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Check your SEO and sitemap status

This guide shows you how to read your site’s search-engine health on the SEO status page. You can check whether your sitemap is up to date. You can also see what MapleGather logged for the Google and Bing step at your last publish. From the same page you can turn on rich search results and set a crawling rule for members-only pages.

Who can do this: Any admin who can open the Website area can read the status. Changing the settings — the rich-results switches and the members-only rule — needs permission to change SEO settings (the website:configure-seo permission).

The Google and Bing tiles show MapleGather’s own record, not a reply from the search engine. MapleGather does not notify Google or Bing today. That step is switched off, so nothing is sent to either of them. The tiles and the Recent pings list show what MapleGather logged at your last publish. They are not proof that a search engine saw anything. Your sitemap is what does the real work. It is built fresh each time a search engine asks for it, so it always matches what is live, and it stays public. That is how search engines find your pages. To find out whether Google has really seen a page, use Google Search Console (step 5).

Before you start

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  • Publish at least one page or post first. Your sitemap and the notification record both begin at your first publish. Until then the Sitemap tile reads “No pages published yet,” the Google and Bing tiles read “Not pinged yet,” and the Recent pings list reads “No pings yet.”

Steps

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  1. In the left sidebar, select Website, then SEO.
  2. Check the Sitemap tile. When your sitemap is current it shows “Up to date” and the time of your last publish, which is the moment the tile is stamped.
  3. Check the Google and Bing tiles. When MapleGather recorded the notification step as complete for that search engine, the tile shows “Pinged” and how long ago it was recorded. Remember this is MapleGather’s own record, not a reply from Google or Bing.
  4. Read the “Recent pings” list under the tiles. It shows the last few entries in that record, newest first, with the search engine the entry relates to (Target), when it was recorded (Sent), and the recorded outcome (Status).
  5. For Google’s own, deeper indexing report, select Open Google Search Console on the Google tile. It opens in a new tab. This is the one place that tells you whether Google has really seen a page. While you are there, submit your sitemap address. MapleGather does not submit it for you today.
  6. To keep members-only pages out of search engines, turn on Hide members-only pages from search engines.
  7. To help search engines show rich results, turn on the switches under “Structured data (JSON-LD)” for the content you want featured:
    • Include organization info
    • Include events
    • Include member directory
    • Include blog posts
  8. Select Save changes.

Your sitemap and robots file are public. To see exactly what search engines see, add /sitemap.xml or /robots.txt to your site address.

Verify

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You’ll know your settings saved when a “Settings saved.” message appears and Save changes switches off, because there’s nothing left to save. The Sitemap tile reads “Up to date” again after your next publish.

If something goes wrong

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  • A ping shows as “Not delivered,” or a tile shows “Ping failed.” — these are one recorded fact shown in two places, not two problems: MapleGather’s record of the notification step for that search engine is a failed one. “Not delivered” is the wording in the Recent pings list; “Ping failed.” is the badge on that search engine’s tile above it. Either can appear for Google or for Bing. There’s nothing to fix and nothing to redo, and it costs you nothing that matters: publishing still works, and your sitemap is still current and still publicly readable, which is what search engines actually use to find your content. The tile also reads “We couldn’t refresh this just now,” and the Google tile offers Retry — that button reloads this page’s status, it does not redo the notification step, so the badge stays as it is until your next publish records a new entry. The Bing tile shows the same badge with no Retry button, for the same reason. If it keeps appearing over several publishes, tell us. And don’t read a clean “Pinged” badge as proof either — it isn’t one.
  • The whole page won’t load — MapleGather shows “We couldn’t load your SEO status.” Select Retry and check your connection.
  • There’s no Save changes button and the switches are greyed out — MapleGather shows “You don’t have permission to change SEO settings.” You can read the status, but an admin with that permission has to make the change.
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