[Support request] Low LCP and CLS making Google ignore our site

[David]

Hi there,

that issue is:

Ensure that the page source does not contain large amounts of CSS or code at the top of the page. Consider moving code and styles into separate files.

which is caused by optimization plugins that inline all your CSS and Javascripts in the head of your site.

[Kris]

Hi David,

We are using WP Fastest Cache plugin with the following optios selected: https://i.postimg.cc/HLCZ3S4R/WPfastest-Cache.jpg
I thought the whole point of using optimization plugins was to “inline all your CSS and Javascripts in the head of your site” ?

Would you recommend an alternative plugin, or something else? Here is the latest Coverage report from DevTools: https://i.postimg.cc/N044DQ02/Chrome-Dev-Tools7.jpg

Thanks,
Kris

[Fernando]

Commonly used Caching/Optimization plugins by our users are Autoptimize and WP Rocket. For reference, here’s an article showing an ideal setup for Autoptimize: https://docs.generatepress.com/article/configuring-autoptimize/

It depends. It can help performance-wise, but if it’s a lot, SEO-wise, having a lot of inline CSS and code on your Header pushes down your Content too far down.

One approach is to try to look for a setting to minimize CSS code. This may shorten the code pushing down the Content. Try to exclude JS files from inlining to your Header through your plugin as well. If that doesn’t work, it may be best to disable to feature that does this, SEO-wise.

[Kris]

Hi Fernando,

I installed Autoptise and did those setting you recommended. At DevTools we now have only 2 lines:
https://i.postimg.cc/DwH3rW60/Chrome-Dev-Tools8-Autopt.jpg
Compared to WP Fastest Cache, which had 6 lines https://i.postimg.cc/N044DQ02/Chrome-Dev-Tools7.jpg
Total bytes is 848 less now. I suppose that is better then?
Lighthouse is about the same BUT GTmetrix has now in RED: “Reduce initial server response time FCP LCP”
This makes it bad, eh? I might be better off with WP Fastest Cache?

[Fernando]

Yes, it seems to have improved a lot performance-wise on mobile especially: https://share.getcloudapp.com/DOukWE7K

I tested on GT Metrix as well, and this is the result I got from your website: https://share.getcloudapp.com/Z4umvNRm

Can you try retesting?

I personally don’t use GT Metrix though as I find Pagespeed Insights more accurate.

[Kris]

OK, I retested GTmetrix and now the “Reduce initial server response time FCP LCP” is gone.

On Pagespeed Insights we get now amazing scores! Mobile 90,97,100,98 and Desktop 98,98,100,100

I dare to say that there are few websites that are better optimised than ours!

Which sadly brings me back to my original problems:

1. Why do we have “No URLs with a good page experience on mobile or desktop” at Google Search Console?

2. Why doesn’t Bing index our pages: “The inspected URL is known to Bing but has some issues which are preventing indexation”

This just does not make any sense? How do we tell Google and Bing our website is actually very, very good?

Even Yandex finds problems in our sitemaps: https://i.postimg.cc/ZRLW92gx/Yandex.jpg

I have no idea what those errors might be?

Maybe we are looking at the wrong place? Maybe the problem is in htaccess file?

You can find it here if you could take a look: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jlli4ydkzyrfitn/htaccess?dl=0

[David]

1. I tested one of your posts for Mobile Friendly:

https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly/result?id=EPpRTshOYfLVEp–W36Tpg

And it passed.
So you may just need to tell the GSC to revalidate those pages.

2. Bing – from the little experience i have; all i can say is its guidelines are terrible.
Again this may be that previously the crawling of those pages failed due to the Inline code, which now that is removed/reduced you should try recrawling those pages.

3. Yandex -that looks like its having trouble with image data in the sitemap. I assume the site map is from your SEO plugin, if so check with their plugin support as they should be able to advise on that.

[Kris]

Hi David,

Yep, I’ve been clicking on those revalidation buttons, but still we have “NO URLs with a good page experience on mobile or desktop” in the Page Experience tab. Even though in the Mobile Usability tab we can see 172 pages that have “These pages provide a good page experience”! https://i.postimg.cc/x8Nc9xbs/Google-Search-Console.jpg

Also in this view https://i.postimg.cc/G2xxRpG7/Google-Search-Console2.jpg
we have zero good pages at the same time we have zero failing pages!

Since we have 507 indexed pages, and if we do have 172 “good page experience” -mobile pages, we should also have 335 failed pages (507-172). But no, we have zero failing pages! This is so confusing mate!

Also, I found something really strange on URL Inspection: https://i.postimg.cc/QNfhxGgV/Google-Search-Console3.jpg

Firstly, we don’t have that link from this page http://socialmediarevolver.com/how-to-build-a-successful-online-store/ to this URL
http://socialmediarevolver.com/how-to-use-instagram-for-business/instagramforbusiness/

Second, why do we even have this page URL? http://socialmediarevolver.com/how-to-use-instagram-for-business/instagramforbusiness/

It is not a page that was created manually. It looks like the URL has included it’s category in it as we do have a category titled “instagram-for-business” seen here https://socialmediarevolver.com/category/extra-bullets/instagram/instagram-for-business/

the spelling is not the same though as our category has hyphens in it.

What do you guys make of this?

Thank you David and Fernando for staying with me on this issue! I would not have been able to solve these on my own, and as you know Google and Bing do not really give you direct answers, nor reply to emails. So, stay awesome,guys!

[David]

The:
“NO URLs with a good page experience on mobile or desktop” i believe this is a user data collection thing. It simply means that Google has been unable to collect enough real world data to complete that report. If all the other metrics are green then its probably safe to ignore.

172 “good page experience”
That also looks data related, Google is saying it has collected enough data to validate those URLs.

Over time i would expect those metrics to change and some of the blanks get filled in.

The missing referrer URL, unfortunately i cannot explain what would cause that.

[Kris]

Hi David,

I think the GSC has a 28-day collection period, so let’s wait and see what happens in 28 days.

The website gets good metrics across the board, so if logic prevails this should be reflected in the GSC sooner or later.

I will keep you poested. Thank you again for help! Cheers, Kris

…oh one more thing: I noticed this on the dashboard:

“DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT is defined. You should also disallow PHP execution in GP Hooks.”

Do I need to do this? I’d rather not mess with the site now that we have it in good order.

[David]

For this:
“DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT is defined. You should also disallow PHP execution in GP Hooks.”

Are you using any GP Hook Elements ?

[Kris]

Not at the moment, David.

But when the GSC problem clears I might want to add the Google Analytics code as a Hook.

-Kris

[David]

Ok, you can leave that as is, GA codes don’t require PHP execution, so you will be able to add those to a Hook element when you need to.

[Author]

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