Tips Tuesday – New Plugin Tests, WP 6 Beta, YouTube Stats, First-Party Cookies

Hello Happy Site Owners and Webmasters!

Tips this week include:

• New plugins I’m checking out – Yoast Product Review Schema and Advanced Database Cleaner
• New form security I’m testing with reCAPTCHA v3
• 2 bonus sessions coming for the DIY SEO live workshops
• Why to do what works for you and your audience
• WordPress 6.0 Betas are out and where to get update instructions
• Why WP is paring back on the new Webfonts API in 6.0
• A super interview all about the new era of WP themes
• A reminder why not to click links in emails
• How to keep pop ups from hurting your SEO
• Why Brave and other search engines are bypassing AMP pages now
• What’s in the YouTube Trends and Stats for 2022 report you have to know
• How to get more video views on Facebook
• The importance of first-party cookie tracking data and why it is your gold mine

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BlogAid Happenings

Woohoo for spring break!! The weather is finally warmer and Zak and I have been getting in some extended deck time!!

It’s been a great break, but time for me to get back to work and I have some awesome goodies coming your way.

New Plugins to Check

I’ve got several plugins on my test list and hope to have some tutorials out for you soon.

Yoast Product Review Schema

One of my new clients is using this, but she had to tweak it a bit.

Y’all know that I’ve been reporting how much Google is now looking to promote in-depth product reviews. And y’all also know how much Google eats schema markup like candy.

Plus, I recently reported that Yoast has an app to integrate with Shopify to give your product listings there an extra SEO boost.

So, I’m very excited about this new plugin for your WordPress site and I’ll be digging into it this week and I’ll keep you posted on what I find.

Advanced Database Cleaner

During site audit fixes, I clean out the client’s database way deeper than most plugins do.

And that’s a risky thing and you should have done by a professional site tech.

Well, during one troubleshooting session to find what is causing so many extra database calls on one of my client’s sites, Dustin of ProSiteHelp ran even deeper checks and cleaning on the database that also showed orphaned cron jobs that were still running even though the associated plugins had been deleted.

The WP Crontrol plugin can show those cron jobs too. But this new plugin shows it all.

So, I’m going to give it a try and have already alerted my Webmaster designers to it as well.

And as mentioned, this is definitely not a plugin that non-tech site owners should be poking around with, though.

New Form Security to Check

Another of my new clients discovered that the Google reCaptcha v3 no longer puts its badge in the bottom right corner of every page on the site.

That’s one of the few reCaptcha spam filters that you can integrate with Formidable Forms, which I show in my tutorial for setting up that form and why I like it better than others.

Now, it does still put the extra request on all posts and pages, it just doesn’t show the badge and that’s what we hated about it.

So, I’m going to figure out how to do tests to see if it protects all forms on every page, like our optins and such.

As many of you know, I’ve been using CleanTalk for the last several months as it protects us from spam on comments and forms too.

But, I have never been comfortable recommending it as their onboarding and interface are ancient and hard, plus it had one issue after another for the first 3-4 months I was evaluating it. It has been stable for the last 3 months, and it catches more crap than I have ever seen any spam filter catch.

It is a paid plugin, though. And Akismet is the only other plugin that protects forms and comments too, and you’re supposed to make a donation to use it as well, so it’s not free either. And I’m just not a big fan of it.

So, I will do my best to test the Google reCaptcha v3 and if it works well, we’ll start using it to at least protect our contact forms. And then see if it protects our optin forms. But we may continue to use AntiSpam Bee for our comment spam filter, as I don’t think it will protect those. 

These tests will take time and I’ll keep you posted.

Site Services Update

I’m thrilled to report that the waitlist is down to our normal 2-3 week waitlist time.

So, if you have an audit checkup coming due for May, now would be the time to fill out the site audit request form.

And, if you haven’t had an audit yet and want to get it fast and secure and your plugins and SEO checked before the end of spring, now is the time to do it.

BlogAid Course Happenings

New Bonus Sessions for the DIY SEO Course

We’re still on spring break from the live workshops.

But in the last one, members agreed that they would be interested in a couple of different bonus sessions.

The first one is to cover the caveats of using the 2 new plugin tutorials I released a couple of weeks ago for:

• Enable Media Replace
• Limit Modified Date

And then I suggested that we have live group sessions to offer feedback on content. Honestly, that’s the only way that you can teach what high quality content is all about.

And that’s the ticket to higher ranking posts.

So, I’m working up those sessions and will be sending out the meeting info for them soon.

And then we’ll get back to our regularly posted workshops for how to build a Content Silo, and then we’ll start our on-page SEO series of workshops.

It’s never too late to join the DIY SEO course. Replays are available on all workshops.

BB Hub Happenings

The BB Hub is a private member area and Facebook group for my DIY site audit clients.

Digital Downloads Workshops are Great!!

We’re on spring break from the workshops this week.

I want to give a huge shout out and thank you to Denise Wakeman for the awesome info she delivered in her first workshop with our BB Hubbers.

She showed us all kinds of easy ways to discover what our clients really want and need.

That’s so super important to know before you spend the energy creating something.

And I have to tell you, one of the things she showed us has my head swimming with ideas of posts to write and other content to create.

This info is not only good for creating downloadables, it’s like a mini master content marketing class too.

FYI, if you’re not a BB Hub member, there is a chance that Denise will be taking this series public. And I’ll be sure to let you know.

Do What Works for You and Your Audience

One of the things Denise talks about frequently in follower emails is that there are a 100 ways to do things. And you need to choose the one that works best for you and your audience.

I’ve been really taking that to heart while I’ve been on spring break and giving myself the time to re-evaluate what I’m doing and what y’all need.

