http://www.developerbarn.com

Hi everyone,

I would appreciate some feedback on my site, DeveloperBarn Forums - Programming help and discussion at DeveloperBarn.com.

I just put up a new skin that I designed. We've been up since March of this year. I'd like to say we're doing well, but not as well as I'd like. We're still new and we cover topics that are highly available, so I would expect that.

Looking forward to some good feedback.

Cheers!

• title is very spammy. I'd be far more concise instead of every keyword specific. Perhaps, "Programming help and discussion at Developer Barn.com" Incorporate the keywords instead into the page elements (h1, p, etc)
• remove the Top X stats for guests. it's bloat.
• remove and disable the archive and especially the archive footer links.
• have a look through my guide for more generic setting advice (link in sig)

Thanks for the advice, Brian. I actually have already modified the template to place the thread titles and forum information in <h1> tags. Guess I should do the same with the blogs. I'll make some changes and post back when they're complete.

Cheers

Alright, I made all but one of the changes so far. The changes that were made, definitely improved the site performance. Pages are loading much more quickly and I think the reason is because the Top Stats is not visible to unregistered users anymore. That saved some major querying.

Anyway, I have a question about your suggestion for the title. The title is getting it's content from the meta keywords. Are those not good keywords for my site content?

Should I just change the template to not use the keywords or should I do something else?

Thanks for your help!

The page title should be what that individual page is about or contains.... not EVERYTHING that your site contains or talks about.

search here for "long tail". Joe made a good post about it.

Originally Posted by briansol

The page title should be what that individual page is about or contains.... not EVERYTHING that your site contains or talks about.

search here for "long tail". Joe made a good post about it.

Right. Currently, when you go to new pages, forums, threads, etc., the title changes to match the content. It's just the main page that contains the meta data.

What is the Search Long Tail? - vBulletin SEO Forums

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

What is the Search Long Tail? - vBulletin SEO Forums

hmm...not sure I understand :(

Anyway, it seems that the tips that I have applied from this forum have helped greatly. I appear to be getting much more traffic than before. Hopefully this trend lasts.

I'm up for more suggestions if there are any. I appreciate the feedback.

Originally Posted by jmurrayhead

Hi everyone,

I would appreciate some feedback on my site, DeveloperBarn Forums - ASP Help, ASP.Net Help, PHP Help, SQL Help, Tutorials, Windows Help, Linux Help.

I just put up a new skin that I designed. We've been up since March of this year. I'd like to say we're doing well, but not as well as I'd like. We're still new and we cover topics that are highly available, so I would expect that.

Looking forward to some good feedback.

Cheers!

I don't see anything above the fold telling me what your forum is about. If I hadn't read this thread here and found your site through a search engine, I would think you talk about developing barns are farming building.

In your logo at the top left, I would definitely make a new tag line that says what your forum is about. Something that mixes with the "Barn" theme.

[How To] Remove Forum Title from Thread Pages for Long Tail Optimization / Increased Thread Title Relevancy

Originally Posted by JDM6763

I don't see anything above the fold telling me what your forum is about. If I hadn't read this thread here and found your site through a search engine, I would think you talk about developing barns are farming building.

In your logo at the top left, I would definitely make a new tag line that says what your forum is about. Something that mixes with the "Barn" theme.

I'm not sure I follow. If you found me in Google, it specifically says what the forum is about. Take this Google search, for example: string functions by name - Google Search=

I'm the 7th one down, and it gives only relevant information...nothing about barns. And this is how the majority of my visitors will and have found me...via Google searches for the criteria they search for.

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

[How To] Remove Forum Title from Thread Pages for Long Tail Optimization / Increased Thread Title Relevancy

I had already done this on most of those templates...but what does it matter if it is done on MEMBERINFO? I already prevent bots from indexing that page...I would assume most people would considering the irrelevance.

If you prevent bots from indexing member info pages, I think that is a good idea and there is no need to remove the forum title.

Some people keep them open to harvest additional traffic, and (in that case) it would be better to remove the forum title.

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

If you prevent bots from indexing member info pages, I think that is a good idea and there is no need to remove the forum title.

Some people keep them open to harvest additional traffic, and (in that case) it would be better to remove the forum title.

Okay, thanks for confirming that. If you notice anything else that could be improved upon, please let me know. I've been doing what I can to improve on SEO.