What SEO functions will VB5 have? Will VBSEO still be an upsell???

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  • dog-tag
    Member
    • Jan 2012
    • 52
    • 4.1.x

    What SEO functions will VB5 have? Will VBSEO still be an upsell???

    Hello,

    I would like to know the future SEO functions of vBulletin 5?

    Will it be a case of spending another $150 on vbseo, or will vbulletin take this seriously?

    I would like to know will vb5 -
    • add dynamic meta tags
    • add image alt tags
    • rewrite attachment URLs (with thread keywords/titles or desired niche keyword phrase)
    • add image sizes
    • Site wide no follow links (internal/outbound)
    • Intelligent sitemapping (VBSEO style)


    I've lost alot of faith in vBulletin over the last 6 months, and I've seen many others have too. The future of VB5s' SEO capabilities are my #1 concern.

    I see VB as the chasis of a car.
    I need to buy a template (just like car paint)
    I need to buy VBSEO to rank (like petrol + oil)
    I need to get plugins like spam-o-matic to be secure (like a car alarm)
    I need plugins for simple functionality i.e process bounced mail, watermark images, CYB advanced permissions, thank you hack, default avatars etc etc (they're like the wheels on the car)

    My personal view on upgrading from VB4 to VB5 would be a slow and painful move. All my plugins would cease to work, and my forum would commit suicide on itself.

    I haven't made this thread to insult, I'm just looking for reasurrance here that VB5 will actually be worth it. I just can't help but feel this is just a money making stunt for Internet Brands, and I will be the one who will suffer badly. I've spent a long time getting my forum right, and I'm still tweaking it.

    Even though there is still bugs in VB4 the company has decided to stop updating it and moved onto a new project. That's scary to see from a forum owners point of view, because our forums are our little babies and Internet brands doesn't seem to have our best interests (like SEO) at heart.
  • BirdOPrey5
    Senior Member
    • Jul 2008
    • 9613
    • 5.6.3

    #2
    I've never had problems with SEO on my VB3 or VB4 forums and never needed to buy VBSEO.

    VBSEO is by definition not an "upsell" because it is offered by another company. Upsells are when the same company offers something more for you to buy, such as buy a TV from Best Buy and they upsell you a 5 year warranty for another $200.

    SEO is not important to everyone as you may think- we recently had a poll on most important issues to deal with in VB5 and SEO was not a top vote getter. The best thing you can do to help your forum SEO is to have great content that people WANT to see... The "tricks" of using nofollow tags or keywords in URLs are minor at BEST and the big search engines are starting to see through these things. Content will always be king, all the SEO in the world won't help a site with no content and poor SEO will only have a minor impact on a site with good content. The search engines WANT to get the best content out there. We've seen over the last couple years Google penalizing sites who use SEO tricks with no content behind them.

    Comment

    • dog-tag
      Member
      • Jan 2012
      • 52
      • 4.1.x

      #3
      VBSEO is by definition not an "upsell" because it is offered by another company. Upsells are when the same company offers something more for you to buy
      I wouldn't be surprised if VBSEO and vBulletin were privately affiliated, to me its a very big and obvious upsell, but you do have a valid point.

      The "tricks" of using nofollow tags or keywords in URLs are minor at BEST and the big search engines are starting to see through these things.
      Its not a trick, Google openly talk about these optimisation techniques and their algorithms. Matt Cutts even blogs and makes videos about them, calling them "tricks" is a little ignorant to say the least.

      Content will always be king, all the SEO in the world won't help a site with no content and poor SEO will only have a minor impact on a site with good content. The search engines WANT to get the best content out there. We've seen over the last couple years Google penalizing sites who use SEO tricks with no content behind them.
      You mentioned Content 6 times in this one paragraph...

      As a webmaster I look after the "content" not vBulletin. By looking at your response Joe, it appears to me that vBulletin is washing its hands of any on-page SEO responsibility.

      Even though your response wasn't very helpful, I think I can read between the lines and see what you're saying.

      Thank you for your reply.

      Comment

      • Mark.B
        vBulletin Support
        • Feb 2004
        • 24286
        • 6.0.X

        #4
        Originally posted by dog-tag
        I wouldn't be surprised if VBSEO and vBulletin were privately affiliated
        They are *completely* separate and unrelated companies.

