A prospect arrives on a showcase site, looks for the pricing page, doesn’t find it in the main menu, and leaves the site in less than ten seconds. This scenario repeats on a large number of professional sites where navigation relies on a single, often incomplete menu. Exploring all the pages and sections of a site actually requires combining several mechanisms, not just clicking on the visible tabs.
The HTML sitemap, the first reflex to list all pages
When you want to see all the pages of a professional site at a glance, the shortest path is through the sitemap (or HTML sitemap). This page, often accessible from the footer, displays a hierarchical list of all the sections and sub-pages published.
For example, you can discover the pages of Tekniko by directly accessing their sitemap, which provides a complete view of the offerings, from services to legal notices, in just a few seconds.
The HTML sitemap should not be confused with the XML sitemap, which is intended for search engines. The HTML sitemap is aimed at human visitors: it lists the pages with readable titles, organized by category. The XML sitemap, on the other hand, contains raw URLs and technical metadata (last modified date, update frequency) that Google or Bing use for indexing.
On a WordPress site, the HTML sitemap can be generated automatically by dedicated plugins. On a custom-coded site, it requires manual maintenance with each page addition, which explains why some sitemaps are incomplete or outdated.
WCAG 2.2 Accessibility Criterion: why a single menu is no longer enough
The WCAG 2.2 recommendation, published by the W3C and recognized as ISO/IEC 40500:2025 standard, imposes a specific criterion for sites aiming for AA compliance. Criterion 2.4.5 (Multiple Ways) requires that each page be accessible by at least two distinct paths within a set of pages.
In practical terms, a compliant professional site cannot rely solely on a main menu. It must offer at least one additional mechanism from the following:
- An HTML sitemap listing all sections and pages
- An internal search bar allowing content to be found by keywords
- A breadcrumb trail displaying the hierarchical path to the viewed page
- Contextual links between related pages (internal linking)
This requirement now applies under the European Accessibility Act in Europe. For a visitor, this means that a compliant site always offers multiple ways to navigate to any page, including those not listed in the visible menu.
XML Sitemap and crawling tools to explore a site from the outside
When an HTML sitemap cannot be found, or when you want to check that you haven’t missed anything, you can directly query the XML sitemap. Most professional sites have one, accessible at /sitemap.xml or /sitemap_index.xml. Just type this URL into the browser’s address bar to get the raw list of all indexed pages.
Reading an XML sitemap file without technical skills
The file displays as code, but the URLs are readable. Each loc tag contains the full address of a page. You can copy and paste these URLs into a spreadsheet to sort them by section or modification date. An XML sitemap often reveals pages that are invisible in the menu: advertising landing pages, old promotions, archived blog posts.
Free crawlers to map a complete site
Tools like Screaming Frog (free version limited to 500 URLs) or browser scraping extensions allow you to automatically browse all the pages of a site by following internal links. The crawler starts from the homepage, follows every HTML link it finds, and gradually builds a map of the site.
Feedback varies on this point: some sites block crawlers via their robots.txt file, and the free version of some tools is insufficient for sites exceeding several hundred pages. For a typical showcase site, these limits rarely pose a problem.
Manual exploration: leveraging internal linking and the footer
Not all visitors want to open an XML sitemap in their browser. Manual exploration remains the most common method, provided you know where to look beyond the main menu.
The footer often concentrates links to the forgotten pages of the menu: legal notices, privacy policy, terms and conditions, sitemap, recruitment page. On many professional sites, the footer contains more links than the main navigation menu.
The breadcrumb trail, when present, allows you to navigate back up the site structure from any deep page. If you arrive at a blog post via a search engine, the breadcrumb displays the full path: Home > Blog > Category > Article. Clicking on “Category” gives access to all associated content, including those not visible elsewhere.
Internal linking, meaning the links placed in the body of texts to other pages of the same site, constitutes a third exploration channel. Good internal linking turns every page into an entry point to others. On a well-constructed site, reading an article or a service sheet naturally leads to complementary content without going back through the menu.
Internal search and filter navigation on large sites
On professional sites exceeding a few dozen pages (catalogs, e-commerce sites, service portals), internal search becomes the fastest way to locate a specific page. A well-configured search field indexes all published content, including PDFs and downloadable documents.
The quality of this search varies greatly from site to site. Some internal engines only search in page titles, while others scan the complete content. Testing the internal search with varied terms (service name, location, technical keyword) quickly gives an idea of its reliability.
Navigation filters by category, content type, or date complement text-based search. They are mainly found on professional blogs and high-volume sites, where browsing a sitemap would become tedious.
Ultimately, exploring a professional site in its entirety involves combining these channels: sitemap for the overview, internal search for precise targeting, footer and linking for discovery while reading. A site that offers these four access points leaves no page in the shadows.