WiscWeb - Adding Google Search Console to Your Site
This document will walk you through the process of creating your Google Search Console account and adding it to the Customizer in the UW Theme.
Important
- Note: This app is not a “core app” under UW-Madison’s Google Privacy Policy or Terms of Service.
- Support: Support is not available from the UW-Madison Google team for non-core apps. We recommend the following for assistance:
- Review Google documentation.
- Enroll in free Google training.
- Recommendation: Use a departmental service account when using non-core apps to share ownership of data and avoid losing access to data owned by a former employee/student.
Overview
Google's Search Console tool allows users to monitor and optimize their site's performance in Google search results. Among other things, a few typical functions of this tool include:
- Tracking a site's performance in search results
- Making adjustments in order to enhance placement in search results
- Requesting that Google re-crawl a website
- Linking to a sitemap
Please note that support of this tool is limited within the Google and WiscWeb teams at DoIT.
For a full list of Google Search Console's abilities, please see the related Google documentation.
Steps
Step 1: Creating a Google Search Console account
- Open a new private browsing window/incognito window
- Navigate to Google Search Console
- If you already have an account, Sign In
- It is recommended that you use an Microsoft 365 Service (departmental) account for this purpose. For more information regarding Service Accounts, please refer to Microsoft 365 - Getting Started with Service Accounts.
- You would use that account to sign in
- It is recommended that you use an Microsoft 365 Service (departmental) account for this purpose. For more information regarding Service Accounts, please refer to Microsoft 365 - Getting Started with Service Accounts.
- In the screen where you choose the Property Type, select the URL Prefix box
- Type in the URL of the site you would like to register into the Enter URL field
- In the Verify Ownership window, scroll down and click on the HTML tag option
- In the box, you will see some code starting with a <meta> tag. The ID you need will be after the content= within the quotation marks.
Example:<meta name="google-site-verification" content="this is your console ID" />
- Copy the ID listed between the quotation marks and then scroll down to follow the steps for adding it to your WiscWeb project.
- Keep this window open as you will need to return to it as soon as you add the ID to your project.
Step 2: Adding a Google Search Console ID to your project/website
- In a separate browsing window, navigate to your project Dashboard in WiscWeb
- Click on Appearance and choose Customize
- Choose Google Services
- In the Google Search Console field, paste in the ID you copied
- Click Publish
Step 3: Verifying ID in Google Search Console
- Toggle back to your Google Search Console window
- Click the Verify button in the HTML tag box
- Allow the tool to verify that the ID has been added to your site successfully.