VBSEO really effective

The problem with vBSEO, imho, it works for some sites and people say it doesn't.

There is no way to quantify it, we installed it in Dec 06, and only now after 5 months are we seeing the benefits. For some it is days, others weeks or months.

There are no definitive ways to install vBSEO and people can only give an opinion.

The true way to judge vBSEO would be to do 2 identical sites, with identical content and then leave them to compete against each other. The thing is though that is catch 22, you will be penalised for doing so.

As for the cost, even if we did not become the hottest site on the net, $149.00 is not a lot of money if you are a serious player in the forum market. And tbh, it makes your site URLS look a lot more attractive, as well as the other features, it is well worth it imho.

How do you judge what is the best performance? The amount of money you earn? Our site does not run Google ads, as tbh I think they look cheap and nearly every site on the net uses them. Those like Brian will sing its praises, as he has worked hard and IS reaping the rewards.

I still praise vBSEO, but our site is not about making money, our site is about helping people and we have no real desire to monitize it.

What are your aims? How long has the domain been registered? I truely believe until you gain the trust of a search engine, ie your site is at least 6 - 9 months old, things will be slow. But thats just an opinion from our experience of it.

I sort of expected some immediate effects of using vBSEO, but I have listened and taken notice of the fact that SEO is not instant, it can take days, weeks, months, every site is unique and different, and I suppose to a degree, unpredictable.

Good luck with your site, but I would say, give it longer than 50 days, ours is only just 9 months old and it has taken 5 months to get listed with 35,900 urls with Google. Is this because of vBSEO? I am positive it is. You only have to look at out search engine referrals, they increase every day.

Originally Posted by gedsta

How do you judge what is the best performance? The amount of money you earn? Our site does not run Google ads, as tbh I think they look cheap and nearly every site on the net uses them. Those like Brian will sing its praises, as he has worked hard and IS reaping the rewards.

I judge the success by total search engine referrals. To me, this is the key.

Search engine referrals are the key to measuring success. However, vBSEO simply helps your pages get noticed and indexed. It does not improve the quality or relevance of your content. Only you can do that and content is the key to success.

Originally Posted by Mike

I judge the success by total search engine referrals. To me, this is the key.

I think that was the point I was trying to make, in which case, I would say vBSEO is performing, however I accept that I have to meet it half way and add content.

Anyone who thinks they will get rich off a $149.00 product is dreaming, its the same in any walk of life, you have to work for it, this product opens the doors for your website into the search engine world.

Looking at some of the other members forums on here (I see Brian as a great role model) Just adding vBSEO didn't do this for him. It was the same as the others with successful sites, hardwork dedication, adding content and getting involved as well as building up links.

Hi Gedsta and others

I completely agree with you on content and traffic as what is send to you by Google, Yahoo & msn. Now about my experience I have two forums which were on phpbb. last year i migrated one from phpbb to vbulletin and I saw immediate results as traffic to forum almost increased 5 times ( i am forced to have a dedicated server from rackspace) without any SEO. How much time i spend on that forum, around 2-3 hours a week at max ( that too cleaning lot of junk). any link back , content putting nothing at all, as I dont have the time. and I am witnessing everyday higher traffic without any SEO. ( probably it justifies google saying, make content for human, robots will follow)

The other one ( to be fair, it was not very popular anyway) was migrated to vbulletin and vbseo together last month and has remained where it was during phpbb days though accompanying wordpress blog is getting good traffic ( it is updated once a week).

My idea is not to criticise VBSEo as 50 days is too short a period to judge a product but what I wish to say is that there is something in wordpress which very search engine friendly and probably VBSeo shall also try to get that.