Review Generator

After writing up a tutorial explaining how to mark up review posts for better visibility in search engines, I decided to create a "Review Generator" which you can use to write up formatted reviews for your site.

This review generator uses a simple form in which you can add details of your review. You can then generate the code to paste into your blog post, and even preview the content of your review.

Learn more about marking up review posts, or head on over to the review generator page to start using it right away!

In recent weeks, I've been marking up my book reviews using microformat review code. This will enable my reviews to appear more prominently in search engine results where rich snippets are available, like this:

An example of a "marked-up" review in Google search results

Unlike regular search results which display only plain text, pages which are marked up using microformats are more eye-catching and concise, containing star-ratings, summaries and more.

Many major websites have been marking up their pages using microformats for some time, but as Google is beginning to display rich snippets among regular search results it's important for us as independent bloggers to keep up and retain our search engine rankings!

So in this post I'll explain how we can easily mark up our review posts and enhance their ranking in search engine results.

How to mark up review posts for rich snippets

In order to mark up posts using microformats, we need to edit the HTML content of the post.

Most blogging services (such as Wordpress, Blogger and TypePad) allow us to switch between HTML and WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) post editors.

By editing the HTML of our posts, we are able to wrap important information in our posts in unobtrusive <span> or <div> tags using class names required for microformat mark-up.

These class names tell Google (and other search engines) what the content refers to. For example:

• <span class="summary"> defines a summary of the review
• <span class="reviewer"> defines the name of the person writing the review

The following explains all of the possible class names which can be used to define information contained in reviews:

Property	Description
itemreviewed (item)	The item being reviewed. In microformats, can include the name of the item reviewed (fn).
rating	A numerical quality rating for the item (for example, 4). You can indicate a rating scale by specifying best (default: 5) and worst (default: 1).
reviewer	The author of the review.
dtreviewed	The date that the item was reviewed in ISO date format.
description	The body of the review.
summary	A short summary of the review.

Examples of marked-up reviews

Here is a very basic example of a review which has not yet been marked up using microformats:

Anutha Buggy
Reviewed by MumBloggerSue on January 6 2011.

Not bad for the price, but lacking in features

A cute basic pram in bold red to suit both boys and girls. Has front swivel wheels and reclines fully for newborns, but comes with no accessories and is awkward to put up and down. Not great for public transport journeys, but a good choice for those on a tight budget.

Rating: 3.5

Here is the same post, marked up with span tags to include all of the data from the table above:

<div class="hreview">
<span class="item"><span class="fn">Anutha Buggy<span><span>
Reviewed by <span class="reviewer>MumBloggerSue<span> on <span class="dtreviewed">January 6 2011.<span class="value=title" title="2011-06-01"><span><span>

<span class="summary">Not bad for the price, but lacking in features.<span>

<span class="description">A cute basic pram in bold red to suit both boys and girls. Has front swivel wheels and reclines fully for newborns, but comes with no accessories and is awkward to put up and down. Not great for public transport journeys, but a good choice for those on a tight budget.<span>

Rating: <span class="rating">3.5</span>
</div> 

How this example works

• In the first line, class="hreview" indicates that the HTML enclosed in the
  describes a review.
• The structured information is conveyed by the class attribute (such as class="rating" and class="reviewer", and the values (such as 3.5, MumBloggerSue). You can change the tags such as span and div to suit your formatting needs.
• Properties can contain other properties. In the example above, the property item describes the subject of the review, and includes the subproperty fn(name).

About the time formatting

Because it would be virtually impossible to define a single means of formatting dates across the entire web, Google reccomends that we include review dates in ISO format by atributing this as the "title" within span tags, as in the example above.

Using this date format, the numeric month comes first, followed by the date, and finally the year (using four digits).

In our example, the date January 6th 2011 is translated as <span class="value-title" title="01-06-2011"></span>

This is nested within the dtreviewed section, and is the only "empty" tag allowed by Google in rich snippet markup.

*Google prevents all other empty span and div tags from being used for rich snippets to prevent spammers from misusing the format. By ensuring marked up pages contain real content and not simply keywords, the integrity of search engine results is maintained.

A review post generator (for those who'd like to mark-up their posts the easy way!)

I've created a handy "Review Generator" for those who prefer to mark up their posts the easy way ;)

Using this review generator, you can easily mark up your review posts using microformats, for increased visibility in search engines.

