two simple template mods for vBulletin SEO

Here are two very simple template mods to help you with SEO'ing vBulletin.

1. For individual thread pages, your HTML title tag should be ONLY the title of the thread. Most people agree that the HTML title tag is one of the most important basic SEO aspects. Forum software typically uses: "Title-of-board -- title-of-thread" as the HTML title. Pare it down to just "title-of-thread". Not only does this help with targeting your page towards the most relevant keyword or keyphrase for the thread, but it helps with the "semantic" SEO aspect. When searchers see their search term as the title of your page in the SERPS, they're more likely to click on it than a page title with extraneous information.

2. Set up your postbit template so that if people don't explicitly enter a title for their thread replies, "re:title-of-thread" gets automatically inserted as the post title. This will raise the keyword density of your thread title on the page -- naturally. Nearly every time a reply post is added, the thread title is inserted one more time into the page.

If you're not explicity adding in your thread title to other templates or portions of your vBulletin pages, then the title will likely appear only twice on-page: in the navbar, and as the topic title of the first post.


This also demonstrates another benefit of encouraging your members to post descriptive thread titles. If people on your forums have a tendency to post titles like "need help" or "I have a question", then that's the text that will get inserted into your title tag, your post text titles, and (with vBSEO) your url. This is generally useless from an SEO perspective -- unless you're trying to get traffic for phrases such as "need help"!

Here's another:

Turn on the "similar threads" function. Good SEO and natural keyword inclusion is just one of the reasons to use it. You can also insert the thread title again here. Instead of the standard "Similar Threads" heading, just change it to: "Similar Threads for: title-of-thread".

How would i go about having the thread title automatically inserted into thread replies? Thanks in advance.

Originally Posted by Jonathan

Here are two very simple template mods to help you with SEO'ing vBulletin.

1. For individual thread pages, your HTML title tag should be ONLY the title of the thread. Most people agree that the HTML title tag is one of the most important basic SEO aspects. Forum software typically uses: "Title-of-board -- title-of-thread" as the HTML title. Pare it down to just "title-of-thread". Not only does this help with targeting your page towards the most relevant keyword or keyphrase for the thread, but it helps with the "semantic" SEO aspect. When searchers see their search term as the title of your page in the SERPS, they're more likely to click on it than a page title with extraneous information.

2. Set up your postbit template so that if people don't explicitly enter a title for their thread replies, "re:title-of-thread" gets automatically inserted as the post title. This will raise the keyword density of your thread title on the page -- naturally. Nearly every time a reply post is added, the thread title is inserted one more time into the page.

If you're not explicity adding in your thread title to other templates or portions of your vBulletin pages, then the title will likely appear only twice on-page: in the navbar, and as the topic title of the first post.


This also demonstrates another benefit of encouraging your members to post descriptive thread titles. If people on your forums have a tendency to post titles like "need help" or "I have a question", then that's the text that will get inserted into your title tag, your post text titles, and (with vBSEO) your url. This is generally useless from an SEO perspective -- unless you're trying to get traffic for phrases such as "need help"!

There is an option in Admin CP --> Thread Display Options

If you have 2 threads with same title you are in trouble

Originally Posted by Jonathan

Here are two very simple template mods to help you with SEO'ing vBulletin.

1. For individual thread pages, your HTML title tag should be ONLY the title of the thread. Most people agree that the HTML title tag is one of the most important basic SEO aspects. Forum software typically uses: "Title-of-board -- title-of-thread" as the HTML title. Pare it down to just "title-of-thread". Not only does this help with targeting your page towards the most relevant keyword or keyphrase for the thread, but it helps with the "semantic" SEO aspect. When searchers see their search term as the title of your page in the SERPS, they're more likely to click on it than a page title with extraneous information.

2. Set up your postbit template so that if people don't explicitly enter a title for their thread replies, "re:title-of-thread" gets automatically inserted as the post title. This will raise the keyword density of your thread title on the page -- naturally. Nearly every time a reply post is added, the thread title is inserted one more time into the page.

If you're not explicity adding in your thread title to other templates or portions of your vBulletin pages, then the title will likely appear only twice on-page: in the navbar, and as the topic title of the first post.


This also demonstrates another benefit of encouraging your members to post descriptive thread titles. If people on your forums have a tendency to post titles like "need help" or "I have a question", then that's the text that will get inserted into your title tag, your post text titles, and (with vBSEO) your url. This is generally useless from an SEO perspective -- unless you're trying to get traffic for phrases such as "need help"!

Originally Posted by infordig

If you have 2 threads with same title you are in trouble

Well then that would go for any site because vbulletin automatically puts the thread title in the title tags when you few that thread

Excellent vB SEO ideas Jonathan. Thanks!

I plan on implementing those later today.

1) vBulletin now uses the format of Thread Title - Site Name. Are you saying it's still a bad idea to have the site name in the title, even if it's at the end?

Originally Posted by ConqSoft

1) vBulletin now uses the format of Thread Title - Site Name. Are you saying it's still a bad idea to have the site name in the title, even if it's at the end?

My opinion is that putting the site name in the title tag typically dilutes the title. However, this may not be true in all cases. It depends on what your site title is, and how it relates to the keywords that you're targeting.

Keep in mind the newer "Relevant Phrases" feature of vBSEO, which can be used for even easier title insertion.

@infordig -- you should be OK with 2 threads with the same title. The title tags will be the same. However, keep in mind that lots of pages on websites have identical title tags. As long as the entire pages aren't identical, I would think it would be fine. Let me know if you see it differently though.

I agree - Using the site name in the title for thread pages dilute the title and diminishes your relevance on a thread by thread basis. It should be removed.

2. Set up your postbit template so that if people don't explicitly enter a title for their thread replies, "re:title-of-thread" gets automatically inserted as the post title. This will raise the keyword density of your thread title on the page -- naturally. Nearly every time a reply post is added, the thread title is inserted one more time into the page.

How?

Many thanks.

Zooman

AdminCP -> vBulletin Options -> Message Posting and Editing Options -> Automatically Quote Post / Thread Title

Originally Posted by ConqSoft

AdminCP -> vBulletin Options -> Message Posting and Editing Options -> Automatically Quote Post / Thread Title

Cheers mate all done now

question....

I am not real handy at editing templates unless I know exactly where to go and what to do. If I want to take this thread title out to avoid the dilution, where and how do I do it?

And where and how do I ad the title in "similar threads"?

Thanks

ok, I figured out that first part, but the similar threads thing is killing me.