Submission & Sync: pings, GSC submit & last status
Use the Submission & Sync tab under Indexing & Sitemaps to ping search engines, push sitemaps to Google Search Console when connected, read last-submit timestamps, and wire up IndexNow auto-notify on publish.
Before you start
Open WP Admin › SEO Rank Genius › Indexing & Sitemaps › Submission & Sync. The direct URL shape is:
/wp-admin/admin.php?page=seo-link-genius_indexing&tab=submission-sync
- Confirm your XML sitemap is reachable publicly (often /sitemap.xml). The plugin surfaces the canonical sitemap URL in this tab when
SLG_Indexing_Manager::get_sitemap_url()resolves it. - For Google API submission, connect Google Search Console from Tools › GSC first—this tab mirrors connection state and disables the bulk submit button until OAuth is ready.
- Administrator-level access is assumed; mapped roles behave like your capability plugin defines.
Mockup 1: Tab routing inside Indexing mirrors the grouped nav—Submission & Sync sits under Sync & Advanced.
Submission screen layout
Reading top to bottom, the PHP template stacks these regions:
Google Search Console connection banner
Green success panel when connected (property + email) with Manage GSC linking to admin.php?page=seo-link-genius_tools&tab=gsc; amber warning with Connect GSC when disconnected.
Sitemap Submission strip
Copy-friendly <code> block for your resolved sitemap URL plus an external open link.
Two-up engine workspace
Google Search Console actions on the left, Bing Webmaster Tools with optional ping toggle on the right. A full-width secondary action row triggers global pings.
IndexNow, AI Platforms, footer save
IndexNow exposes enable/auto-ping, post-type pickers, manual URL submission, optional log table, and Save IndexNow Settings. Separate Save Settings persists tab toggles bound to indexing AJAX.
✓ Submitted badge when API reports success.
Last submitted · 12 min ago Submit All Sitemaps to GSCLast submitted mirrored from unified status array.
Mockup 2: Sitemap hero row plus Google/Bing cards—note the ✓ badge, relative last ping line, Bing toggle keyed to bing_ping_enabled.
Ping search engines
Ping All Search Engines (#slg-ping-search-engines-btn) is the blunt instrument: hit it after major publishes, migrations, or when you manually rotate sitemap shards. Bing’s dedicated Enable Bing Ping checkbox writes to indexer settings (bing_ping_enabled) so automated workflows can quietly opt in/out.
Fires AJAX handlers that hydrate overview KPI widgets when callbacks expose fresh submission payloads.
📣 Ping All Search EnginesMockup 3: Secondary/outline button anchored under the Bing card—successful responses can refresh Overview chips via window.slgRefreshOverviewSubmission.
GSC sitemap submit
- Finish OAuth inside Tools › Google Search Console until the banner turns green.
- Validate the surfaced sitemap URL resolves with HTTP 200 and returns valid XML (XML Sitemap guide).
- Use Submit All Sitemaps to GSC; the UI advertises consolidated submission across posts/pages/taxonomies for tracking inside Search Console reports.
- Watch for Last submitted: … ago copy powered by WordPress relative time helpers on google_time; when disconnected, the CTA disables with a “Connect GSC first” tooltip.
Connect GSC to submit sitemaps directly via the API for faster indexing.
Connect GSCMockup 4: Amber onboarding panel matches the conditional branch in PHP—bulk submit stays disabled until SLG_GSC_Connector::is_connected() succeeds.
Auto-sync & schedules
“Auto-sync” in this surface is event-driven, not a hidden cron string:
- IndexNow — Auto-Ping on Publish: when master Enable IndexNow is checked, ticking auto-ping lets Bing, Yandex, Seznam, and Naver learn about publishes/updates without extra keys (per UI copy).
- Post Types to Ping: chip checkboxes marshal into the saved payload consumed by AJAX action slg_indexnow_save_settings; exclude attachments automatically like the PHP loop skips attachment.
- Manual & batch: single URL submissions go through slg_indexnow_submit_url; Submit Recent Posts (batch) calls slg_indexnow_submit_batch, then may fan out refreshed submission stats.
| URL | Status | Time |
|---|---|---|
| /blog/new-launch/ | ✓ 200 | 3 min ago |
| /guides/schema/ | ✓ 200 | 1 hr ago |
Mockup 5: Toggles correspond to IDs slg-indexnow-enabled / slg-indexnow-auto-ping; the log table renders only when SLG_IndexNow::get_log() returns rows.
| Signal | Shown in Submission & Sync |
|---|---|
| google_submitted | ✓ Submitted chip beside Google card header |
| google_time | #slg-google-last-submit relative stamp |
| bing_submitted / time | Parallel badge + line beneath Bing ping toggle |
| Disconnected GSC | Dashed warning + disabled primary CTA iconography |
Why doesn’t Bing show a mega-button?
Bing leans on the toggle plus global ping; Google uses first-class API hooks—both still refresh from the same consolidated status bag.
Mockup 6: Mapping tab labels to persisted flags helps support teams correlate UI copy with tab-submission-sync.php variables.