Tips Tuesday – Schema Markup SEO, Login Hacks, Gemini AI

Hello Happy Site Owner!

There’s big schema news this week, and that’s super important for our SEO.

Plus, I checked out Google’s new Gemini AI – I’ve got info on what I found.

Tips this week include:

• Concerns set to Kadence about AI
• Update on email list service DNS issues
• Looker Studio beta launch
• Site cloning info in the works
• Swapping out Gutenberg blocks plugins
• Why to leave your homepage revamp for last
• Custom post types and Rich Results
• What schema markup is
• Issues with schema on About page
• Is Authorship still a thing?
• New WP Login Challenge tutorial
• Why you need to secure every Smart device you have
• Why more content is moving to a subscription model
• Why a Top Creator is Leaving YouTube
• I tried Google’s Gemini AI – here’s what I found
• The impact of AI on Search

BlogAid Happenings

Whew!!! I’m glad to be getting back to a normal pace with things. Like every year, it’s pedal to the metal from December until mid February around here. And then it starts ramping down a bit until things go pretty quiet by the first of spring.

And I’m even more delighted about having a bit of that early spring weather in my neck of the woods.

One of the things I enjoy most on weekend mornings is being able to camp out on the covered deck with Zak, drink my cup of hot tea, and read the industry news while writing Tips Tuesday and AI Discover Hub News.

We have a heated blankie and Zak naps while I read and type.

Birdie chatter is increasing and it sounds like a park. Plus, it’s nice to look into the middle of at the 3 and 4 story tall trees that surround us, as we’re on the 2nd level in the back and the trees are rooted in the meadow another story down.

Now and then Zak jumps up to bark at a squirrel that he thinks is getting too close as it runs across the roof and jumps into a tree near the deck.

I call this southern-facing deck, that overlooks woods and a meadow, my sanity room. It’s right off my office. And it’s one of the main reasons I bought the house.

It’s the best place to take a break and let my mind rest and wander a bit toward creative endeavors, or just take in the beauty and sounds of nature.

I hope you have a place where you can relax and daydream a little too.

Concerns Sent to Kadence

One of the things that I’m thankful to get off my plate this last week was compiling all of our questions and concerns about AI in Kadence, and more specifically, the lack of clear info.

I was delighted to see emails from them last week with updated Knowledge Base articles on it.

And in one of them was an AI thing I didn’t even know existed, which is the new Advanced Block that serves as an AI writer. 

I sent an email to them on the 9th and we’ll see what becomes of it. 

Email List Service Issues Update

I’m also relieved that we got through all of the email DNS record hoohaa.

It ticks me off that me and my clients did everything right years ago with our email client and list service setup as far as ensuring that we had all of the modern DNS records needed, and all verifications and authentications needed to ensure good delivery of our emails, yet our vendors borked things at the last minute.

There have been issues with Mailchimp, Flodesk, and multiple issues with MailerLite.

I’ve been keeping my site audit client Hub members updated with what to check and what actions to take, and more importantly, what actions not to take, as some of what the vendors say do is not accurate. Everything may be fine with your setup, yet they show you a generic message that it isn’t because they are not actually checking.

The point of us getting ahead of the curves is so that we can relax when these deadlines hit.

I wish our vendors would take that same approach.

But, I guess they know folks won’t move until they are in pain.

The silver lining is that all of the email list services are now compliant with best practices. Too many of them weren’t, which is scary.

Me, my clients, and my vendor partners had to spend a lot of preventable time on this. But, I believe we’re at the end of this messiness.

Looker Studio Beta Launched

I am tickled pink to get 2 clients set up with Looker Studio during this beta test phase. And I’ll be setting up another one toward the end of this week.

Looker Studio is a free product from Google with native connectors for things like GA4, GSC (Google Search Console), YouTube, Google Sheets, and more. Plus, there are 3rd party connectors to most any other service you use too.

Looker Studio makes your metrics visual and so easy to see what’s going on with your marketing efforts.

But, the real key is that with customized reports, Looker makes it super easy to dive into your metrics and get actionable info so you know exactly what posts and pages need attention and/or get ideas for new content.

One of my beta testers is going bonkers on YouTube. Having an easy way to see how he’s doing with videos both on YouTube and in Google Search is fantastic!!!! Easily seeing those clicks to your site is even more fun!

