WPSSO should pull in descriptions from your content or excerpts. Do you have a URL to an example post / page? If you enable the Debug Messages option on the Essentials or Advanced settings page, I can tell you exactly why the description tag might be missing. 😉
js.
Hello JS,
Apologies for delay in reply.
Sure. So as explained on the post pages it shows the og:description fine no issues: http://www.whitakerservices.co.uk/227-years-whitakers-2016-rebrand/
HOWEVER on a normal page the og:description is missing: http://www.whitakerservices.co.uk/about/
IF you look at the source code you can see that the meta description is pulled in but not the og:description for your plugin. however the theme we use has an opengraph option and enabling that does pull in the og:description..
I have turned on debug but cannot seem to find where the debug html is located.
You have a plugin or service “optimizing” the HTML and removing HTML comments. Would you mind disabling that feature temporarily?
You should disable you theme’s OG meta tags — they create some duplicates which Facebook isn’t going to like.
Thanks,
js.
Hello JS,
Thats been disabled AND those OG tags are now removed…
Hello JS,
I can see those html comments now.
It sates that the description/excerpt is missing BUT as you have seen with the themes OG tags they definitely exist OR the themes OG tags wouldn’t work…
Hm. Here’s an interesting bit:
SucomWebpage :: get_content : content strlen before 31820 and after changes / filters 31726
SucomWebpage :: get_description : description strlen before html cleanup 31726
SucomWebpage :: get_description : description strlen before limit length 0 (limiting to 300 chars)
Does your content include any text? Once the HTML tags are removed, it appears that there’s nothing left…
If your content doesn’t have any text, then you could try using excerpts. If you have the Pro version, you can enable excerpts for Pages easily under the SSO -> Advanced -> WP / Theme Integration tab.
js.
Hello JS,
yup most definitely does include text. As you saw earlier it pulled through fine. Just not with your plugin..
I understand what you are saying about the paid premium plugin. However I would only use that for custom descriptions/excerpts.
At the moment wanting to use the default ones which aren’t pulling through with your plugin..
I’ve made some changes for the next version to make some of the pattern matching specifically ungreedy, so this might help preserve the context text, which appears to be wrapped in lots of HTML tags in your case… Let me know if v8.32.1 fixes your issue — it should be out later today or tomorrow.
If you have the Pro version, you can choose to install the Pre-release version from the SSO -> Update Manager settings page.
js.
Hello JS,
Apologies for the late reply.
yes this still is an issue. Again the meta:description pulls in fine (via yoast seo) BUT not the og:description with your plugin…
your update doesn’t seem to have fixed this issue..
Confused as to why yoast can pull in the description but your plugin cannot? understand that there is a lot of html around text BUT this again doesn’t seem to effect the yoast plugin..
The text from the Yoast SEO meta description tag does not appear anywhere in your page, so I would assume it’s a custom description:
<meta name="description" content="Whitaker Services, one of the most respected specialists with over 25 years experience in making organisations more effective through interior design"/>
You’ve disabled the Debug Messages option, so I can’t comment on what WPSSO may (or may not) be finding.
An easy alternative, to provide text to both Yoast SEO (so you don’t have to enter custom text) and WPSSO would be to enable excerpts for pages as well.
https://www.google.com/search?q=how+to+enable+excerpts+for+wordpress+pages
js.
Hmm not sure where you picked that up from:
The text from the Yoast SEO meta description tag does not appear anywhere in your page, so I would assume it’s a custom description:
this is copied directly from the source code:
<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v3.2.5 - https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/ -->
<meta name="description" content="Whitakers offers specialist textiles products and design services to a wide range of business sectors. Predominantly, we work within the healthcare market"/>
So it yoast does pick up the meta description. As you can see its added via yoast so its clearly picking it up.
Yup, i am aware of that i can enable excerpts for pages etc. HOWEVER as yoast was picking this automatically i wanted to ensure that part worked as it should rather than start to create additional work.
I have re enabled the comment for your plugin if that helps..
just seems like your plugin is broken somewhere and not pulling it in where as yoast seems to have no issues…
You misunderstood — The text from the Yoast SEO meta description tag (its value, not the meta tag itself) does not appear anywhere in your page, so I would assume it’s a custom description.
This is the text:
Whitaker Services, one of the most respected specialists with over 25 years experience in making organisations more effective through interior design
It does not appear anywhere in your content, so it appears as though you entered that text in the Yoast SEO metabox — it does not appear as though Yoast SEO pulled that text from your post content (since that text does not appear in your content).
There are no WPSSO debug HTML messages in the webpage at http://www.whitakerservices.co.uk/about/, so I cannot comment as to what WPSSO may or may not be picking up from your content.
js.
Looks like you’ve got it sorted.
<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v3.2.5 - https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/ -->
<meta name="description" content="Whitaker Services, one of the most respected specialists with over 25 years experience in making organisations more effective through interior design."/>
<!-- / Yoast SEO plugin. -->
<!-- wpsso meta tags begin -->
<meta property="og:description" content="Whitaker Services, one of the most respected specialists with over 25 years experience in making organisations more effective through interior design."/>
<meta name="twitter:description" content="Whitaker Services, one of the most respected specialists with over 25 years experience in making organisations more effective through interior design."/>
<!-- wpsso meta tags end -->
js.
Hello JS,
Yup, I already had in the code for excerpt box to be present on pages. So have spent the time adding in descriptions to the excerpt box which yoast and your plugin now picks up.
I guess its better to create unique descriptions than the plugins picking it up automatically from content text which I think plugins cant do as its dynamic content, so maybe have that in for a future update?
In any case, many thanks for all your help. good plugin which i will hopefully purchase soon 😉
