Joeychgo
05-16-2005, 04:10 AM
How to SEO (Search Engine Optimization) your vBulletin Forum (Versions 3.0 - 3.07)
Well, I have seen a number of posts on vbulletin, vb.org and on TAZ all claiming to offer advice on how to SEO your vBulletin Forum.
In short - although some posts are partially accurate, as a whole, they are wrong IMO. Here I will discuss how.
First. A little about Google PR. Google PR is but one of over 100 factors that google uses to determine the search engine results, and I believe a minor one at that. Anyone who talks about PR being spread around a forum and how to share PR from one page to another is simply incorrect IMO and mistaken. Beyond that, Google isnt the only search engine out there and PR is meaningless for Yahoo and MSN. But if your really insistant on being worried about PR, I have a PR 6 on my main forum and this forum had a PR 4 in just 3 months.
WHY DO SEO?
Ive also seen numerous posts that question or even mock the concept of SEO. Let me spell this out. People search for things, and if they come across your forum in their search, they might just register andbecome part of your community. In short, its pretty much free advertising. Again, anyone who tells you SEO isnt necessary, just doesnt understand.
Ok, that said. There are a handful of things you can do to SEO your forum. Some are whats called On Page Optimization, which means the actual construction of your site, and other are called off page. Off page generally means building links to your site.
First, if you can, place your forums in their own directory. Most people use "forums" for the directory name. Don't. Instead, use a Keyword for the directory name.
Digital Point has a good keyword suggestion tool (http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/). Keywords are what words and phrases people search for that match your site. If you have a site for Ford Mustangs for example, you would enter that phrase into the keyword tool and it will tell you what similar words and phrases people search for.
Ok. Now. Write your Title and Description in the Admin CP. Give this some thought. Use kewwords in both. Dont waste space with meaningless terms. Often, Google and other search engines will use these for their listings so basically, your writing your search engine listing.
Example Description
Better: At vBulletin Webmaster you can learn and discuss how to build, SEO, promote, customize, manage and profit from your Vbulletin forum.
Bad: A discussion forum for vb webmasters
In the better description, there are keywords, but its also descriptive and will attract the eye of someone searching Google for a VB related website.
Now, we're gonna change around the titles and descriptions in your threads. See Title and Description Changes for Better SEO (http://www.vbulletin-faq.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2261) for an explanation on how to do this. What this will do is make it so the title of a thread is the page title, and the forum description the thread is in will be the page description. Google and other search engines dont like to see the same title and description across thousands of pages. This also tells the search engines what the thread is about and strengthens how they list you in the search results.
I also Disable viewing signatures for visitors (http://www.vbwebmaster.com/forums/showthread.php?t=55) - I do this so search engines have an easier time spidering and so while they spider they dont use so much bandwidth.
Ok. Next we're going to put in some H1 tags.
Yes, H1 tags are important, how important depends on how you use the tag and which search engine you're talking about.
Back in the days of yore... H1 tags were used as a page header designation. If your page was about "purple widgets' You would place <H1>Purple Widgets</H1> at the top of you page. When seen through a browser, the encapsulated text appeared much larger that the rest of the pages text and helped people to understand what that page of information was about. There are differing opinions about the importance of still using the tag today, but I still use it in my sites and it does seem to help. Using them won't catapult you to the top of the search engines but if used correctly at the top of the page, it can help certain search engines to understand what your page is about. It is usually a good practice to make sure the words in your H1 tag also appear several times on the page, in your METAs, and somewhere in the Title.
In this case, your H1 will be the same as your Page Title.To do this, Go to your SHOWTHREAD template and look for $navbar.
Below it, place this:
<center>
<h1><font size="4">$thread[title]</font></h1>
$foruminfo[title]</center>
This will give you the Bold print at the top of this thread that is the title of the thread. I chose to size it at 4. You can use any size you like or no size at all. I also centered it. Again, thats a style choice on my part.
Now, for each of your forums, I want you to take a look at the description. Is it rich with related keywords and keyword phrases? Make it that way. Think out the descriptions a little and go ahead, make them a little wordy and descriptive. Search engines like text.
Ok. Now go to your forumhome_lastpostby template.
Look for this and remove it. It will be in there twice so remove both.
<img class="inlineimg" src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/lastpost.gif" alt="$vbphrase[go_to_last_post]" border="0" />
That code just gives you the little http://www.vbulletin-faq.com/forum/images/vbfaqjohn/buttons/lastpost.gif next to the Last Post. Its a waste IMO and just chews up bandwidth. People always click the text.
Ok - If you dont already have a homepage, get one. I recommend the CMPS homepage system available at vBAdvanced (http://www.vbadvanced.com). I explained here about The importance of Having a Home Page (http://www.vbulletin-faq.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2082). I also recommend you install a navigation box, like this site has on the homepage. That also helps search engines with easy navigation around your site.
If you have a vBulletin skin, or are thinking of one, I would only suggest one that isnt super graphic intensive. Google doesnt like pages larger then 101k. A bunch of graphics will slow google down. What you see here is just a style. Simple graphics and CSS changes. Members here can help you with this if you like (although they charge a nominal fee for his services) One of our admins did the style and graphics here on vBulletin FAQ.
Ok - Now - install the vBulletin Easy Archive (http://www.vbwebmaster.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4149#post4149). That link is to another thread here where I discuss it's installation and modification. This gives the search engines a simple place to spider your site and Google seems to use the archives as sitemap or an easy way into your site.
I also recommend linking to your new archive everywhere, but in a bit of an unusual fashion. I want you to make a series of links in your forum footer. Each link will be to a different forum but will link to the archive version of that forum. (see the bottom of this page for an example)
Thats it for today. Part 2 soon.
