Yoast On Why It’s Adopting IndexNow Protocol
The founder of Yoast, Joost de Valk, explains the reason that he changed his mind about the addition of IndexNow in SEO. SEO plugin.
In the beginning, Microsoft had criticized its open-source IndexNow indexing protocols for search engines. Yoast has reversed course and said they’ll now be a supporter of it.
In a chat in a conversation with Search Engine Journal, founder Joost de Valk discusses the reasons.
The adoption of IndexNow by Yoast is a significant moment for the publishing industry and the communities of search marketers. It could lead to much more widespread adoption of this new method that could significantly alter the SEO landscape and improve content marketing in an uplifting manner.
IndexNow
IndexNow can be described as an indexing method that allows websites to receive fast indexing from search engines.
It’s an open-source initiative created to help websites notify search engines of the latest or revised content.
Search engines gain by not wasting data center resources by repeatedly crawling websites that have not changed and are indexable.
IndexNow indexing protocol can notify search engines of newly removed pages. IndexNow indexing protocol can be used to alert search engines about pages that have been released recently and return the server with a 404 response.
IndexNow helps reduce the energy consumed for data center operations and aids in reducing the causes of global warming.
Many businesses have already embraced IndexNow, including search engines to publishing websites.
SEO plugin RankMath is now compatible with IndexNow, allowing web admins to notify search engines of newly added or updated pages immediately.
The two main obstacles in the adoption of IndexNow were Google as well as Yoast SEO Plugin.Until now.
Informal Announcement by Yoast
When IndexNow was first announced in September 2021, De Valk was the most well-known skeptic of the new indexing method, posting that he did not find any value in it.
Also, he tweets:
“Ever that XML sitemaps were created, URL discovery, as far as we’re concerned, is a “solved issue.”
For most websites indexed by search engines, getting them to crawl your content isn’t an issue.
Yoast SEO generates XML sitemaps and even sends pings to search engines whenever those are changed.”
So, after all the negativity and naysaying, it wasn’t quite a surprise that De Valk informally announced that Yoast would integrate IndexNow in the paid version of Yoast SEO software.
A blog post that accompanied De Valk’s announcement stated: a blog post that accompanied Announcement by DeValk included the following information:
“Bing, Yandex, and Seznam have supported this modern standard. I’ve heard of additional search engines joining the ranks.
…We’ll be providing support for it in Yoast SEO Premium soon, and we’re looking forward to seeing how it affects the user experience if it has any.”
The article didn’t explain the reason Yoast was reversing the course.
That’s why Search Engine Journal reached out to De Valk to inquire why they changed their minds.
De Valk responded:
“Yeah…”, and our view has changed due to two factors:
We were told that other search engines and systems were using it.
They have changed the way it works somewhat (or clarified it more clearly) that we are only required to ping one destination. In this way, we replace the XML sitemap’s ping with the request to IndexNow, and then it’s done.”
If asked if he would like to have IndexNow added to Yoast’s free version, Yoast, De Valk answered:
“Yeah! I could!”
I am not sure of the date or time. We’ll check how it functions first.”
Incorporating Yoast IndexNow
De Valk didn’t say whether the other search engines he had heard of were using IndexNow, including Google.
However, it’s a significant issue that Yoast is embracing the new indexing process since it’s the most extensive WordPress SEO plugin globally, boasting more than five million active users.
This will help cement IndexNow as an essential indexing method and allow more search engines to join the trend towards instant indexing. This can aid publishers and SEOs.
