How long is your search long tail?

Originally Posted by Brutal_Dreamer

I have a small forum and have used VBSEO for a couple of years.

Forum Info for May 22, 2009
Members: 3,589
Threads: 14,362
Posts: 139,417

Search sent 25,136 total visits via 14,825 keywords
35,080 visits entered the site through 6,582 pages
35,080 visits exited from 9,211 pages
35,080 entrances via 26 browsers

Does this seem okay? Should it be better?

Cheers,
Bruce

I'm curious as to why the forum mentioned above with roughly 50,000 less posts and 3,000 less threads then mine is pulling in extremely larger numbers. I've been running vbseo for 3 years with all the tweaks mentioned here. Any idea's on this?

Could it simply just be from his forum content being searched for more then my content?

For comparison's sake my numbers from a couple months ago were:

Mar 10 2009 - Apr 9 2009

Search sent 5,379 total visits via 2,907 keywords
Search sent 5,380 total visits via 1,172 landing pages

There are a huge # of factors involved. You simply cannot compare one forum to another by thread/post count alone. However, your long tail is certainly expected to grow as your thread count does.

You are right on target when you talk about the content, or the niche. Some topics certainly may generate larger volumes of search traffic than others. So the same 50,000 thread on one topic may vastly out perform 50,000 on another topic.

Beyond topic, not all threads are created equal. What is your title and content quality?

• A forum consisting largely of say RSS feeds is completely unlikely to rival one with original content.
• A forum where the titles contributed by users are very week is going to be at a significant disadvantage in comparison to forums where titles and content are stronger and tend to be keyword focused. Think of a basic chat forum versus a very specific auto parts forum, etc.

On top of that there are still many other factors. One site may have less content, but went out and build all kinds of high authority back links. Or one site may have a poor template, overloaded with code and validation and other errors, while the other out performs it with streamlined and minimized code with a high C2C ratio.

One site may be rich in image content that drives search volume, etc.

Even getting the forum homepage wrong can have some impact. I always dislike seeing generic vBAdvanced pages that consist of a bunch of unneeded widgets (calendar, redundant login box, etc), have a generic welcome message, and link to the most recent posts only. Note: I have not reviewed your site, so I do not know if you are impacted by this or not.

If you have not already submitted a critique request, I recommend that you do so. We might be able to pinpoint some tips that will help you improve.

My forum is only 2,5 months old and have only 15k posts but I can't complain

last 30 days:
google sent 8,921 total visits via 4,164 keywords

I did some optimizing in vbseo 4-5 days ago and last 3 days SE traffic is doubled , so I can expect these numbers double next month.
What will be when I get 100k of posts?

Search sent 40,282 total visits via 15,546 keywords

after 4 th month

May 22, 2009 - Jun 22, 2009
Search sent 1,401,600 total visits via 563,721 keywords

--------------------

Threads: 158,312 Posts: 1,875,946, Members: 262,784

Most users ever online was 13,265, 13-05-2009 at 05:34 PM.

Originally Posted by zems

My forum is only 2,5 months old and have only 15k posts but I can't complain

last 30 days:
google sent 8,921 total visits via 4,164 keywords

I did some optimizing in vbseo 4-5 days ago and last 3 days SE traffic is doubled , so I can expect these numbers double next month.
What will be when I get 100k of posts?

Search sent 42,139 total visits via 20,249 keywords



5 times more than last month
I have 10.547 threads in this moment

##### Before #####

From Jan 19, 2009 - Feb 19, 2009

Search sent 1,104,745 total visits via 438,043 keywords

##### After 5 th month ######

Jun 22, 2009 - Jul 22, 2009

Search sent 1,471,091 total visits via 594,264 keywords

--------------------

Threads: 160,685, Posts: 1,912,617, Members: 267,461
Most users ever online was 13,312, Yesterday at 01:37 PM.

Top 10 keyword

84,008
18,268
12,281
11,676
11,618
8,822
7,677
5,655
5,516
5,412

----------------------

Content Overview
13,519,023 Pageviews
7,314,742 Unique Views

Top Content
326,933 pages were viewed a total of 9,810,671 times


Top Landing Pages
1,864,499 visits entered the site through 162,873 pages

Originally Posted by vktechnology

##### Before #####

From Jan 19, 2009 - Feb 19, 2009

Search sent 1,104,745 total visits via 438,043 keywords

##### After 5 th month ######

Jun 22, 2009 - Jul 22, 2009

Search sent 1,471,091 total visits via 594,264 keywords

--------------------

Threads: 160,685, Posts: 1,912,617, Members: 267,461
Most users ever online was 13,312, Yesterday at 01:37 PM.

Top 10 keyword

84,008
18,268
12,281
11,676
11,618
8,822
7,677
5,655
5,516
5,412

----------------------

Content Overview
13,519,023 Pageviews
7,314,742 Unique Views

Top Content
326,933 pages were viewed a total of 9,810,671 times


Top Landing Pages
1,864,499 visits entered the site through 162,873 pages

Glad to see that
You have good improvements with vBSEO

Search Engine Visits:

March 08 : Search sent 2,523 total visits via 1,601 keywords on 553 landing pages.

August 08 : Search sent 4,778 total visits via 2,786 keywords on 736 landing pages.

February 09 : Search sent 7,287 total visits via 4,271 keywords on 806 landing pages.

June 09 : Search sent 5,778 total visits via 3,234 keywords on 625 landing pages.


Long Tail Graph:

Graph of the top 100 keywords, for the month of June 09:




Misc:

Current Status:: Threads: 7,028, Posts: 39,398

Out of which, 17000 posts in 3000 threads are in a locked down archive.


Haven't spent much time on my Forum since November last year. (2008)

Traffic has declined. Seems like time to boost the activity to help activate it again.

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

Traffic has declined. Seems like time to boost the activity to help activate it again.

Yes, the traffic has declined by about 30% since Jan/Feb 2009.

But I don't think I'll be able to give time to my Forum until mid-August. :(

Originally Posted by zems

Search sent 42,139 total visits via 20,249 keywords



5 times more than last month
I have 10.547 threads in this moment

Search sent 77,877 total visits via 37,968 keywords

84% more than last month

I have now Threads: 15.671, Posts: 42.972, Members: 15.598

Originally Posted by zems

Search sent 77,877 total visits via 37,968 keywords

84% more than last month

I have now Threads: 15.671, Posts: 42.972, Members: 15.598

Waw that's double the visitors

Search sent 4,726 total visits via 3,492 keywords

I'm pretty happy for the time being...Will have to work on that though

Good results Ross