[How To] Replace Showpost Links with Permalinks - Max Out Search Engine Crawling Efficiency

OK. Thanks. But if I have it installed why isn't it showing up in my VBulletin Control panel under the VBSEO options? What do I have to do to make sure it's working correctly?

Thanks for the help guys.

why isn't it showing up in my VBulletin Control panel under the VBSEO options?

Are you sure you uploaded this particular .xml file :

cpnav_vbseo_sitemap.xml in your [vb folder]/includes/xml/ directory ?

Problem solved guys. I just reinstalled it and I guess I had disabled it a while back and forgot to turn it back on. I re-enabled it and it's showing up in the control panel as it should.

Thanks for your help and sorry to waste your time with such a dumb problem.

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

vBSEO will instantly replace your showpost links on every thread page with a Permalink version instead. However, there is an important additional step required for your sitemap:

• Login to your vBulletin Control Panel.
• Find the vBSEO heading in your left column.
• Click "vBSEO Sitemap Settings".
• Scroll down to the option for "Include Showpost Pages".
• Select "No" for that option.
• Scroll down and click the "Save" button.

NEVER MIND. I did not copy the one file to includes/xml. My bad.

The vbSeo "Sitemap Settings" Menu Item no longer seems available in version 3.6 on the left column under vbseo. Does this step still apply or is there another way to access this setting?

NEVER MIND. I did same as previous poster and did not copy the one file to includes/xml

Does anyone already see some results of this change?

At the moment, I only see a lot of errors in Website Optimizer because google can't find the pages anymore (old index I assume).

This is an highly advises change. What errors do you see ?

Some Crawl errors:
In Sitemaps (detail: redirect error - but links works fine here)
Not followed (detail: redirect error)
Not found: (detail: 404. But already had a lot of dead links before the change + seems the archive indexes & includes deleted spam posts)

don't think it's that serious (and don't know if it's related), but still.

Wonder if someone can help - I may have just missed something - I have performed this exercise as documented but still it seems I am getting some kind of post number appear when I go into one of my forums - www.systemsfortraders.com.

Thanks in advance

Originally Posted by systemsfortraders

Wonder if someone can help - I may have just missed something - I have performed this exercise as documented but still it seems I am getting some kind of post number appear when I go into one of my forums - www.systemsfortraders.com.

Thanks in advance

the post number is permalink because you replace the showposts number with permalinks your site is correct

Thanks for verifying.

what is the benefit of doing this over just setting showpost pages to be rel noindex?

if a thread has loads of images in every post for example it can be quicker and use less bandwidth to just give someone the link to a specific post in that thread so they don't have to wait for the rest of the thread to load

Originally Posted by Grumbledook

what is the benefit of doing this over just setting showpost pages to be rel noindex?

if a thread has loads of images in every post for example it can be quicker and use less bandwidth to just give someone the link to a specific post in that thread so they don't have to wait for the rest of the thread to load

re-noindex not the best way for showposts however the permalinks is the best way to redirect the showposts and make it didn't index also without any duplicate content

Learn More :
Permalink - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I read your link on permalinks though I didn't see anything there that I didn't already know regarding the benefit of permalinks.

I still don't understand why it is perferable to redirect showposts to the main thread and jump down to the individual post rather than set the indidual posts to noindex? Surely using noindex will avoid the duplicate content issues as well but still allow you to link to individual posts as well? If so, what does setting them up to load the whole thread do that is perferable?

Originally Posted by Grumbledook

I read your link on permalinks though I didn't see anything there that I didn't already know regarding the benefit of permalinks.

I still don't understand why it is perferable to redirect showposts to the main thread and jump down to the individual post rather than set the indidual posts to noindex? Surely using noindex will avoid the duplicate content issues as well but still allow you to link to individual posts as well? If so, what does setting them up to load the whole thread do that is perferable?

Yes the individual posts will still with no-index however I'm like the permalinks here in vbseo.com because in some times I want to scroll up in the page to see more info about the thread and the permalinks allow you to do this but with showposts I can't do this