How to add rel="publisher" markup to link website to Google Page?
-
How to add rel=”publisher” to my site to connect my Google+ Page
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
-
To link a website to a Google+ Page the following publisher markup needs to appear in the <head> section of the homepage. I understand one can not access the head section of a WordPress.com site but connecting to the Google+ Page does not add the markup like the author markup. Is there a trick to linking your website to a G+ Page?
-
Good Afternoon
I’m sorry, no it doesn’t. To link a website you must add the rel=”publisher” markup and it doesn’t appear connecting to the Google+ Page via the sharing feature adds the markup.
When you connect your Personal Profile the rel=”author” tag is added but unfortunately the same does not apply when you connect the G+ Page.
I volunteer in the Google Webmaster Tools Forum and I am trying to assist a user to link his site with his G+ Page on his WordPress.com site but unfortunately I’ve been searching and searching for a solution and I’m coming up empty-handed.
Is there a widget available to add markup to the <head> section?
Thank you for your help.
-
Is there a widget available to add markup to the <head> section?
No.This is a multiuser blogging platform and we bloggers have no access to metadata and cannot add markup to the <head> section.
Reading this may be helpful http://en.support.wordpress.com/com-vs-org/
-
Thank you for the link but I’m hoping I can find a solution for rel=”publisher” for WordPress.com users. Any suggestions?
-
Timethief answered your question. Essentially there isn’t any way for wordpress.com users to access the <head> section of a website to add any additional markup. The link provided in their last answer is useful as it explains the difference between wordpress.com and self-hosted WordPress and what’s permissible on each platform.
-
I understand that the tag can’t be placed in the head section, I knew that from the beginning (please see my original post), I was asking if there was an alternative like the author option or perhaps a widget.
-
-
-
You’re welcome.
Aside from the support docs, all I could find on Google + were these posts in the Staff blog:
http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2013/12/11/publicize-google-pages/ -
Hello Grace!
You may connect your Google+ page to your blog via Google Webmaster Tools. First, sign up for the service by following the steps in our support page:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/webmaster-tools/
After verifying your site, go to this support page in Google:
https://support.google.com/business/answer/4569085?hl=en
And look under the heading “Webmaster linking” for for further instructions.
Let me know if you encounter any problems. Good luck!
-
Thank you I volunteer in the Google WMT forums so I am very aware of the direct linking but for some users (local) direct linking is not sufficient and they are required to place the rel=”publisher” tag in the head section of the site but thank you so much for trying to assist. My main goal was coming to the WordPress.com forum and finding a workaround for these users but unfortunately it appears there isn’t one. Hopefully something will be released like it was for authorship.
Thanks again.
Grace
-
What is the difference between the users who are NOT required to put the information in the header and those who are? I have a feeling there’s a ToS issue lurking here.
-
-
Good Evening,
As far as I am aware, all users must place the publisher markup in the head section but if they prefer they can use direct linking but….
Some users are having difficulty with the link website button (located on the G+ page) (for some reason it doesn’t always work – I’ve noticed it’s usually local pages) therefore they must use the publisher markup.
With direct linking it’s very important that users place the preferred URL version of the homepage (primary domain link) on the G+ Page because no redirects are allowed. Also, to direct link they must have the version of the site they are linking to on the G+ Page added and verified in Webmaster Tools. Direct linking can be confusing for some because of this therefore we’ve found it’s easier for these users to add the markup instead (either manually or via a plugin).
There used to be two Google support pages to link a website, one page appeared in the Webmaster Tools section and one support page appeared in Google+. The WMT support page was very clear that the publisher markup had to appear in the <head> section the other page stated the markup had to appear in the <head> section but unfortunately the markup example included an tag. An tag should not be placed in the <head>, it should be used in the <body> of the HTML.
Also, some users were utilizing the G+ Badge but unfortunately the tag appeared in the <body> section and publisher was not verifying (for some). This prompted me to test the badge on my site and publisher would not verify yet I asked a colleague to add the badge to his site and publisher verified – confusing!
Publisher markup was not verifying for some users because they placed the tag in the <body> section or they used the markup from the support page ( tag) in the <head> section and again, publisher did not verify.
I’ve found from assisting many users in the WMT forums that if Local Pages link the website using the publisher markup, the knowledge graph populates rather quickly after implementation plus they also get a few extra goodies in the site’s search results snippet, e.g. link to Google+ Page, reviews etc.
Currently Google is updating all the support pages and I am hoping they are going to clarify the placement of the publisher tag as well as elaborate on the amount of pages a user can link to a specific site and if they do allow more than one page to site, which G+ Page will appear in search (local, brand etc). (It was a little confusing because the support pages both stated the markup had to appear in the <head> section yet if you implement a badge the rel=”publisher” attribute is used in the badge markup. The badge markup appears in the body section.)
Overall we have noticed that if users place the link rel=”publisher” tag in the <head> section (as per both support pages) publisher verifies consistently. I am assisting a WordPress.com user now that is having difficulty getting publisher to verify having the option to place the tag in the head would be helpful but we’ll have to figure something else out.
I was hoping when you associated your Page with WordPress.com that the rel=”publisher” attribute was added but unfortunately it doesn’t appear to work the same as associating your Personal Profile (the user tried but the attribute didn’t appear on the page, in fact, I couldn’t find any trace of the Page URL in the source code).
Then I wondered if you could utilize a Widget to add markup to the head but again, I learned this isn’t possible either.
I hope this clears up the confusion but as you can see we’ve come across some different issues and (it’s not always so cut and dry) like I said we’ve found that it’s best to place the tag in the head but things are always changing so maybe Google will go back to allowing the markup in the <head> and in the <body>, fingers crossed.
A lot of support pages have been updated over the last few weeks and I did submit feedback about the markup example on the page as well as a few other things we’ve found assisting users. I haven’t checked the support page over the last few days but I’m hopeful it will be updated soon.
-
Interesting. Back in the old days putting the code in the body used to work for verification, but that was before G+.
I was just wondering if the difference was between advertisers and non-advertisers or a tracking issue or something like that.
-
Hello Grace!
I was able to link my Google+ Business page to my WordPress.com blog using the instructions I provided earlier:
First, sign up for the service by following the steps in our support page:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/webmaster-tools/
After verifying your site, go to this support page in Google:
https://support.google.com/business/answer/4569085?hl=en
And look under the heading “Webmaster linking” for for further instructions.
The process was pretty quick and easy. Can you please try that out?
If you look at my Google+ page here:
https://plus.google.com/b/101136736452563182453/101136736452563182453/
In the Links box, you can see my URL with the check mark beside it. That means that it’s been approved.
Let me know if you have similar success doing this. Thanks!
-
Good Morning
@raincoaster – and still does for some users, really very odd, believe me I’ve been racking my brain trying to figure out why it verifies for some and not others – I keep testing hoping to find the reason but so far haven’t been able to pinpoint, doesn’t help that my experience with working with code is minimal.
Absolutely nothing to do with advertisers or non advertisers.
@druesome I’m not sure if you’ve read my responses but I am well aware of how to direct link via Webmaster Tools but for some users the variables (proper primary link, redirects etc) makes it difficult for them to implement (I am a volunteer in the Webmaster Tools Forum) for example, I have been working with a user currently and although I am providing very detailed instruction it’s been difficult. I remember when I first started online I too found things like this difficult. And keeping this in mind I always try and find a solution that is the least frustrating so that the user can reap the benefits of what Google has to offer. I hope this clarifies.
- The topic ‘How to add rel="publisher" markup to link website to Google Page?’ is closed to new replies.
WordPress.com Forums 