Discourage search engines from indexing a site

In development.

As we develop a web site with WordPress we need to be sure that the Settings -> Reading –
Search Engine Visibility: Discourage search engines from indexing this site is checked, so that search engines do not crawl/index the web site making it visible for online searches.

Search Engine Visibility: Discourage search engines from indexing this site
Search Engine Visibility: Discourage search engines from indexing this site.

Going live

As the web site is ready to go live we need to remember to uncheck the check box to make it visible for search engines. It can sometimes be easy to forget to uncheck the option, and by forgetting to deactivate the option the site will not become indexed by search engines.

There is a reminder plugin I like to use named discourage search engines notifier. The plugin adds an icon to the top admin bar. Here it is easy to see that search engines will not index the web site.

WordPress-Discourage-Search-Engines-from-indexing-this-site
Discourage Search Engines Notifier plugin. Showing the discourage search engine checkbox checked.
Site can not be indexed.
Search-Engine-Visibility-WordPress-plugin
Discourage Search Engines Notifier plugin. Showing the discourage search engine unchecked.
Site will be indexed.

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