I added a WP Customer Reviews plugin but nothing seems to appear on Google search
-
Hi,
I've added the wordpress Wp Customer Reviews plugin to a my client's website and we brought some past clients to put on reviews in order to empower the hReview factor.
Google as scraped the website several times since but we don't see any change in the organic serp.
Can you please tell me if I've done something wrong or I forgot something?
That's the website - Capital Garage Door
Thanks!
-
Hi Schlomi.
I'm Joey, one of the developers of WP Customer Reviews. I apologize for not seeing this earlier, but I'm glad I stumbled on it and very happy to help.
Your question is one we get a lot. Carson sums it up best when he says you are at Google's mercy - they decide, and it's not just about the formatting of your snippets. You can see just how "hit and miss" it is by looking at the serps when you search on "powered by wp customer reviews"
As you can see, 20-25% of the listings have star ratings in the results. I'd love to see more, but it shows what's out there. The best thing you can do to improve your chances of ratings showing up in search is to upgrade - I see you are using version 2.8, which is several versions behind. We overhauled the plugin in September, which included improvements to the rich snippets.
As an internet marketer, the intent of WP Customer Reviews was to get user generated content onto sites and have the ratings show up in SERPS. It does the job, but like always, Google decides what shows up.
Thanks for using the plugin. If you have some ideas for improvements, drop me a line.
-
Unfortunately, Google has been scaling back reviews quite a bit. We have several sites where we used to show up with star ratings on every page. Now we're lucky to get them to show up at all.
I have noticed it relies a lot on the query. If you are trying to rank for local queries where Google pulls in a local pack, for example, they're really not likely to show your stars. Maybe this is to prevent confusion. Maybe it's to help themselves on Google Maps.
Try doing a site: search with the exact URL. In my experience it's most likely to show up in low-competition searches, and nothing is less competitive than a site: search with your own site. For example https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.shopperapproved.com does seem to pull in stars.
The good news: what you have is working.
The bad news: you're at Google's mercy as to when your snippets will pull in. Page and domain authority (in Google's eyes) does seem to play a part, and the query will change things up. My advice is always to implement it, continue marketing, and wait for Google to realize you're really an awesome company/site with reviews worth highlighting.
Unfortunately, there's no magic number of reviews or count of links. It just depends on competition in the SERP.
-
Thanks for the answer Blakewenloe
It does have a rich snippet code that's why I'm wondering why it doesn't show anything.
Can anyone tell how much time/reviews you need until Google starts showing the ratings on serp?
-
Does the plugin include Google rich snippet code? If it's just a Wordpress review plugin without google's rich snippet code, Google isn't (as far as I know) going to display the reviews in the serp. Also, I notice that the reviews don't show the "gold stars" for the homepage (most of the time) but do for the subpages. I searched the "garage repair in victoria, va" keyword and it showed the stars from the actual google reviews.
Here's a free plugin that includes the rich snippet: https://wordpress.org/plugins/rich-reviews/
ShopperApproved has ridiculous pricing but it works well: http://www.shopperapproved.com/
There may be better options out there, but this should get your started. Good luck!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Search Console Indexed Page Count vs Site:Search Operator page count
We launched a new site and Google Search Console is showing 39 pages have been indexed. When I perform a Site:myurl.com search I see over 100 pages that appear to be indexed. Which is correct and why is there a discrepancy? Also, Search Console Page Index count started at 39 pages on 5/21 and has not increased even though we have hundreds of pages to index. But I do see more results each week from Site:psglearning.com My site is https://wwww.psglearning.com
Technical SEO | | pdowling0 -
UGC - Product Reviews Search Engine accesibility
Hi everyone A question about using product reviews on a website - I completely understand genuine product reviews can be great for creating totally unique content and for seo in general. But my understanding is also that it is great only when it's accessible by google. So the question I have is that by using aggregate review services - i.e. reviews(dot)co(dot)uk widgets, are they always easily accessible by Google? Examples I've seen that use the widget are: https://www.oliverbonas.com/jewellery/silver-honeycomb-bee-necklace-29494 http://www.fires-cookers.co.uk/hoover-dyc169a-tumble-dryer-white.html#prod-reviews So when you view the page source for these pages, the actual content of the reviews are nowhere to be seen. I was wondering if anyone has experience of using any of these thrid party widgets, and if these come as issues, what you would do to make sure these reviews content are seen by Google? Thank you
Technical SEO | | MH-UK0 -
International Targeting - Google Search Console not recognizing the tags
Hi, We are facing a problem with international targeting not being recognized by the Google Search Console. This is the URL to which we added the following tags: URL: http://kilgray.com/memoq/2015-100/help-en/index.html TAGS: Flang tool Result: http://screencast.com/t/rrBgcr1X Search Console result: http://screencast.com/t/fP45ZR2c I am a bit lost here, as the tags were validated also from different members of the community. Is this because of the frames? (Yes, the site is built in frames). Thanks for your help!
Technical SEO | | Kilgray0 -
How do I "undo" or remove a Google Search Console change of address?
I have a client that set a change of address in Google Search Console where they informed Google that their preferred domain was a subdomain, and now they want Google to also consider their base domain (without the change of address). How do I get the change of address in Google search console removed?
Technical SEO | | KatherineWatierOng0 -
Google Ecommerce Alerts
I recently started getting email notifications from Google re: new products on our websites. I am subscribed to Google alerts. Can anyone shed some light on this?
Technical SEO | | AMHC0 -
Google showing https:// page in search results but directing to http:// page
We're a bit confused as to why Google shows a secure page https:// URL in the results for some of our pages. This includes our homepage. But when you click through it isn't taking you to the https:// page, just the normal unsecured page. This isn't happening for all of our results, most of our deeper content results are not showing as https://. I thought this might have something to do with Google conducting searches behind secure pages now, but this problem doesn't seem to affect other sites and our competitors. Any ideas as to why this is happening and how we get around it?
Technical SEO | | amiraicaew0 -
Nofollow links appear to be still included in SEOMOZ crawl and Google
I have added the nofollow tag to links throughout my site to hide duplicate content from Google but these pages are still being shown in my SEOMOZ crawl. I also fetched an example page with the Googlebot within Webmaster tools and it showed all nofollow links. An example is http://www.adventurepeaks.com/news All News tags have nofollow but each tag is appearing in my SEOMOZ crawl report as duplicate content. Any suggestions on whether this is a problem or if i have applied the tag incorrectly? Many thanks in advance
Technical SEO | | adventure340 -
Google showing former meta tags in search results inspite of new tags being crawled by it
I had changed the meta tags for a site www.aztexsodablast.com.au about a month back and Google has also crawled those new tags but in search results when I search for the term 'Aztex Sodablast' it is continuing to show the old tags while on the site, the new tags are being displayed. What may be the issue and how could I correct the problem?
Technical SEO | | pulseseo0