for whom, in plain language: "wood-fired pizza in Fremantle" beats "a culinary journey". Tell Ullbek how your customers describe you.
- A title and description on every page. These become the headline and summary under your link in search results. Ullbek writes them when it builds a page. Ask it to sharpen them whenever you like.
- Links to your site. Put your address on your Google Business Profile, Instagram bio, email signature and anywhere else you're listed. Links are still how search engines decide who's worth visiting.
- Fresh, true information. Up-to-date hours, prices and news give people a reason to come back. Each update you publish is announced automatically.
Common questions
How long until my site shows up in search?
Bing and the other IndexNow engines hear about your pages the moment you publish. When each one visits and lists them is up to the engine — often within hours or days for Bing, sometimes longer. Google is usually slower for brand-new sites. Search Console helps there.
Do I need to do anything to turn this on?
No. It's built into publishing for every site, on the free plan and on Premium Hosting, at no extra cost.
Does it work on my free ullbek.site address?
Yes. Free addresses and custom domains get the same sitemap, robots.txt and instant notices. When you connect a domain, your pages are announced again at their new address.
What happens when I take my site offline?
The pages stop being served, and search engines drop them as they find them gone. If you only want to hide one page from search, ask Ullbek to keep it out of search engines instead of deleting it.
Will my preview or unfinished work show up in Google?
No. Only what you publish is announced or listed in your sitemap. Your preview and your private internal pages are never published.
"You build the site. Ullbek makes sure search engines hear about it — every time you publish."
That's the whole picture: the housekeeping is automatic, the instant notices go out on their own, and Google is one free Search Console signup away. Spend your time on the part that matters most — saying clearly what you do — and let publishing handle the rest.
Ready to be found?
Build your site, press Publish, and the search engines hear about it straight away.