Me and a lot of my clients are making big changes with our lives and online businesses these days.

And there is definitely a focus on ensuring that what we are doing is working for us first, and then for our audience.

If you need to make a change, even a big one, do it. 

Now is a good time.

Even if it’s a little scary, just do it.

You’ll clear your path and find your way.

That’s all the happenings around here. Let’s jump into this week’s tips.

WordPress Tips

WP 6.0 Beta 2 Out

I expect Beta 3 may roll out today.

And the final, public release is expected on May 24.

BlogAid News subscribers will get update instructions when I think it is safe for most of us to do that. So be sure you’re subscribed.

Pared Back Webfonts API in 6.0

One of the issues WP faced with Gutenberg Phase 1, which was the block editor, was just how much core code had to change to support it.

But, they still had to remain backwards compatible for anyone who did not want to switch to Gutenberg blocks yet.

And now with Gutenberg Phase 2, which is making every part of the theme block compatible, they are running into the same issue.

WP 5.8 and 5.9 were all about bringing Full Site Editing to the core. That also requires an FSE compatible theme, which most site owners don’t have yet. And in my opinion, we are not ready to switch to yet either.

One of the things they need in core to make more big changes to FSE theme adoption is the ability to call in Webfonts.

So, they created an API for that to bring in things like Google Fonts and call them from the theme.json file, which is basically a replacement of the CSS file that most themes use now.

There was a huge push at first to get it into version 6.0.

But they have backed off that push due to so many folks saying that enough testing has not been done yet, and this thing could break current themes.

I have to wonder if all that hoohaa with the WebP images debacle didn’t make the devs think twice about doing proper research and testing before they shove something on us that may be catastrophic to too many site owners.

So, they are paring it back to have some API support for Webfonts in the core that devs can start using.

But they need more time to develop a plugin that has an interface for end users and designers, and this will allow for way more testing under way more setups.

I’m delighted to hear this.

I’m all for progress with going fully Gute everywhere on our sites.

But, I’m more in favor of deep, deep testing and research to determine the impact on the 445 million sites that use WP now.

Theme Tips

New Era of WordPress Themes

The folks at Post Status have a good podcast that discusses this new era of WP themes that we are moving into.

It’s a must-listen for all designers.

And I think it’s a good listen for all site owners to get a glimpse into our near future and will inspire you as to why we needed to take this Gutenberg journey in the first place.

Security Tips

Do NOT click email links

Email phishing attacks on the rise. 

And many of them look like they are from vendors that you use.

No matter how legit an email looks DO NOT click that link!!!!

Instead, log into your account directly to check for notifications or alerts.

SEO Tips

How to Keep Pop Ups from Hurting Your SEO

Some of y’all have optin pop ups that piss Google off.

And some piss off your site visitors too.

You definitely want to have a look at this Search Engine Journal post about what Google can and can’t tolerate with your pop ups, and how some types of them, or the timing on them, can hurt your SEO.

Brave and Duck Duck Go Bypass Amp Pages

99% of my followers listened to me when I told y’all way back when not to use AMP, no matter how much Google was promoting it.

And the 1% who didn’t listen, saw their revenue drop lower than whale poop.

AMP was fairly easy to get into for bloggers, but a booger bear to come out of.

It was not so easy for enterprise-level sites to get into and they spent millions of dollars on the conversion, only to have Google not only drop AMP, but get sued over how they showed preference for it in Search.

Well, it cost so much for site owners to come out of AMP that they just didn’t do it.

However, many search engines never wanted to serve up AMP pages.

So, a few of them are redirecting folks to a non-AMP link.

Alright, so y’all are asking why I’m telling you this, since you didn’t use AMP.

We have no idea how well this is going to work or impact your mobile pages.

I know some of y’all are starting to get more traffic from the Brave and Duck Duck Go search engines. So, keep an eye on your analytics and see if you get a drop or a boost from this.

Video Tips

YouTube Trends and Stats for 2022

Video is bigger than ever in 2022.

The folks over at Blogging Wizard have a collection of stats and trends for YouTube.

And while it may be hard for you to relate your efforts and clients to a lot of them, there are 3 I’d like to highlight for you. 

• Women make up the majority of YouTube views. For most of you, that is your target audience.
• The highest revenue earner on YouTube is a 9 yr old boy doing toy reviews. I’m telling you, product reviews are where it’s at with video, especially on YouTube.
• The U.S. has the most YouTube viewers – and again, that is the target audience for most of you.

How to Get More Video Views on Facebook

I can hear several of you saying that you get more video views on Instagram.

Okay.

But don’t forget about your Facebook page.

The folks at Social Media Examiner have a bunch of tips to help you get more video views on Facebook.

That includes tips for how to use the Creator Studio to help you optimize your videos for your Facebook audience too.

Monetization Tips

The Importance of First Party Cookie Tracking

While 3rd party cookie tracking may be going away soon, 1st party cookie tracking remains the real gold mine.

3rd party cookies are those from other sources like Google and ad agencies.

1st party cookies are your own analytics.

Some ad agencies now have their own optin that basically tricks your site visitor into giving them 1st party cookie tracking permission. But the visitor thinks they are signing up for your newsletter.

The real value to the ad agency is the ability to keep showing that person targeted ads because their online behavior can still be tracked and they can build a persona on it.

The targeted ads bring in way more revenue than non-targeted ads.

So, bloggers are willingly giving up their 1st party tracking data to get paid more.

If you’re in this boat, I hope you will listen to this podcast from the folks at Search Engine Journal and get in the know about just how insanely valuable that 1st party tracking data is.

One of these days, when your ad revenue drops, I hope you remember this info and find other ways to make use of that gold mine data instead of just throwing in the towel.

Wrap Up

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

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