Another beta tester has a huge site and she is doing a massive revamp to shore up all of your multiple funnels and conversion points.

She has to know what posts are getting traffic and which ones are converting, and where that traffic is coming from.

She has 3 sets of spreadsheets that she has open on her desktop, her tablet, and printed out to do this manual research comparison.

And now she’ll be able to easily do all of it in Looker by just searching on specific keywords, landing pages, traffic sources, or any other way she wants to filter the data.

And once she picks what she wants to research, the entire report dynamically changes to show her just that info on just that thing.

Plus, she runs a Shopify store. And we’ll be looking into the best way to get those metrics into the report too.

My third beta tester has a large and active site plus a Shopify store. Plus, she’s keeping track of her email list open rate and click throughs too. So we’ll be looking into ways to put that data into the report as well.

All of the testers will be giving me weekly feedback on how they’re doing with the tutorials I made for each page of the report. And then they will let me know how much that is helping them find what they need to know and/or anything they have questions about or would like to see tweaked in the reports.

I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.

Theme and Block Tips

Site Cloning Info in the Works

One of the biggest time chunks with switching themes is cloning your existing site and then moving the revamp back to the live site, even if it is only moving the theme, not a full migration back.

I’ve been working with my host and designer partners to make a compilation doc of our cloning choices, as well as critically important details about the whole theme revamp process.

I’ll be sharing that info with my site audit Hub clients as well as Webmaster Training members soon.

Swapping Out Blocks

I’ve been making good progress with getting Spectra blocks off of 3 of my sites.

But the other 2 sites are just too much for me to have time to do, as 1 of those sites has Spectra Blocks on every page and post.

I’ve been speaking with my clients who have reasonably priced VAs to recommend.

But first, I’m going to clone the site that has the most Spectra blocks to switch and just deactivate that plugin and see how things look.

And then I’m going to consider using native WP blocks in those Spectra spots as much as possible and just get away from any blocks plugin unless I just have to have the extra styling features.

Native WP block styling has improved considerably since I first started using Spectra, back whe it was called UAG.

So, that alone may seriously cut down on how much needs to be revamped using Kadence Blocks.

I hope to do this trial this week and I’ll be keeping my Hubbers and Webmasters posted on my progress with it.

And if I do need to hire a VA, I’ll be making training videos for how to work with Kadence Blocks for things like swapping from Advanced Columns to the Row Layout block and such. And I’ll send them tutorials on how to use Find My Blocks and Limit Modified Date plugin too so that it’s fast to see where the blocks are in use and protects my SEO for when the post/page is updated.

Leave the Homepage for Last

If you’re in the process of swapping out Spectra Blocks, and you’re using the Astra theme, then consider leaving your homepage alone. You can swap out those blocks during your swap to the Kadence theme.

I’m suggesting this because homepages usually have the most complex layout. No need to take that on until you have your new theme in place, as some of the layout will be dictated by it, especially if you also change the fonts and such.

SEO Tips

Custom Post Types and Rich Results

One of my clients, who is also in the DIY SEO course, was checking her Google Search Console results and found an error that was new to me. 

It was on her About page, and it was flagging a missing field in the schema markup, which happened to be a Rich Result.

Before I tell you what we found, let’s do a little refresher on what all this schema stuff is.

What is Schema Markup?

Keep in mind that schema markup is a set of extra tags that describe the content and helps Google make more sense of it.

For example, if the content is about a person, then you would expect to see more information that is related to that person, like their name, or their work title or such.

Schema markup ensures that all of this content is lumped together and associated with the top tag of “person” instead of it being crawled as separate pieces of info.

Custom Post Types

The same thing happens on foodie sites.

When you use a plugin like WP Recipe Maker, it converts the schema from Article, which is what regular blog posts are, into the custom post type of Recipe.

That’s a HUGE schema clue to Google on what this post is about.

Rich Results

And then that plugin adds schema that is considered by Google to be a Rich Result. This is for things like the star reviews on recipes, or even the guided steps.

About Page Schema Issue

Yoast SEO provides ways to turn your pages into special custom post types so it can add more of these special rich result schema tags to the content.

What we found on my client’s site was that her About page was set up as a custom post type, and it did add the special ProfilePage tag, but it did not add another schema field that Google thought should be there.

Schema markup is a hierarchy. Think of it as a table of contents with bullet point sections that are indented when chapters have multiple sections. And it flows from top to bottom.