Well, I have seen a number of posts on vbulletin, vb.org and on TAZ all claiming to offer advice on how to SEO your vBulletin Forum.
In short - although some posts are partially accurate, as a whole, they are wrong IMO. Here I will discuss how.
First. A little about Google PR. Google PR is but one of over 100 factors that google uses to determine the search engine results, and I believe a minor one at that. Anyone who talks about PR being spread around a forum and how to share PR from one page to another is simply incorrect IMO and mistaken. Beyond that, Google isnt the only search engine out there and PR is meaningless for Yahoo and MSN. But if your really insistant on being worried about PR, I have a PR 6 on my main forum and this forum had a PR 4 in just 3 months.
WHY DO SEO?
Ive also seen numerous posts that question or even mock the concept of SEO. Let me spell this out. People search for things, and if they come across your forum in their search, they might just register andbecome part of your community. In short, its pretty much free advertising. Again, anyone who tells you SEO isnt necessary, just doesnt understand.
Ok, that said. There are a handful of things you can do to SEO your forum. Some are whats called On Page Optimization, which means the actual construction of your site, and other are called off page. Off page generally means building links to your site.
First, if you can, place your forums in their own directory. Most people use "forums" for the directory name. Don't. Instead, use a Keyword for the directory name.
Digital Point has a good keyword suggestion tool (http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/). Keywords are what words and phrases people search for that match your site. If you have a site for Ford Mustangs for example, you would enter that phrase into the keyword tool and it will tell you what similar words and phrases people search for.
Ok. Now. Write your Title and Description in the Admin CP. Give this some thought. Use kewwords in both. Dont waste space with meaningless terms. Often, Google and other search engines will use these for their listings so basically, your writing your search engine listing.
Example Description
Better: At vBulletin Webmaster you can learn and discuss how to build, SEO, promote, customize, manage and profit from your Vbulletin forum.
Bad: A discussion forum for vb webmasters
In the better description, there are keywords, but its also descriptive and will attract the eye of someone searching Google for a VB related website.
Now, we're gonna change around the titles and descriptions in your threads. See Title and Description Changes for Better SEO (http://www.vbulletin-faq.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2261) for an explanation on how to do this. What this will do is make it so the title of a thread is the page title, and the forum description the thread is in will be the page description. Google and other search engines dont like to see the same title and description across thousands of pages. This also tells the search engines what the thread is about and strengthens how they list you in the search results.
I also Disable viewing signatures for visitors (http://www.vbwebmaster.com/forums/showthread.php?t=55) - I do this so search engines have an easier time spidering and so while they spider they dont use so much bandwidth.
Ok. Next we're going to put in some H1 tags.
Yes, H1 tags are important, how important depends on how you use the tag and which search engine you're talking about.
Back in the days of yore... H1 tags were used as a page header designation. If your page was about "purple widgets' You would place <H1>Purple Widgets</H1> at the top of you page. When seen through a browser, the encapsulated text appeared much larger that the rest of the pages text and helped people to understand what that page of information was about. There are differing opinions about the importance of still using the tag today, but I still use it in my sites and it does seem to help. Using them won't catapult you to the top of the search engines but if used correctly at the top of the page, it can help certain search engines to understand what your page is about. It is usually a good practice to make sure the words in your H1 tag also appear several times on the page, in your METAs, and somewhere in the Title.
In this case, your H1 will be the same as your Page Title.To do this, Go to your SHOWTHREAD template and look for $navbar.
Below it, place this:
<center>
<h1><font size="4">$thread[title]</font></h1>
$foruminfo[title]</center>
This will give you the Bold print at the top of this thread that is the title of the thread. I chose to size it at 4. You can use any size you like or no size at all. I also centered it. Again, thats a style choice on my part.
Now, for each of your forums, I want you to take a look at the description. Is it rich with related keywords and keyword phrases? Make it that way. Think out the descriptions a little and go ahead, make them a little wordy and descriptive. Search engines like text.
Ok. Now go to your forumhome_lastpostby template.
Look for this and remove it. It will be in there twice so remove both.
<img class="inlineimg" src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/lastpost.gif" alt="$vbphrase[go_to_last_post]" border="0" />
That code just gives you the little http://www.vbulletin-faq.com/forum/images/vbfaqjohn/buttons/lastpost.gif next to the Last Post. Its a waste IMO and just chews up bandwidth. People always click the text.
Ok - If you dont already have a homepage, get one. I recommend the CMPS homepage system available at vBAdvanced (http://www.vbadvanced.com). I explained here about The importance of Having a Home Page (http://www.vbulletin-faq.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2082). I also recommend you install a navigation box, like this site has on the homepage. That also helps search engines with easy navigation around your site.
If you have a vBulletin skin, or are thinking of one, I would only suggest one that isnt super graphic intensive. Google doesnt like pages larger then 101k. A bunch of graphics will slow google down. What you see here is just a style. Simple graphics and CSS changes. Members here can help you with this if you like (although they charge a nominal fee for his services) One of our admins did the style and graphics here on vBulletin FAQ.
Ok - Now - install the vBulletin Easy Archive (http://www.vbwebmaster.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4149#post4149). That link is to another thread here where I discuss it's installation and modification. This gives the search engines a simple place to spider your site and Google seems to use the archives as sitemap or an easy way into your site.
I also recommend linking to your new archive everywhere, but in a bit of an unusual fashion. I want you to make a series of links in your forum footer. Each link will be to a different forum but will link to the archive version of that forum. (see the bottom of this page for an example)
Thats it for today. Part 2 soon.