🔍 Overview
If your Search Atlas WordPress plugin icon is showing red, or your OTTO SEO deployments are not saving or persisting to your WordPress site, this guide walks you through the most common causes and how to fix them quickly.
⚠️ Why Is the WordPress Plugin Showing Red?
A red plugin status means Search Atlas has lost its authenticated connection to your WordPress site. This is usually caused by one of the following:
- A WordPress core, plugin, or theme update that reset REST API permissions
- A security plugin (such as Wordfence or iThemes Security) blocking the Search Atlas REST API route
- A hosting-level firewall or CDN rule interfering with authentication requests
- An expired or revoked application password on the WordPress side
- A caching layer serving stale authentication responses
🛠️ How to Reconnect the WordPress Plugin
- Log in to your Search Atlas account and navigate to Settings > Integrations > WordPress.
- Locate the disconnected site. You will see a red indicator next to the connector.
- Click Reconnect and follow the on-screen authentication prompts.
- When redirected to your WordPress admin, confirm that the Search Atlas application password is active under Users > Your Profile > Application Passwords. If you see an old or duplicate entry, revoke it and allow Search Atlas to generate a new one.
- Return to Search Atlas and verify the connector status has changed to green (connected).
- If the status still shows red after reconnecting, clear any full-page or object caches on your WordPress site (via your caching plugin or hosting control panel) and attempt reconnection again.
Tip: If you use a security plugin, temporarily disable it during reconnection and then add the Search Atlas REST API route (/wp-json/search-atlas/) to the allowlist before re-enabling it.
💾 Why Won't My Deployment Save or Persist?
Even after a successful reconnection, some customers find that OTTO SEO deployments — such as Knowledge Based Trust and Factual Enhancement optimisations — appear to save in the platform but do not persist on the live WordPress site. This is a sync issue between Search Atlas and your CMS.
Common reasons this happens include:
- The WordPress connector was reconnected but the CMS sync was not re-enabled for the project
- A REST API route error prevented the deployment payload from being written to WordPress
- A caching or CDN layer returned a cached version of the page, making it appear the changes were not applied
- The WordPress user account linked to the connector has insufficient permissions (must be Administrator role)
✅ How to Fix Deployment Sync Failures
- Confirm your WordPress connector is showing green in Settings > Integrations > WordPress. If it is not, complete the reconnection steps above first.
- In Search Atlas, open your OTTO SEO project and navigate to the deployment in question (e.g., Knowledge Based Trust and Factual Enhancement Issues).
- Check that CMS Sync is toggled on for the project. If this setting was off, enable it and re-deploy.
- Click Deploy again. Wait at least 60 seconds before checking your live site, as sync operations can take a short time to propagate.
- Purge all caches on your WordPress site — including page cache, object cache, and any CDN cache — then reload the page to confirm the changes are live.
- Verify the WordPress account used in the connector has Administrator privileges. Go to WordPress Admin > Users and confirm the role assigned to the connected account.
- If you still see a wp_client_error in the platform after following these steps, check your hosting provider's error logs for blocked REST API requests and whitelist the Search Atlas IP range if required.
🚫 Common Mistakes to Avoid
- Do not revoke the Search Atlas application password manually unless you intend to fully reconnect — doing so will immediately break the sync.
- Do not assume a green connector status means sync is active. Always verify the CMS Sync toggle is enabled at the project level.
- Do not check for deployed changes before clearing your cache — cached pages will always show the old content.
💬 Still Need Help?
If you have followed all of the steps above and the plugin is still disconnected or deployments are still not persisting, If you need further assistance, open the chat widget in the bottom-right corner of the platform and type human teammate to be connected with a member of our team.