Tips Tuesday – ModSecurity, Add Google Analytics, Image SEO, GSC Reports

Hello Happy Site Owners and Webmasters!

Tips this week include:

• A new post on what ModSecurity is and why you don’t want to turn it off permanently even if your host tells you to
• A new post on how to add Google Analytics and other script code directly to your site
• A new post on how to fix ModSecurity related errors when you try to add that script code
• The change of date for Part 2 of the Image SEO live workshop
• The new SEO workshops on the way for keywords and ranking
• A status update on the new clients I’m currently onboarding for site service work
• An opportunity for a Blab-like chat for those who are working from home now
• A surprise, and last minute addition to WP 5.4
• Serious improvement to downloading Google Search Console reports

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Join me Live to Discuss Tips Tuesday

I hope you’ll join for tonight’s livestream at 8pm ET / 5pm PT on the BlogAid Facebook Page. It’s a great way to get the deeper story on what’s reported in Tips Tuesday. And, I almost always have breaking news for the day too. So come join us live for the party.

Who I Help

All tips, advice, and suggestions in this, and all BlogAid posts and tutorials, are intended to empower DIY site owners who are not on hosting that is restrictive in what you can and can’t do with your site and hosting setup.

Livestream Replay

BlogAid Happenings

This past week has been full of getting a little caught up on research regarding the roll of ModSecurity and issues with folks placing code and scripts on their site.

My webmasters have been reporting this issue for a few months.

And now my DIY SEO members have been reporting that they are getting errors when trying to drop their Google Analytics plugin and switch to adding the GA code directly to the site instead.

Adding Google Analytics Code and ModSecurity Errors

I completed my research and testing on these code issues and have 3 new posts for you.

• What is ModSecurity and Should You Turn it Off?
• How to Add Google Analytics Tracking Code to Your Site
• Fix ModSecurity Errors When Adding Scripts to Your Site Head Area

I’ve also updated the appropriate Google Connections tutorials in the DIY SEO course with this info too.

A little shy on news this week

Tips Tuesday is a little shy on news this week, as researching, testing, and producing these posts and videos pretty much took all of my spare time.

Image SEO Part 2 Workshop this Thursday

I apologize to my DIY SEO course members for my mix up with the date on the next workshop.

I had originally posted part 2 of our Image SEO workshop as a bonus session, meaning on Tuesday instead of our regular Thursday.

But, in the last email I sent with the part 1 replay, I mentioned the next workshop would be on Thursday.

So, I changed it to that.

You should have received an email with the new Zoom meeting info. And you can also find it in the member area.

New SEO Workshops on the way

But, we will still be taking at least a week off, maybe two, as I finish creating the 2 new workshops for the DIY SEO course.

They will be on:

• Keywords
• Ranking

And I’ll be shuffling the rest of the workshop schedule to accommodate where these will go into the flow.

I’ll be sending you the next live workshop meeting info as soon as I have it so you can mark your calendar.

Onboarding new site service clients

I’m keeping pretty close to on track with all of the site service requests I received over the holidays and since.

I’ve got about 5 project that are about to wrap up, out of the 12 that are open. And I’ll be onboarding new projects later this week.

I’m pretty booked for the rest of March, and already have several clients who requested April site services.

So, if you want to get your site audit or migration or such done for the spring, do contact me now.

Work from home – welcome to our world

I know a few of you listen to the Tips Tuesday podcast on your way to work.

And I’m wondering how many of you are unexpectedly working from home now, and maybe reading Tips Tuesday instead.

I also know that a lot of my clients are already used to working from home, but they likely weren’t expecting to have the kids home now too, and it’s disrupting their blogging schedule and such.

As you many of you know, I used to have a road job as an electronic engineer. And I spent a whole lot of that drive time thinking up things I could create when I got home, or mulling over new blog posts for my sites or such.

I quit that job 6-7 years ago and have been doing BlogAid full time now. And that last road job made me hate travel so much that I’m perfectly happy being home most of the time now.

I have plenty of client meetings and livestream time and such to keep me from feeling completely isolated.

But, that also means that I’m always chatting with folks who are bloggers or webmasters or such too.

I know many of you feel isolated in your business, as your family and friends don’t understand what you do, and all that it takes to do it.

And I know many of you have taken a hit on your site traffic lately too.

What can I do to help you through these uncertain times?

This sort of thing makes me really miss the Blab days.

So, I’ve been thinking about having open Q&A sessions on Zoom that everybody can come to and participate.

Just like Blab, you can come on camera with me, or just come on audio, or just type into chat.

What do you think about that?

Let me know in the comments on the blog, or anywhere you see this post online.

That’s all the news from around here. Let’s jump into this week’s tips from around the ‘net.

WordPress Tips

WP 5.4 will have a full screen mode

Well, it looks like the founder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg slipped in one last change to WordPress 5.4 on the day the first Release Candidate came out, and developers are having a fit with him over it.

The ability to go full screen on the editor in WordPress has been around for some time.

But with WP 5.4, it will be the default view.

You can elect to turn it off, of course.

But I didn’t want it to jar you when you go to the post or page editor after you update to 5.4.

WP devs are throwing a fit that Matt did not respect the release schedule.

When an RC, or Release Candidate comes out, no new items or functions can be put into it. But that’s exactly what Matt did.

And now you know why I wait until near to time of public release before making a post letting you know what will be in the next release too!!!

I’ll have a video tour for you in a couple of weeks, as WP 5.4 won’t be out until March 31.

But, I’ll have updates to the Gutenberg Ninja course out prior to that with all the new WP 5.4 goodies that are coming!!!!

SEO Tips

Download Google Search Console Reports

Hey, how about this good news!!!

Google has radically improved the download feature for reports in Google Search Console.

You can now download any of the reports.

And, it finally supports Excel as well as Google Sheets.

I’m thinking it would be helpful for those who are following their Performance report closely.

And this way you can sort your posts as you see fit, not just on clicks or impressions.

I hope to have time at the first of next month to give this a try and see if it cuts down on the time I spend gathering metrics data.

I’ve been very good to track it this year.

I was doing it weekly. But it’s just too much work to data mine that deeply on both BlogAid and Heartwood Art.

So, I’ve switched to doing it monthly.

And even with that I’m definitely seeing some trends, especially on Heartwood Art as some posts are catching on fire everywhere, and that’s a good thing.

Wrap Up

That’s a wrap for this week’s Tips Tuesday.

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