Google data highliter - Reviews

[lindapowers]

Hi

The way VM is showing rating for reviews is not "google friendly". Google can't read your rating and votes only with the stars.

VM only shows the stars and the rating in a tooltip, this is not enough.


Google requires:

rating 4/5 **** of 1 opinion

but VM is showing:

**** (stars with tooltip).


This is the minimum requirement to show the global rating and votes.

I already spoke with Spyros about it here: https://www.virtuemarttemplates.eu/forum/hera-template-support/388-google-data-highliter-reviews.html


But I removed it since I don't like changing code after each update of template and vm.

This requires a few lines added in productdetails/default.php and some lines at rating.php under sublayouts.


Rich Snippets are good but sadly google tends to remove them and not show them until you do the data highliter, and for this to show correctly we must show rating in the correct format.

Regards

[Ghost]

Actually VM shows structured data since 3.0.10 http://virtuemart.net/news/latest-news/472-release-of-3-0-10.

It's in JSON-LD format instead of microdata, but it's just a matter of preference. Google will see it anyways. The code is located in components/com_virtuemart/sublayouts/snippets.php. Make sure your productdetails template override actually loads this sublayout. I.e. template override must be from VM 3.0.10 or newer.

[lindapowers]

Hi thanks for reply

Sorry but your stamente is not correct, if you take a look at vm extension site http://extensions.virtuemart.net/support/virtuemart-supporter-membership-detail

or the demo http://demo.virtuemart.net/headpiece/cap-baseball-detail

We use 3.0.12.

You can see the format for the reviews is not readable by google highlighter. Actually if you try to mark the stars or tooltip as rating or vote it wont read it.

This is the correct format for reviews http://www.cuidadicos.es/complementos-naturales/jaleas-y-propoleos/reina-real-vital-30-ampollas-de-10ml.html Sorry is in spanish but you can see the text which shows rating and reviews with the stars.


The rich snippets are ok but google will decide to show them or not. Sadly they won't in many cases. If you use the data highligher from google webmaster tools it would in most cases. And this is exactly what is not possible with VM currently.

To check what I tell you is as simple as going to google webmaster tools and test the highlight tool where you will see there is no way to mark the rating and votes cause the format is not correct.


Regards

[Ghost]

Like I said, the data is provided in JSON-LD format. It looks like this in page source code:

Code Select Expand

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org/",
  "@type": "Product",
  "name": "Cowboy Hat",
    "image": "http://demo.virtuemart.net/images/stories/virtuemart/product/hat3.png",
      "description": "Classic pattern, durable stiff brim resists sun & moisture.",
      "aggregateRating":{
    "@type": "AggregateRating",
    "ratingValue": "4.7",
    "reviewCount": "1"
  },
    "offers":{
    "@type": "Offer",
    "priceCurrency": "EUR",
    "price": "14.52"
  }
}
</script>

Taken from here http://demo.virtuemart.net/headpiece/cowboy-hat-detail

See rich snippets result, data is recognized: https://developers.google.com/structured-data/testing-tool?url=http%253A%252F%252Fdemo.virtuemart.net%252Fheadpiece%252Fcowboy-hat-detail

Code Select Expand

aggregateRating [AggregateRating]:
ratingValue:
4.7
reviewCount:
1

The site you showed uses both microdata and JSON-LD which is unnecessary. You can choose one over another (I prefer microdata) but there's no point in using both.

[lindapowers]

Lets try again...

1- I'm not talking about rich snippets, im talking about Google Data Highlighter https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/2692911?hl=en

2 - The code is not displayed correctly. Is what Im trying to tell you.

3 - Again, is not the same thing cause when rich snippets fail cause as google says they will decide if they show it or not without a reason you can use google highlight data to show the rich snippets.

The image is in spanish but as you can see there is no way to mark the rating as global rating or reviews cause the rating and votes are not displayed in a readable format for google.



Regards

[Ghost]

I see what you mean now. You can click "Add missing tags" and add ratings there. This markup can be added invisibly like this:

Code Select Expand

<span itemprop="aggregateRating" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/AggregateRating">
<meta itemprop="ratingValue" content="4.5">
<meta itemprop="bestRating" content="5">
<meta itemprop="ratingCount" content="3"></span>

[lindapowers]

I see what you mean now. You can click "Add missing tags" and add ratings there. This markup can be added invisibly like this:

Code Select Expand

<span itemprop="aggregateRating" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/AggregateRating">
<meta itemprop="ratingValue" content="4.5">
<meta itemprop="bestRating" content="5">
<meta itemprop="ratingCount" content="3"></span>

Thanks but as you can imagine doing that manually is not valid for us with around 100 products, even less for bigger shops. You will have to do that for every page manually and update changes manually too.

The rating and votes will be detected by google if they were displayed is the correct format to start of in VirtueMart and marking them in one page will allow the rest to be detected easily. This means adding a few lines of code to allow people to increase their global rankings with the data highlighter. So not something to ignore... which sadly will be, as usual.

[GJC Web Design]

Hi lp,  this could be done at template level though and automatically

[lindapowers]

Hi lp,  this could be done at template level though and automatically

Hi, I told Spyros already and although he always helps us and adds interesting things he doesn't seem to understand the problem in this case of not being able to add reviews to the google highlighter. Rich snippets are not enough sometimes and speaking with other webmasters seems quite common that snippets are displayed for a few days and then never again... unless you use this feature.

Is quite simple to solve in 2 template overrides which Spyros already includes, code worked fine for me except in IE where it ruined the display but if VM or the templater doesn't add it.. not much we can do.

Little details like this make a big difference for the rankings of every shop owner and should be a priority.

Another way to ask it, is why are reviews not displayed in a readable format for the biggest search engine... not to mention that VM also cuts review count on 10 but at least if we could show the global rating and votes...

Regards

[Spiros Petrakis]

Hi lindapowers,

it is not that i dont understand about your request it is that i believe it is unnecessary when the microdata is already there.
Google added Data Highlighter tool for those that can not apply rich snippets directly in the code, it is actually an alternative way to tell google about your page data when you have no other way.

Anyway i will add an option for this in next version of my templates for people that want to use the highlighter instead, but i see no reason to add it in the core when we already have a valid solution already. 

[jux]

In fact you can click on the last star when you are doing manual highligher into webmaster google tools
And it works

[lindapowers]

In fact you can click on the last star when you are doing manual highligher into webmaster google tools
And it works

No it does not work, furthermore you can't click only in the last star, the stars are taken as a whole element.