Adding Author and Updated Schema Markup to WordPress Static Pages

Question

Google Webmaster tools is showing me some errors in the Structured Data section.

The error says it cannot find author and updated information in some of the URLs on my website.

Most of these URLs are static pages like testimonials, contact, and more. It doesn't make sense to have an author name or a date on those pages. Our theme is based on Underscores starter theme.

In case you want to see it, here is how the markup in our /template-parts/content-page.php file looks like:

    <?php
    /**
    * Template part for displaying page content in page.php
    *
    * @link https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/basics/template-hierarchy/
    *
    * @package design
    */

    ?>

    <article id="post-<?php the_ID(); ?>" <?php post_class(); ?>>
    <header class="entry-header">
    <?php the_title( '<h1 class="entry-title">', '</h1>' ); ?>

    </header><!-- .entry-header -->
    <?php           if ( has_post_thumbnail() ) {
    the_post_thumbnail();
    }
    ?>
    <div class="entry-content">
    <?php
        the_content();

        wp_link_pages( array(
            'before' => '<div class="page-links">' . esc_html__( 'Pages:', 'design' ),
            'after'  => '</div>',
        ) );
    ?>
    </div><!-- .entry-content -->

    <?php if ( get_edit_post_link() ) : ?>
    <footer class="entry-footer">
        <?php
            edit_post_link(
                sprintf(
                    wp_kses(
                        /* translators: %s: Name of current post. Only visible to screen readers */
                        __( 'Edit <span class="screen-reader-text">%s</span>', 'design' ),
                        array(
                            'span' => array(
                                'class' => array(),
                            ),
                        )
                    ),
                    get_the_title()
                ),
                '<span class="edit-link">',
                '</span>'
            );
        ?>
    </footer><!-- .entry-footer -->
    <?php endif; ?>
    </article><!-- #post-<?php the_ID(); ?> -->

Any pointers on how to fix missing author and updated errors in structured data without actually displaying those into our static WordPress pages.

Thanks

Answer 1

Best practice would be to structure your schema so that the author is your organizations. Under Schema, an itemprop="author" can be either a Person or an Organization.

If you do have another content item like a blog post, it ought to have an author listed. Having an author assigned can boost your pagerank.

Author information can be placed into the HTML via the template using the microdata format or as a separate JSON-LD entry using a plugin like Schema. JSON-LD is preferred by Google.