        Originally posted by dog-tag
        As a webmaster I look after the "content" not vBulletin. By looking at your response Joe, it appears to me that vBulletin is washing its hands of any on-page SEO responsibility.

        Even though your response wasn't very helpful, I think I can read between the lines and see what you're saying.

        Thank you for your reply.
        That is not what Joe said at all.

        The point is, some people are completely obsessed with SEO. That's fine for them, but Joe mentioned CONTENT six times because that is what is important, not employing tricks to fool search engines into indexing sites higher when there's no content behind it.

        There is a place for some SEO, beyond that it becomes an unhealthy obsession that does more harm than good.
        MARK.B
        vBulletin Support
        ------------
        My Unofficial vBulletin 6.0.0 Demo: https://www.talknewsuk.com
        My Unofficial vBulletin Cloud Demo: https://www.adminammo.com

        Comment

        • dog-tag
          Member
          • Jan 2012
          • 52
          • 4.1.x

          #5
          The point is, some people are completely obsessed with SEO. That's fine for them, but Joe mentioned CONTENT six times because that is what is important, not employing tricks to fool search engines into indexing sites higher when there's no content behind it.

          There is a place for some SEO, beyond that it becomes an unhealthy obsession that does more harm than good.
          Mark I don't consider myself as one of these people who are obsessed, I don't check my rankings all day every day, I'm a webmaster who has enough knowledge in SEO (and experience) to be very concerned though. I think as a paying customer I have right to ask these questions.

          I'm not trying to create a fight with site staff here, I've seen enough members getting banned here recently for "attacking site staff" so I hope I'm coming across as professional here.

          I think SEO is damn important (just look at the success of VBSEO) and shouldn't be just shunted aside like this, for alot of people its their bread and butter, how can vBulletin purposely avoid giving people great on-page SEO options? Surely it would help vBulletin sell even more copies, or is it a case of sell the shiny graphics (because the noobs love it) and let the coders on vbulletin.org worry about the more advanced stuff?

          To me its a shame because I like vBulletin and was hoping to get more positive feedback (something to be excited about) but instead its just same old. I would really like to know about the poll Joe mentioned, I've looked around but can't find it. From my point of view vBulletin is washing its hands of SEO responsibilities, but maybe if I can see this poll I can least see it more from your points of view.

          Comment

          • Mark.B
            vBulletin Support
            • Feb 2004
            • 24286
            • 6.0.X

            #6
            Not really going to go into a vBSEO debate here, it's been done to death hundreds of times.

            Suffice to say, we're not "shunting SEO aside" at all.
            MARK.B
            vBulletin Support
            ------------
            My Unofficial vBulletin 6.0.0 Demo: https://www.talknewsuk.com
            My Unofficial vBulletin Cloud Demo: https://www.adminammo.com

            Comment

            • BirdOPrey5
              Senior Member
              • Jul 2008
              • 9613
              • 5.6.3

              #7
              Here is the poll- https://www.vbulletin.com/forum/show...nnect-Features

              The SEO feature is now in 3rd place, which is an uptick from when I saw the poll last. You'll see the 2nd through 6th places are just separated by a few votes.

              Comment

              • dog-tag
                Member
                • Jan 2012
                • 52
                • 4.1.x

                #8
                @Joe its currently 2nd (out of 10) thanks for sharing the link

                @Mark its clear you guys just want off this subject quickly.

                Like I said above, I can read between the lines so thanks for taking the time in replying to me and we'll leave this thread as it stands.

                Comment

                • Mark.B
                  vBulletin Support
                  • Feb 2004
                  • 24286
                  • 6.0.X

                  #9
                  You really need to STOP reading your own opinions into every comment we make.

