Best archive settings?

With the introduction of 3.0 and 2.0 of sitemap.. Is there a Best recommendation setting for archived links?

For the new Footer Archive Links section , I have it set to :

"Add links to ALL archive pages (guests only". )

So that all my archive pages show up at the bottom of the forums. (guests and spiders readable only)

I think its really important to have as many in-site pages linked to from your home page. The search engines add more emphasis to your pages if their linked to from your home page. And I turned it on for "guests only" because I see no advantage of having it enabled when members are logged in... since Search Engines cant crawl "logged in" content.

Im thinking the original /archive/ link on the home forums page doesnt need to be there anymore since all my links are already being displayed individually on my home page.

Im wondering if others have disabled their main /archive/ link on their home page if they already have their pages displayed at the bottom of their index like I do.

any thoughts?

I recommend turning them off.

All you are doing with it is giving page weight to pages you really don't want visitors viewing anyway.

In fact, i recommend turning off the archive altogether, once you have vbseo installed and REAL pages in the SERP's.

Originally Posted by briansol

I recommend turning them off.

All you are doing with it is giving page weight to pages you really don't want visitors viewing anyway.

In fact, i recommend turning off the archive altogether, once you have vbseo installed and REAL pages in the SERP's.

this seems to be the *new* consensus over the last few months... whats going on? Is there some new secret info from google saying that this isnt a good idea anymore?

There are still alot of professional , big name websites that have their archive pages at the bottom of their home page. Most of my older posts / archived data actually has better content filled posts then the newer posts.

If all it does is put a slightly lower priority to other possibly more important posts, im willing to take the risk.

I recommended adding a feature in VBSEO but not sure if this has been added.
Seperate archive forumdisplay pages
and
Seperate archive showthread pages

this shall be best for sitemap.

Mine are off, and my site is fully indexed, would rather keep the page weight.

Originally Posted by mikeinjersey

this seems to be the *new* consensus over the last few months... whats going on? Is there some new secret info from google saying that this isnt a good idea anymore?

it never was a good idea. it's duplicate content.
some have it set up as a "sitemap", but, thats what the sitemap.xml is for. There's really no good reason to use it.

You want your showthread pages in the serps, not your archive. With vbseo, this can be done, by using the 301 option. over time, keep an eye on your serps', and when the archive seems to be less and less, turn it off, and 301 /archive/ to index.

There are still alot of professional , big name websites that have their archive pages at the bottom of their home page.

there's also ton's that don't even use vbseo Most big sites got that way because of word of mouth... not because of their archive.

Most of my older posts / archived data actually has better content filled posts then the newer posts.

old doesn't mean archive... the archive is instant and runs side by side with the current topics. Frankly, it has nothing to do with "archive" at all. its just a poorly used term that vB came up with.

If all it does is put a slightly lower priority to other possibly more important posts, im willing to take the risk.

My Vbulletin Archive is unable to get a PageRank ? (dont know why) - Admin Zone Forums

that's a good read, but ignore everything minstrel says. he has his head in the sand.

Originally Posted by Future

I recommended adding a feature in VBSEO but not sure if this has been added.
Seperate archive forumdisplay pages
and
Seperate archive showthread pages

this shall be best for sitemap.

not sure what this will do, as it already is sorta like this... shows the forums in a list, with a link to the show thread links....

Originally Posted by Dave Hybrid

Mine are off, and my site is fully indexed, would rather keep the page weight.

I have my archive on and the vbseo links in the footer to guest only, but I only link to the main categories.

My archives has pr and I get some clicks from the ad's in them so I guess I've never really thought about disabling it..

I see a lot of ppl suggestions and not using the sitemap feature for vb and I don't really get it ?

Also I don't have the actual post as the archived version, but pointing to the real thread to reduce duplicate content.

just my 2 cents

You want your showthread pages in the serps

can you tell me what you mean by serps? And I havent found a way to turn the Archive off while still having the individual archive links showing up at the bottom of the footer. Is there a way? It seems once I turn off the archive function, it stops everything archive related.

also, I see theres a way now to automatically notify Yahoo of our sitemaps..with that registration number and all.. but do they notify us back that they recieved our sitemap? I get the ones from google...not from yahoo though.. if they dont notify us, is there a way we can find out that they received it from us?

sorry for all the questions.

Originally Posted by mikeinjersey

can you tell me what you mean by serps?

serp = search engine result page

And I havent found a way to turn the Archive off while still having the individual archive links showing up at the bottom of the footer.

you won't find this its not possible (or logical) to link to something that doesn't exist

also, I see theres a way now to automatically notify Yahoo of our sitemaps..with that registration number and all.. but do they notify us back that they recieved our sitemap? I get the ones from google...not from yahoo though.. if they dont notify us, is there a way we can find out that they received it from us?

yahoo and google and msn now support robots.txt notice of sitemap location.

see:
Robots.txt now support the sitemap file

Brian, what about that Developer Network thing from yahoo..in which we get a number once we fill out the registration. Once we put that in our settings, doesnt that notify Yahoo of our sitemap and location?

Another thing about that... there is a field for

*Web Application URL:

I just put the address of my main forum home page there.. are we suppose to put the direct address of our Yahoo sitemap there ?

thx for all the help.