Google thinks that Yoast missed a step on the ladder, and it put out a warning.

This is known by Yoast, but not being changed. I have to wonder if they haven’t gotten around to fixing it, or if they have a reason for it.

Is Authorship Still a Thing?

Yes, I believe it is.

But, it’s not called that anymore, since the demise of G+.

And I’m telling you this because of that issue we ran into on the About page schema.

Google is giving us multiple clues that they still want to verify who the author is of the content they are crawling.

And they are making a big push to find real people who are helping people.

So, issues with schema on an About page is a problem, as that page usually serves as our digital identity.

I had already planned to bring Authorship tutorials back to the DIY SEO course this year. They won’t be like they were before with the G+ triangle we had to connect to verify ourselves. But, we’ll be doing everything we can to boost our authenticity with Google.

Security Tips

New WP Login Challenge Tutorial

Bot and hacker attacks are up 300% since last year.

With doing so many site audits every week, I get to see what’s hitting our sites, and what’s on the rise.

Over the past few months, attacks on our WP login page have gone through the roof.

I already have a lot of security happening for that page, and it’s working.

But, we want to stop the hits from even reaching the hosting as much as possible.

I’ve added a new tutorial for a Cloudflare WAF rule to the Webmaster Training course. 

And I’ll be adding this rule during all site audit checkups and fixes from now on too.

Secure Every Smart Device You Own

Folks, please take this seriously. And then take action on it.

Every smart device you have is connected to the internet through your wifi router.

Collectively, things like this, including your printer, TV, frig, thermostat, lights, and even your router itself are called the Internet of Things (IoT).

IoT devices are used as fodder by hackers to gang up on the connections they want to hack. It’s called a DDoS attack (Distributed Denial of Service). And the IoT devices are what do the distribution part of it.

The hackers overwhelm the connection with a thousand arrows of IoT stuff. And then while the connection is trying to deal with all that, the hackers slip in something malicious.

Those connection targets include critically important infrastructure for the country as well as business targets that hold your personal info.

YOUR devices are being used in that war.

Ensure your software is up to date on each device.

The easiest way to do that is to unplug it, not just power down, remove the cord. And then let it reboot. It will likely download new software during that reboot, so give it time.

Anything that is connected to wifi in any way needs to be kept secure.

If you don’t believe me, see this TikTok on how smart toothbrushes were used in a DDoS attack.

Monetization Tips

More Content Moving to Subscription Model

I follow the All In podcast to keep tabs on what’s happening in the business and financial sectors because these guys look at what’s going on from all angles, including the online sectors.

Here’s a TikTok clip of them discussing the massive layoffs of journalists and how the ad model is failing. And this is just an extension of the mass layoffs by media companies in 2023.

If you blog for ad revenue, this shift applies to you too.

The takeaway is that you need gazillions of readers to make money with ads.

You need far fewer subscribers to make money.

You also need far fewer folks buying your products to make a real living too.

Blogging is the slowest and hardest way to make money online.

Stop giving away the store for free.

Start charging for the fact that you can help folks.

My mantra is: I’m in business to make money helping people – in that order.

Being in business means selling something. Right now that may just be your ad-supported content.

How about making the content itself pay?

Joining the Medium membership is one way to do that, and write something exclusively for it.

Selling printables is another low-cost way to move in that direction.

Before you know it you’ll have enough to fill up a shop.

But it all starts with your mindset – and that you are in business.

Why a Top Creator is Leaving YouTube

Instagram is starting to look far more attractive as a platform for creating and nurturing community, especially for solo vloggers.

Check out this YouTube goodbye vlog from a top creator who is making that move.

She’s also going to try TikTok, but I think she’ll find it is in flux now too, and trying to be a YouTube competitor.

AI Tips

I Tried Google Gemini 

In last week’s AI Discover Hub News and post, I talked about the launch of Google’s Gemini AI, which is the Bard and Duet.ai replacement.

I got to play with it over the weekend and will have a full report on AI Discover Hub as soon as I can get to it. 

There’s a LOT of misinformation out there about the connection/integration with Workspace and I’ll be addressing that as well.

So, be sure you’re signed up to that newsletter so you can stay on top of what’s important in the AI world that will actually be useful to us.

The Impact of AI on Search

Google’s Q4 earnings report clearly show the impact AI is having on search.

This is what’s happening and what it means for us.

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