Google Indexing API Guide

Step 1: Create a Google Cloud Platform project

1. Go to the Google Cloud Console
2. Create a new project (or select an existing one)
3. Give your project a meaningful name like "Credo Transportation Indexing"

Step 2: Enable the Indexing API

1. In the Cloud Console, go to "APIs & Services" > "Library"
2. Search for "Indexing API" and select it
3. Click "Enable" to activate the API for your project

Step 3: Create service account credentials

1. Go to "APIs & Services" > "Credentials"
2. Click "Create credentials" > "Service account"
3. Fill in the service account details:
   • Name: "Indexing API Service Account"
   • Role: Project > Owner (or a more restricted role if preferred)
4. Click "Create" and then "Done"
5. In the service accounts list, find your new account and click the three dots menu
6. Select "Manage keys" > "Add key" > "Create new key"
7. Choose JSON format and click "Create"
8. Save the downloaded JSON file securely - you'll need it for authentication

Step 4: Verify your domain ownership

1. Go to Google Search Console
2. Make sure you have verified ownership of your domain (property)
3. The Google account used to verify the property must have permissions in your GCP project

Step 5: Implement API calls

Here's a sample code in Node.js to update the URL status:

const {google} = require('googleapis');
const key = require('./service-account-key.json');

// Create a new JWT client using the service account key
const jwtClient = new google.auth.JWT(
  key.client_email,
  null,
  key.private_key,
  ['https://www.googleapis.com/auth/indexing'],
  null
);

// Function to publish a URL
async function publishUrl(url) {
  // Authorize the client
  await jwtClient.authorize();
  
  // Initialize the Indexing API
  const indexing = google.indexing({
    version: 'v3',
    auth: jwtClient
  });
  
  // Publish the URL
  try {
    const response = await indexing.urlNotifications.publish({
      requestBody: {
        url: url,
        type: 'URL_UPDATED' // or 'URL_DELETED' to remove from index
      }
    });
    
    console.log('Response:', response.data);
    return response.data;
  } catch (error) {
    console.error('Error publishing URL:', error);
    throw error;
  }
}

// Example usage
publishUrl('https://credotransportation.com/cars.html')
  .then(result => console.log('Success:', result))
  .catch(err => console.error('Error:', err));

Step 6: Batch processing multiple URLs

For efficiency, you can submit multiple URLs in a batch:

// Function to batch publish URLs
async function batchPublishUrls(urls) {
  // Authorize the client
  await jwtClient.authorize();
  
  // Initialize the Indexing API
  const indexing = google.indexing({
    version: 'v3',
    auth: jwtClient
  });
  
  // Create an array of promises for each URL
  const promises = urls.map(url => {
    return indexing.urlNotifications.publish({
      requestBody: {
        url: url,
        type: 'URL_UPDATED'
      }
    });
  });
  
  // Execute all promises
  try {
    const responses = await Promise.all(promises);
    return responses.map(response => response.data);
  } catch (error) {
    console.error('Error batch publishing URLs:', error);
    throw error;
  }
}

// Example usage
const urlsToIndex = [
  'https://credotransportation.com/',
  'https://credotransportation.com/cars.html',
  'https://credotransportation.com/tracking.html',
  'https://credotransportation.com/contact.html'
];

batchPublishUrls(urlsToIndex)
  .then(results => console.log('Batch success:', results))
  .catch(err => console.error('Batch error:', err));