Why the vBulletin archive is useless and counterproductive

Introduction

A member at this board got me thinking about the vBulletin archive functionality which lead to the conclusion that IMO it's completely useless and counterproductive, especially for a board running vBSEO. So I disabled it to see what it will do to my board. Results will be posted in a few months.

What is my conclusion based on?

Wel let's see. The vBulletin archive function was designed by vBulletin because vBulletin needed to find a way to get their forum's pages indexed better by crawlers. How do you get pages to index better? By making pages light, CSS based, having high content2code ratio, accessible link structure, and using SEO friendly urls. The archive did just that: they contain no tables, very little code, and a lots of links that are a bit more SEO friendly. Sounds good? You would think so, but no, not really.

The first problem with the whole idea is that it creates duplicate pages for the same content. And because people will in most cases never link to your archive pages, the normal pages might still rank higher in the serps than the archive ones, rendering the latter supplemental.

The second problem is that the archive is designed in a way that the oldest threads on any board will gain the highest Pagerank from the forum index. Does that make sense? Not to me. Outdated information might rank higher in search engines than newer and more accurate information. On top of that, some completely useless topics that are never searched for anyway, might get high pagerank for no good reason. They just sit there, sucking up your pagerank flow, while all your good content is wasted.

When running vBSEO it's even less logical to have an archive. vBSEO creates unique and keyword rich URL's from showthread pages. Why would you want to preserve this URL:

Code:

http://www.vbseo.com/archive/index.php/t-123456.html

when you have this:

Code:

http://www.vbseo.com/f34/top-ten-secrets-building-successful-forum-community-11298/

SEO'ing the archive

The solution used here on vBSEO forums to overcome some of these problems, is to make the archive look like a site map for the forums. This means there is still a duplicate link structure, but no duplicate content and showthread url's. This site map takes crawlers to a duplicate of forumdisplay and on that page, the crawlers can find unique and keyword rich showthread URL's that direct them to the content.

Not a bad idea, it certainly solves the duplicate content / showthread problem. I used this practice myself for a full year with success. Unfortunately it still doesn't solve the second problem: the link structure is still designed to show old topics first, making them appear more important than newer topics, even if the new contain better content. This old to new ordering is of course done because it makes the archive (or site map) look more static, which is good for SEO.

But SEO is more than creating static, keyword-rich link structures alone. It's also about creating keyword-rich and valuable content that can easily be found by crawlers and human visitors. This is why I believe the archive or site map has no value and can be counterproductive for your forum. It's sends visitors to the wrong places and it wastes pagerank, that could otherwise be flowing to content that really matters. Content that actually can get traffic to your site.

What is a site map?

According to Wikipedia:

A site map (or sitemap) is a graphical representation of the architecture of a web site. [1] It can be either a document in any form used as a planning tool for web design, or a web page that lists the pages on a web site, typically organized in hierarchical fashion.

Did you focus on the word that is important in this definition? That's right a site map should be hierarchical. That means it starts it's structure with the most important page and ends off with the least important one. How does this compare to our forums' site map? Well, first, a site map does not need to create a duplicate link structure for forumdisplay, it has no purpose and only confuses visitors and users. Secondly, our site map is not hierarchical. Just think about what would happen, if every site in the world would have a site map that shows old (possibly outdated) content first, and new content (likely more advanced and/or relevant) last.

What should a forum site map look like anyway?

A discussion forum is of course not like a list of articles on a website. On a big forum, there are millions of posts, some of which are good, others that are completely worthless. To make a complete and hierarchical site map of every page would of course be impossible. But we do not need to do that anyway. Google can easily find all our pages if we send the urls to them. This can be achieved with the free vBSEO Sitemap Generator. This way all pages can be indexed without crawlers visiting the archive.

However what we do need is a site map that shows all content that you know is important for users and visitors. This site map could include:

• Link to a custom page that contains all sticky topics
• Keyword-rich links to the most important forumdisplay pages
• Links to all the other (custom) pages on your forum (faq's, about us, advertising options,...)
• Link to your article forum(s) (if you have one)
• Links to topics that have high value for members and visitors but are not sticky or article

The first and last are probably the most important, this is what makes a good site map and ultimately will drive traffic to your site!

I hope you enjoyed reading my second article here

-dutch

Very interesting article.

Originally Posted by dutchbb

However what we do need is a site map that shows all content that you know is important for users and visitors. This site map could include:

• Link to a custom page that contains all sticky topics
• Keyword-rich links to the most important forumdisplay pages
• Links to all the other (custom) pages on your forum (faq's, about us, advertising options,...)
• Link to your article forum(s) (if you have one)
• Links to topics that have high value for members and visitors but are not sticky or article

Ok, now we need the criteria that will allow us to algorithmically determine/gather points 2, 3, 4 and 5 so that vBSEO can automatically create such a sitemap.

Originally Posted by dutchbb

Introduction

A member at this board got me thinking about the vBulletin archive functionality

wonder who that was

Originally Posted by Juan Muriente

Very interesting article.
Ok, now we need the criteria that will allow us to algorithmically determine/gather points 2, 3, 4 and 5 so that vBSEO can automatically create such a sitemap.

Thanks. If point 1 could be automatically created from existing sticky's it would save a lot of time also

Originally Posted by Loco

wonder who that was

Those who still don't believe vbseo works, check this out:

vbulletin archive - Google Search

TWO days after posting on number 2 in the serp for 'vbulletin archive' !!

I think I'll turn mine off now. . I had it hidden, but I think I'll completely disable it now.

Originally Posted by Juan Muriente

Very interesting article.
Ok, now we need the criteria that will allow us to algorithmically determine/gather points 2, 3, 4 and 5 so that vBSEO can automatically create such a sitemap.

For point #3, why not have an edit box in the vBSEO ACP that let's the owner input the desired custom pages?

For point #5, why not use vB's thread rating system to order threads by their star rating?

To turn it off I'm assuming we go under ACP - Search Engine Friendly Archive - then put all options to no.

Originally Posted by dutchbb

Thanks. If point 1 could be automatically created from existing sticky's it would save a lot of time also

...

Originally Posted by bernard

For point #3, why not have an edit box in the vBSEO ACP that let's the owner input the desired custom pages?

For point #5, why not use vBulletin's thread rating system to order threads by their star rating?

Taking notes. Thank-you for the feedback.

For now, we have implemented a new feature in vBSEO which inverts the archive thread order so that new threads appear first when using the archive as a sitemap.

I know it's not the ideal sitemap as Tijl suggests in his article, but if it makes vBSEO's automated SEO one step closer to ideal, that's good.

Originally Posted by Juan Muriente

...

I understand this cannot be achieved with rewriting/vbseo, I meant that it could be done with a new plugin like the sitemap generator plugin did for Google/Yahoo stemaps.

You could even make a new add-on for vbseo, making a completely customizable sitemap for forums...

doesnt this depend if you have alot of visits from bots/crawlers?

Those crawlers are visiting/indexing duplicate content/links that creates supplemental search results. It has no value for you or your visitors. When the archive is disabled, the crawlers are forced to index the original threads. I am now testing it on my own site to see how the traffic compares. I'll post the results in a few months.

Originally Posted by dutchbb

Those crawlers are visiting/indexing duplicate content/links that creates supplemental search results. It has no value for you or your visitors. When the archive is disabled, the crawlers are forced to index the original threads. I am now testing it on my own site to see how the traffic compares. I'll post the results in a few months.

Have you posted this on vbulletin.com?

would like to see what crap they come up with.

Waste of time... they do not understand SEO enough. Besides, let vbseo do it for them