Edit page text and SEO settings
Updated
The Content panel changes the text of each page and the search settings of each page. Its two views, Pages and Items, are chosen with the control named "Content to edit". This article covers the Pages view. Add, edit, and reorder items covers the Items view.
Open the Pages view
- Select Open editor in the header of the site's page.
- Select the Content tab.
- Select Pages in the view control.
Choose a page in the Page list. The preview shows the page you choose. While the editor loads the page, it says "Loading the sections of this page…". A site with no page says "This site has no pages to edit yet."
Edit the text of a section
The page appears as a list of its sections, each titled with its position and its name, such as "1. Hero". Select a section to open it and see its text fields. Change the text and select Save changes.
Some sections have no text of their own: "This section has no text of its own. It shows the site's items or Global Values, which you edit under Items or in the Global Values panel." A page with no section the editor can change says "This page has no sections the editor can change."
The editor saves the sections you changed in one change. The change appears in the site's history as "Edited the" page name "page" followed by the sections. If someone changed the page in WP Admin or through the Website Agent after you opened it, the editor doesn't save. It says "This site changed somewhere else" and shows the current text, so you can make your edit again.
Set the SEO settings of a page
Select SEO settings under the page's sections to open the search settings of the page. The group is closed until you select it.
| Field | What it does |
|---|---|
| SEO title | The title that search results show. Leave it empty to use the title WordPress builds. Search results show about 60 characters, and the field counts yours. |
| Meta description | The snippet under the title. Leave it empty, and search engines write their own snippet from the page. Search results show about 160 characters. |
| Canonical URL | The address that search engines treat as the page's own. Leave it empty to use the page's own address. Enter a full address that starts with https:// and belongs to this site. |
| Hide this page from search engines | Adds a noindex tag, so search engines drop the page from their results. |
Select Save SEO settings. A message confirms "SEO settings saved for" the page title. A canonical address on another website is refused, because it would move the page's ranking to that website.
SEO settings are a change of their own in the site's history, so you can undo them. Undo changes and restore snapshots explains how.
If the Pages view doesn't load
"The editor couldn't load the site's content, because the site didn't answer. Reload the page to try again." means the site didn't answer. Select Reload page. If the site runs an older release of the Local Service Core plugin, the editor says that the Content panel needs version 0.3.10 or later. Open WP Admin, update Local Service Core under Plugins, and reload the editor.