%%sitename%% Not Working in the Titles & Metas Feature

Hi,

We understand there is an issue with your title template variables. We’d like to get some more information

Can you confirm you are using the most recent Yoast SEO v5.5.1??

Can you confirm you are using WordPress 4.8.2? You can check by clicking on the W in the top left and selecting About. If you need to update, please check with your host provider.?Please know that if you are using an older version of WordPress Core you may experience unexpected behavior with Yoast.?This guide explains more:?https://yoast.com/why-we-dont-support-old-wordpress-versions/.

Can you provide a link to a url where sitename is not working as expected?

Can you take a screenshot of what the template variables look like on the backend? You embed images using pasteboard.co

Hello,

Yes, I am using the updated versions of Yoast SEO (v5.5.1) and WordPress (4.8.2).

Take a look at this link https://www.explainz.com/explanations/tech-web/web-hosting/ and also my site’s home page https://www.explainz.com/.

The title for the post page should actually be “Virtual Private Server Hosting | Explainz – Precise. Brief. Clear” and not just “Virtual Private Server Hosting”. The home page has got it right. It correctly displays “Home | Explainz – Precise. Brief. Clear”.

Similarly the pages on my site are displaying the site title correctly too. For instance, the About Us page’s site title is “About Us | Explainz – Precise. Brief. Clear”. It’s only the “post” pages that are experiencing trouble.

This is the title template for my posts “%%title%% %%page%% %%sep%% %%sitename%%”. Unfortunately, I am not sure how to crop the image on Pasteboard. The entire web page is getting saved after multiple instances of trying.

Note: I am currently on the Shared Hatchling plan with Hostgator and I have made the upgrade to Cloud Hatchling, which is still in migration. A few days ago I received an update about the migration from Hostgator stating I must update my WordPress PHP 5.4 to 5.5 for the migration, which I did. Just letting you know in case that could be a cause.

Hello,

Any update on this?

That sounds like a plugin or theme conflict. Can you try and gather as much information for us as possible? Please perform the following:
1. Check for conflicts.
2. Does this issue resolved when using the default 2017 theme?
3. Check for JavaScript errors with your console.
If you find any JavaScript errors related to Yoast SEO or if there is a conflict with a plugin or a theme, you can create a new GitHub issue for our developers. Please report the issue to a third party developer as well.
If you didn’t find any conflicts or errors, we think the issue is specific to your site. We’d need to investigate further but are unable to do so on these forums. You can purchase Yoast SEO Premium and receive our Premium email support and we can help you further.

Hello,

I shall do this but wouldn’t uninstalling and installing the theme affect the site’s design. I have added quite a bit of CSS to the theme.

Hi,

We are not sure why the title of ” Virtual Private Server Hosting | Explainz – Precise. Brief. Clear ” fails to appear here: https://www.explainz.com/explanations/tech-internet/web-hosting/. We can see the <title> tag being outputted is “Web Hosting”. See: https://pasteboard.co/GNGN8M6.png.

We suggest editing the post’s name on the backend to see if it changes. This guide explains more about how to do that: https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/titles-and-meta-descriptions/. Then once it is edited, check the source code to see if the title is edited. This guide explains more about how to check the source code: https://kb.yoast.com/kb/view-page-source-site/.

If the title still fails to appear, please try the conflict check as described above. Yes, switching themes out briefly will affect the site’s design. However, while we cannot speak to how you edited and added the CSS to the theme, you may wish to first confer with the theme developer that switching will not result in removal of those edits.

We do know that some plugins and themes saved content to the WordPress database so even if themes/plugins are deactivated all the changes and settings are still saved and are still expected to appear once they are re-activated. However, since we do not know your theme we suggest contacting them to ensure that they are.

Thanks a lot for the inputs, Pcosta88 and Md Mazedul Islam Khan. Quite a lot of the stuff detailed in your responses are a bit too technical for my liking. I can certainly follow those instructions but I am scared I could end up stranded if I goof up somewhere during the process.

I am, however, considering two things. Either hire a third party developer to get the issue rectified or manually type in the site name every time I post new content.

Let me know if manual insertion should be fine. Thanks!

Hi,

Yes you can do a manual edit of the SEO title to add the sitename. The expected result is that the sitename would appear as part of the posts/pages title in a Google search.

Just an update on this issue.

New or the posts created after activating the Yoast SEO plugin are not facing this sitename issue. It’s only the posts that were created before Yoast SEO seem to have this problem.

Hi @francisdza179,

We are not sure why the title of your old posts doesn’t output the %%sitename%% variable. You may want to try going to the edit screen of an old post and saving changes without modifying anything. Is the correct title shown after updating the post?

We’d like to have a closer look at your website and investigate this issue further but are unable to do so on these forums. You can purchase Yoast SEO Premium and receive our Premium email support and we can help you further.

Closed due to inactivity.

We’ve got a similar issue on https://www.zemaitis-uk.com

Post & Page Title Templates are set to %%title%% %%sep%% %%sitename%%

However, with Force rewrite titles disabled (default) the output when bookmarking a page/post is:
“Site Title | Page Title | TaglineSEO Title (Found under Yoast SEO for the specific page)”
NB no space between tagline & SEO Title created.

But with Force rewrite titles enabled it simply outputs: “SEO Title”.

Have tested with Troubleshooter – same issue still. No Java errors. Re-saving makes no difference.

Running WordPress 4.9.4 and Yoast 6.3.1.

Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

Update:

In Troubleshooting mode and using Twenty Seventeen theme similar issue occurs.

With only Yoast enabled meta title is: “SEO Title”

With Yoast off it’s “Page Title – Site Name”

So, no matter what, cannot get Yoast settings of %%title%% %%sep%% %%sitename%% to work correctly.

Any ideas?

Please ignore this – found it was ‘user error’ ??

Doh! Some of it is user error.

I misunderstood what the meta title editor did until – with Force Rewrite, we are getting the correct meta title.

However, with Force rewrite titles disabled (default) the output when bookmarking a page/post is:
“Site Title | Page Title | TaglineSEO Title (Found under Yoast SEO for the specific page)”
NB no space between tagline & SEO Title created.

I’ve seen that you don’t recommend using Force Rewrite as it slows the site down.

Any suggestions?