Simply fill in the form and generate your code. You can even preview your review to make sure everything is correct before copy/pasting the code into your post editor.

Head over to the review generator page to generate your own review posts, and please tell your friends if you find this useful!

Microformats for recipe posts

Google also analyses pages marked up as recipes for rich snippets and inclusion in the recipe search engine.

I've already created a tool you can use to mark up recipe posts with microformats over at Blogger Buster.

Is this post useful for you?

I realise that many British parent bloggers provide reviews on their sites and hope that this post will prove useful in increasing the visibility of your posts in search results. It may also assist when requesting products to be reviewed as you can explain the value of marked-up posts as an incentive =]

Please do let me know if you have found this post useful, or if you would like to read more blogging-themed posts like this by leaving your comments below.

The lovely ladies over at BritMums have organized an Easter blog hop for British parent bloggers to share their sites and favourite posts.

If you're a British parent blogger, be sure to join BritMums (dads are welcome too!) and add your site to the BlogHop below to be included in this month's round up:

The Mum Blogger eCourse

Erica of LittleMummy offers a great FREE eCourse which covers everything you could need to start and build a successful "Mummy Blog".

Although I've been blogging for several years now, I've had quite a break from parent blogging and have signed up for Erica's course to brush up my skills and learn more.

If you're interested to learn how to start and build a successful parent blog, sign up for the eCourse now - it's totally free and judging by Erica's success you're bound to learn a lot too!

Thanks to Nixdminx for passing on this lovely award to Glamumous! I was thrilled to bits to receive my first award for this blog :)

When in Tunisia, one of my favourite beveraes is strong Arabic coffee flavoured with rose-water. Sounds odd, but trust me, this is one of the most divine drinks ever!

As per the concept of this Lovely Blog Award, I would like to nominate 10 blogs which I've recently discovered as new receiptants of this award:

1. Susanna of A Modern Mother, because I read your blog everyday and you post such interesting topics about motherhood in Britain.

2. Esther, Courtney. Michela and Emilie of Babyccino, a site of wonderful things for mums, kids and tiny tots too. I loved the recipe for preserving children...

3. Miss Thrifty, the ultimate money-saver for helping us learn to live for less (and love it!)

4. Reccessionista, who posts wonderful money-saving tips and bargains galore.

5. Nadine at Time Management Mum who writes about juggling a busy life with children. She's just published her first book on time management, which truly looks an interesting read!

6. Becky and Linda over at You've Got Your Hands Full who blog about their experiences with twins and triplets...

7. And another shout for their new travel blog, Have A Lovely Time, where you can find reviews on days out and holidays for families with children (well worth checking out!).

8. Experimental Mum who has a gorgeous design for her blog, and offers loads of wonderful science experiments which my son truly loves!

9. English Mum in Ireland, who I discovered after reading about her wonderful escape to Disneyland (ooh, I'm soooo jealous! But we may yet escape to Disneyland Paris this year...)

10. Are we nearly there yet Mummy, because as Laura rightly points out, parenthood is the longest journey we could ever undertake!

For those who I have nominated to receive this award, I'll be in touch soon through your blogs to let you know. If you choose to accept the reward, here are the rules:

Post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.(You can save the award image to your computer and upload to your blog in the usual way).
Pass the award to 10 other blogs that you have newly discovered.Remember to contact the blogger to let them know they have been chosenfor this award.

I hope you enjoy reading the blogs I have posted here! These are all new additions to my RSS reader (which is now becoming so long to read) but are wonderful bloggers whose posts are well worth a look.

If you're a blogging mummy (or are considering starting a blog sometime soon) be sure to check out Blogging in Pink: a women's guide to blogging by Michelle Mitchell, author of the popular blog, Scribbit.

This 24-chapter guide gives you tips for organizing yourself, getting started, focusing your efforts and taking things to the next level. Plus you get some pret-ty darn spiffy illustrations to boot.

I've been reading Blogging in Pink all afternoon and am very impressed with Michelle's advice. This really does offer some great advice for bloggers, including loads of information I wish I'd had to hand when I first began blogging, such as dealing with comment spam, which blog host to use and "The Ten Commandments of Blogging".

Did I mention this ebook is completely free to download?

Pay a visit to Scribbit to learn more and download this outstanding guide to blogging, and while you're there, check out some of Michelle's other posts too - she really writes an interesting blog about her adventures in Alaska...