Item does not support reviews

Has this plugin now been abandoned? I see no response from @halgatewood about this issue and the plugin was last updated 4 months ago! If so, we would like to know so we can make suitable arrangements to replace a “broken” plugin, as it’s compatibility with newer builds of WP could also an issue now. Thanks.

Looks like a new version was just posted:

3.0.3 – June 15th, 2020
FIX: Security fixes

Doesn’t say what exactly the fixes are or if it’s related to the review snippets. Thinking myself about recommending a different testimonial solution, but this plug in has been pretty handy…..

I have updated to the new version 3.0.3 and then asked GSC to validate the fix. Unfortunately it said “Cannot continue validation process. Affected pages were found. Fix the issue and run validation again” So it appears the update has not resolved this issue.

Please @halgatewood can you provide us with a response as, I believe, we all love the plugin and want to continue to use it, but it is testing our patience.

I also have the same problem. 11 reviews received by the client and added by me to a home page widget area using the Testimonial Rotator and resulting in 11 errors all for the Home page of the website, “Item does not support reviews” in the Google Search Console.” I’m pretty sure this is hurting our ranking on Google.

I’m ready to pull this plugin and find another, but want to give the author a 2nd chance.

As OP on this thread I had this plugin on 4 of my sites, after all it displays the testimonials well. However I have tagged the developer and DM’d him without response, and clearly the plugin is no longer fully supported. A recent security fix did not resolve this issue and it has not been tested against the latest version of WordPress. So I have pulled it from 3 of those sites and GSC has validated my fix. Just need to do some work on the fourth site and then I’m done.

Thank you for the update.

Thanks @rodeboy. I will be advising my clients using this plug-in to redeploy on another plug-in / solution.

Anyone have a good, free alternative pls post and I’ll do likewise if I find one!

Cheers!

@matthew423’s tip to check the Hide Microdata (hreview) box does resolve the error i GSC, but technically it’s only really a workaround. Really wish @halgatewood would just be open about the situation with this plugin. I have a large number of testimonials and replacing the plugin is going to be time consuming, so still hoping for a patch.

@tlgtimeshare I agree with your frustrations! The trouble is GSC considers putting your own testimonials on there as self serving – suggesting that people make them up and so are of no value to the visitor. Whilst I can see what they are saying, personally I only ever use exact quotes from people and if GSC are saying that there is more value with the reviews left coming from TripAdvisor and the like then they really do need to realise that so many of them are false and put on there by trolls etc.

I am now moving to not using a plugin to display testimonials preferring to put them on my sites as straight text, as I feel GSC will catch up with other testimonial plugins in time and we will just have the same problem again.

Anyone got any further suggestions?!

If google disabled this type of microdata, what do you want from the developer? just hide the microdata ?? it helps.

https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2019/09/making-review-rich-results-more-helpful.html

• This reply was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Webprom Design. Reason: added links

I was able to replace Testimonial Rotator with Easy Testimonials, also a free plugin, pretty easily. First I copied the testimonials and their authors, then I installed Easy Testimonials, leaving Testimonial Rotator active. There didn’t seem to be a conflict. The content went to Easy Testimonials. When I deactivated Testimonial Rotator, I had to add the authors and the star rating back in again.
Also, Easy Testimonials allowed me to switch to the Block Editor from the Classic Editor. I only had 9 to do, but it worked pretty smoothly.

Nice @manellyc. Will take a look at that one. Or, as the OP suggests, we may just move to a different business model for testimonials that are validated.

We are a non-profit and have verified reviews on GreatNonProfits we can pull in in a badge for example.

Thanks again all for the discussion on this!

Hi all,

I ended up replacing this plug-in with one that looks to be more widely installed and supported. It also has pro options, but I didn’t opt-in.

Took about 2 hours to copy/paste all 60 of my testimonials over and to swap out a dozen rotator short-codes.

Strong Testimonials by Macho Themes:
https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/strong-testimonials/

• This reply was modified 4 years, 4 months ago by erocksc.

That’s great help @erocksc and thank you for sharing. This certainly looks to be a plugin with good reviews, recent updates and decent support. Will check it out.

Have you come across any issues with Google Search Console on the sites you have used this?