Google search console login seems elusive
Is it just me or is logging into the new Google Search console a challenge? Ever since the new interface came along, I find I’m never quite sure where the login button or URL for the front page is.
Google search console login link
If you want to log directly into the new console, then you can access it from typing in https://search.google.com/search-console/ to your browser. You may still get a redirect from google, but this is the URL that seems to go to the search console
This will take you through to the new console area. Now can you get back to the old area from here? Yes you can. Currently on the new console menu at the bottom there is a text link that says “Go to the old version” see image below.
Google search console login button
Why is the new console so elusive? Firstly, I believe this is because the interface is still new and Google hasn’t totally pushed the new interface out yet. The new google search console was introduced about a year ago and isn’t overly popular with web masters, so it’s a slow transition. As it improves and the tools increase it appears more are adopting the improved user interface. You can still login to the Google webmaster tool here. Secondly it seems to exist on several redirects. So there is no such login area. If you already have an account and a property then you can directly login either by choosing the blue “Use New Search Console” button.
Google is renowned for taking its time to gradually replace original webmasters tools. Maybe that’s a good thing, but clarity is always paramount, so all I would ask is can we have one clear address for the new console tool.
What is Google Search Console?
If you want to know how to use the new Google search console then you will need to makes sure you have added your domain or property and then follow the direction for a console verification.
In effect once you have logged into the new search console, it’s pretty self-explanatory. The tools are there to help you maintain your web site and improve its rankings by understanding what Google are looking for and if it found any errors last time your site was crawled.
If there are any issues you will receive a report and you can fix the issue and request it to be reviewed. This feels like Google are making an effort to work with web designers and at the same time make content a lot more useful.
The Search Console Reporting is also really useful. It enables you to receive alerts when Google sees issues. Additionally when you are logging on to the search console alerts will show up on a bar chart. Google Search Console to be an invaluable tool for managing and troubleshooting all aspects of your web site. So what types of issues might you discover? Broken links, crawl errors, malware, slow loading pages and pages that aren’t showing due to mobile issues are worthy of a mention. Most recently you may of seen the FAQ and How to areas on the search console navigation.
Google Search Console Issues
If you use Yoast, you may be coming across a new feature in the Google console that is raising a warning. The new How To snippets now have an area under enhancements. The idea is to make sure that the rich snippet mark-up is valid. Surprisingly this hasn’t been the case on Yoast plugins recent update.
How-to issues detected
I recently used the excellent Yoast plugin to add some How-to and FAQ snippets to my blog articles. The FAQs seemed fine but i received a Search Console warning once the article was crawled. It said ” How-to issues detected on my website”
It then continued, Search Console has identified that your site is affected by a number of
The warnings recommend that I fix these issues when possible to enable the best experience and coverage in Google Search.
Google Console How-to issues
Yoast Structured data blocks issues
If your website benefits from the excellent Yoast plugin , you may be familiar with some validation issues produced in the Google Search Console after using the provided How To Block.
Google will send you an email entitled new How-to issues detected for site, and name your website. The email looks similar to this.
So in my case it draws attention to the following warnings that were found on my site. These are all since adding the Yoast How to block:
- Missing field ‘tool’
- Missing field ‘supply’
- Either ‘image’ or ‘video’ should be specified
Google do provide specific guidelines on How to properties at How to Data types page. This is provided from within the search console. Here they clearly state a difference between essential and recommended properties.
Essential properties for the How to Structured data are “name ” and “step”.
Recommended properties for the How to Structured data are “description”, “estimatedCost”, “image”, “supply”, “tool”, “totalTime” and “video”
Interstingly Google Search Console call the Recommended properties as Top Warnings.
They explain that these warnings are suggestions for improvement. They can enhance your appearance on Search; some might become errors in the future.
Yoast response to the How to issues
Along with others, we contacted Yoast to see if this is an issue that they can resolve. I think the main concern amongst those logging in to Google search console is how important are these warnings as its giving us a mixed message. Is it a warning or a recommendation? Surely if these are missing fields they just need to be shown with empty values?
Warnings are terribly different to recommendations
Zanet Design Ltd
Yoast did respond to us saying “Not filling out optional fields should not hurt performance. It’s not ideal, we know, and we’re aware of this. Google communicating this as an issue isn’t really helpful to anyone. But don’t worry; we’re working on adding the tool and supply fields as well. Stay tuned! “
So in conclusion, we highly recommend using the Yoast plugin, and if you get the issue above, I imagine it’s a slight over reaction from Googles warning panel. Yoast look like an update is in the pipeline to resolve this any way. For those looking for the Google Search Console login, you are among many others who find it elusive and a little confusing. I predict this will be resolved once the new user interface is fully adopted. Meanwhile you now know how to access both old and new search consoles.