After much chopping and changing, I’ve decided to stay with Rank Math for the forseeable future, especially as my host is now recommending them.
I’ve got one problem though, and it’s with the site-maps.
Pages, posts, custom post types, no problem, they all get generated and show up succesfully in Google Search Console.
With one exception…
I’ve got a logo showcase plugin on my website that uses it’s own taxonomies, and there’s never been a problem with Rank Math getting these logos submitted to Google Search Console, until last night.
Checking on GSC I found that the http error was in fact correct, in that all links from thi part of the sitemap returned 404 errors.
Also, clicking on the Rank Math sitemap, all of these few links returned 404’s.
I’ve tried – unchecking the box to remove these taxonomies from the sitemap, and I’ve tried adding (in Rank Math> Sitemap settings> General) the three categories into ‘exclude terms’, but they’re still showing up on GSC as errors SEE HERE (the sitemap index is fine, the image is taken from the individual sitemap with errors).
Well I just tried disabling the rank math sitemap in WP Rocket, then twice – one for the single sitemap file excluded, and one for the full sitemap excluded.
Obviously this didn’t work, as it’s just a bodge job trying to mask the fact that the offending category still shows, even though it’s been disabled.
How do I stop the offending category from showing in the sitemap?
After a solid hours work, I finally found out how to exclude the offending sitemap without using a bodge job.
Went to the set-up wizard (though there’s probably an easier way) and disabled ALL the categories from showing up.
Then I went to Rank Math> General Settings and enabled the needed categories one by one.
Finally, I went to Rank Math> Sitemap Settings and made sure that the categories from above were now active.
I also made sure to enable the SEO box on the dodgy category so that I could disable (no-index) the dodgy category if needed (forward thinking).
Checked my sitemap and all looked good, submitted it to google and it all went a nice shade of green success.
If a jobs worth doing, its worth doing it without bodging it!
Oh and while I’m here, how about a quick feature request?
I see loads of times in your screenshots, the poor bugger who’s creating the screenshot video needing to go to ‘settings’, then to ‘permalinks’, then re-save the permalinks and then navigate back to Rank Math.
Would it not be better to add a ‘flush permalinks’ button inside Rank Math itself saving 3-4 clicks?
