Critique Please

Hey all.

Currently (and for the first time in about 3 years) we're suffering a dramatic* drop in "G" indexed URL's. Not changed anything on the site recently but as we are currently starting to plan for VB4 upgrade (with CMS) , we would really like to know if vBSEO / SEO is correct, or whether we go with an uninstall and adoption (with the pain) of the new VB SEO's URL's.

* Google Webmaster Tools reveal 515,300 submitted & 186,400 indexed.

We really appreciate the feedback guys I will try to answer any questions....

SITE

In general, your site is pretty clean and well organized. The only thing that stands out to me is the intersital ad. There's not much good SEO perspecitves on google, mostly questions about them.

I would A/B test your intersital ad. Have you added that recently?

Hi Brian

In general, your site is pretty clean and well organized

Thank you.

I was not aware we were using interstitial ads - could you please tell me where it was displayed?

I received it from clicking a thread from forumdisplay - ad - shwothread

Thank you I'm a investigate that right now...I bloody HATE Those things!!

Apart from that, no obvious changes needed then huh? Why the indexed drop though? ..that's the worry...

It very well may be from the Ad. That is my original point. If google tries to load your thread, but sees an ad instead, it will pull it from its index as its not a 'content page'. The ad physically showed on the /thread-123/ page. I'm assuming it's javascript, but ya never know.

Oh, thanks pal, I think I got it

It was a part of the Tribalfusion footer ad - I hadn't added "Full page" as a filter, as I have done with the other ads. It would be very cool to think that it was the reason for the drop...very!

Thanks for your time Brian

Monitor it for a week and see what happens

Yup, will do....

UPDATE

Ok, so we're 4 days in, following the change. The indexed URL's in Google are still dropping (another 4,000 in 4 days).

Does your pages dropped if you use site: command in Google ?
I see you have 487,000 pages indexed in Google.

Hi Marco

I see 181,000 in G Webmaster Tools > Sitemaps.

Originally Posted by Lazer

Hi Marco

I see 181,000 in G Webmaster Tools > Sitemaps.

If you want to know the exact number of indexed pages is using site: command don't use any other ways to check.
Can you check now what's the indexed URLs number today and tomorrow ? What's the number of URLs today ? So We can compare today and tomorrow.

Down again - 177,038 today in Google Webmaster Tools > Sitemaps

Originally Posted by Lazer

Down again - 177,038 today in Google Webmaster Tools > Sitemaps

As I said before Can you compare today's indexed number and tomorrow indexed number via site: command ? That's the correct way to know the exact indexed pages number.