                  Neither of us has said any such thing.
                  MARK.B
                  vBulletin Support
                  ------------
                  My Unofficial vBulletin 6.0.0 Demo: https://www.talknewsuk.com
                  My Unofficial vBulletin Cloud Demo: https://www.adminammo.com

                  Comment

                  • we_are_borg
                    Senior Member
                    • Aug 2004
                    • 5454
                    • 4.2.X

                    #10
                    Well the question staff still needs to answer is

                    I would like to know will vb5 -
                    • add dynamic meta tags
                    • add image alt tags
                    • rewrite attachment URLs (with thread keywords/titles or desired niche keyword phrase)
                    • add image sizes
                    • Site wide no follow links (internal/outbound)
                    • Intelligent sitemapping (VBSEO style)


                    Comment

                    • BirdOPrey5
                      Senior Member
                      • Jul 2008
                      • 9613
                      • 5.6.3

                      #11
                      As of the latest demo (Beta 28)...

                      • I do not see working dynamic meta tags in threads
                      • I do not see alt tags for images however this was always possible, and still is, via a simple custom BB Code, if you honestly think anyone will spend time entering an alt description when adding an image.
                      • All URLs are rewritten but not with the keywords or titles you wish
                      • No image sizes, but again this can be done via a custom bbcode, at least 1 dimension.
                      • I'm really not sure why you'd want site-wide nofollow links for internal and outbound links? Seems most internal links you'd want to follow except to those pages not search engine friendly (registration and such.) That said on a test page with both internal and external links the word "nofollow" doesn't appear anywhere in the HTML source
                      • I don't know why VBSEO sitemapping is any different than the sitemap tool in VB4- all I know is I never submitted a sitemap and all my posts are listed in Google within a couple hours. So I don't have an answer for this, sorry.


                      AS THE SOFTWARE IS BETA EVERYTHING ABOVE IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE BEFORE FINAL RELEASE

                      Don't take my lack of knowledge of the differences between VBSEO sitemaps and VB sitemaps as "vBulletin doesn't understand SEO" I'm not a developer so it really doesn't matter whether I know it or not. We can't all be exports at everything.
                      Last edited by BirdOPrey5; Mon 11 Feb '13, 2:50am.

                      Comment

                      • In Omnibus
                        Senior Member
                        • Apr 2010
                        • 2310

                        #12
                        Originally posted by Joe D.
                        I've never had problems with SEO on my VB3 or VB4 forums and never needed to buy VBSEO.

                        SEO is not important to everyone as you may think- we recently had a poll on most important issues to deal with in VB5 and SEO was not a top vote getter.
                        This. SEO is something a forum administrator does by way of meta data, tags, titles, unique content, etc. If it's that important it can even be written into the TOS that members are required to title and tag threads a certain way. SEO isn't some new invention only to be achieved by spending money on aftermarket add-ons. SEO also isn't helping people locate your forums. If your URL is not on page one of a search engine result the odds that your site is being located are slim to none, leaning towards none. Unless your site is in an entirely non-competitive niche it's nearly impossible to make page one. It sure as hell can't be done with SEO alone.

                        SEO is quite possibly the most overrated nonsense to be associated with vBulletin.

                        Comment

                        • BirdOPrey5
                          Senior Member
                          • Jul 2008
                          • 9613
                          • 5.6.3

                          #13
                          Update-

                          Alternate tags and image heights are available if you actually click on the insert image button on the editor- I am so used to just manually typing [img] tags.

                          It actually has some pretty advanced options for inserting images- screenshot:

                          Click image for larger version

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                          Comment

                          • BirdOPrey5
                            Senior Member
                            • Jul 2008
                            • 9613
                            • 5.6.3

                            #14
                            Originally posted by mrmckoy
                            what about h1 tags?
                            You are free to crease an H1 bbcode and use it wherever you can use bbcode.

                            Comment

                            • Graham Walters
                              Senior Member
                              • Feb 2013
                              • 143
                              • 5.1.x

                              #15
                              Originally posted by mrmckoy
                              what about h1 tags?
                              H1 tags are a dodgy area, even when creating a new page in VB5 because the page already has default h1 tags.

                              To combat this you need to get used to using HTML5 in VB5, then it becomes a lot more acceptable for your own content.
                              If you are running a busy forum, then I would say that tagging isn't that important because your content is changing by the hour, if not by the minute.

                              If your site allows it, create unique static content that Google ( and other search engines) can index, also look into micro-data.

                              Being a webmaster you should know that keywords will be detected and selected by the webmaster tools, the essential thing to combat this is to construct your pages properly with keyword meta-tags.

                              Comment

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