Considering a re-attempt at vbseo

I have to say, I was disappointed in what I seen in my first attempt at using this software. I figured 5 months was enough to get an idea of what to expect from the software. My main concern was giving up the archive, as I was strongly advised to do. I lost alot of adsense and CPM income due to this. That issue probably overshadowed anything else that may have been happening with the work that vbseo was doing because I was very irritated with that loss of income.

Juan told me my forum needed alot of work. Know idea what that work was beause I never got a reponse after that. A private forum was created for the purpose of telling me what was wrong with my forum, yet no details ever came. That was another big disappointment. I realize you guys are busy around here though, and I am not really important enough to rate individual time from your guys. However, I didn't ask for it either, you offered it.

Something else that concerned me is that when I expressed my concern about not receiving benefits from vbseo, a moderator at this forum let me know that he could help my forum in terms for SEO, and that what he did was basically complete the work that vbseo started. I am not an overly trusting person when it comes to the online world, and that struck me as fishy at the time. I payed money that alot of people complain about for this software, then get told that I can pay another $500-$600 to get the complete SEO job. I was under the understanding that vbseo did this, and that is why I bought the software. I became very untrusting of this place at that point, and I cant help it as that is my my mentality. It just felt, at that point, like I was being a victim of double dipping.

Anyway, I have heard that alot of improvements have been made, and I understand that google has created alot of problems in terms of visual results. However, google is not the only search engine out there, and I hope that yahoo and msn are being included in the research and development here. I think I will be reinstalling vbseo on my football forum, however, I am not sure about disabling the archive.

Alot has been said regarding this product. Good and bad all over the place. I expect that this thread will get moved out of view rather soon, and I have no problem with that. I would hope though, that it doesn't get deleted and maybe the owners of this software get an understanding of some of the doubts that people like me have dealt with. I just felt it would be better to say this here, than somewhere else.

Now if I can just figure out how to get this reinstalled.

If you would like to install the latest version, open a support ticket to request the pre-release of 2.4.5. It has many improvements.

Also, vBSEO is just one piece of the puzzle. It's not the "magic button". There are many other things you can do to improve SEO on your site.

I assume you meant T2DMan above? He has some great SEO tips for vBulletin. Most of them are posted publicly, and you can do them yourself if you feel comfortable doing that type of thing. (vBulletin-Search Engine Optimize vBulletin-top hack) But, he also offers a paid service, where he does much more to get your site as search engine friendly as possible. That's outside the realm of this site though, and something he has been doing well before vBSEO was created. He just happens to be a moderator here.

How safe if 2.4.5? Where is 2.4.4? I only see 2.4.0 in my download area.

It skipped to 2.4.5 from 2.4.0. MANY sites are running 2.4.5 with no problems. It's the suggested version to be running at this time.

Hi sportsoutlaw,

Glad to hear that you are looking towards a re-installation. Our next version will be rolling out shortly & you will be very impressed at some of the new features that will be included.

The vBSEO Total Support Team will always do its very best to help customers and non-customers alike within the forums for issues related to vBSEO and SEO in general. I'm sorry to hear that your experience was less than satisfactory in the past. For the most part, we get excellent feedback for the support we provide.

FYI Regarding consulting services. vBSEO does not charge for these services. At this time they are provided by a 3rd party representative who also happens to be a moderator here. T2DMan has developed an excellent reputation for assisting with template modifications and keyword targeting research that are more geared towards a consulting service than an automated SEO software tool like vBSEO.

We appreciate your feedback & are always committed to improving the customer experience!

Joe, I understand what you are saying.

My point is, and it is a point that others agree on, is that it looks like vbseo is double dipping into someones wallet when a representative of the site is offering a service to improve upon the service that you are selling.

No disrespect toward anyone attempted here, but that is exactly how this is looked upon as. And the way it was represented to me at the time, it made it look even worse. What is worse is that you have staff here that isnt fully on board with the suggestions that is made by the "third party".

I cant help but see this as a conflict of interest. I am sure that no harm was meant by anyone, but that is just the way it comes off to many people. Remember, you are dealing with people like me in regards to selling your product. People like me dont understand much of this and come here looking for a product that fixes things for them. We dont expect, after spending $150 to hear that to truly do the job that we we expected this software to do, that you can pay 4 times that price to finish the job. I understand that it is a legit situation, but it doesnt come across that way at first, at least for me, and others I have talked to about it.

vBSEO does not require any additional consulting services to provide an SEO improvement for vBulletin forums.

However, SEO is a moving target and various admins having different levels of experience with SEO. Our advanced configuration options give them the flexibility to tweak their SEO to their liking, although (for beginning users) our default configuration options will suffice.

However, we always recommend that admins do whatever they can to improve their forum whether it be via organic search results (i.e. onsite - vBSEO) AND offsite (i.e. linkbuilding), general SEM (Search Engine Marketing such as PPC programs, i.e. Google Adwords, etc.), improving their template for aesthetics and/or usability, etc.

T2DMan's consulting services do receive excellent feedback making them an additional option for admins with the available resources to contract his services.

To do the best at SEO, you have to do everything right. I break that down into three parts:

• onpage - keyword selection, creative writing, tempate changes, vbseo
• onsite - vbseo
• whole of web - links, links, links

Then to really build a successful community on the people site, you need to work at building community. Thats a whole another matter.

With only one of the parts, you dont stand a chance.

• If you thing that you are going to get to the top of the phrase "IBM" with just vbseo... Not possible.
• If you think that you are going to get to the top merely by having words on the right place on your pages...
• What you would need is links links links.

Then if you actually managed to get to the top, and people saw that you had a spammy site, and that your title, snippet, and url did not look official, you probably would not get the traffic.

Each step takes time and effort to do well.

By all means PLEASE read through and apply the threads on my forum. Over 47,000 views of the SEO vBulletin thread. However, while you may be able to do it yourself, just like I can change the oil of my car, I generally get the mechanic to do it. I basically detail each step that I do on my forum. But I am also surprised when people come to me having first tried, and not done the job well.

Be aware, that even with vBSEO, my onpage seo work, and the other site tidy up things that I do (or that you do after looking at the vbseo.com forum and my forum). Without links, you are nothing. And without strategies for building community, you are nothing.

Internet Marketing is fun, its an adventure that we are all learning about.

reactivated 2.4.0, liked seeing the new URL's again. upgraded to 2.4.5 and my site is now in trouble. All my other directories are going to my 404 page.

Hi t2dman

I guess I didnt add one of the things that brought me the most frustration, but it is in my original review. I had good rankings across the three major search engines. I never improves on any of them, and lost my yahoo rankings totally. I understand the importance of SEO.

Originally Posted by sportsoutlaw

reactivated 2.4.0, liked seeing the new URL's again. upgraded to 2.4.5 and my site is now in trouble. All my other directories are going to my 404 page.

Replied to your ticket.

Keith, thanks for jumping in and helping me through whatever it was that was messing up. Still dont know exactly what it was, but it is all working now!

Glad to have you join us again sportsoutlaw!