Search Results

The one thing that forum members can do to help boost the forum's ranking in the SERPs is to choose titles for threads that represent the actual topic of the thread, and to stay on topic. That last part is harder to do, I know, and I am guilty of going off-topic from time to time too, since that's the way that normal conversation goes, so I don't harp too much on that. I'd rather have real conversation that SEO-ready text, anyhow.

 

Search engines use automated processes to determine what a web page is about. The algorithm gives more weight to the text in titles than that of the body of the page, but if the body of the page does not appear to be about the same thing, the search engine has no way to reference it.

Think of it as a filing cabinet before things went digital. In a large company, each cabinet might be labeled according to the types of information that is to be stored there. That would be the equivalent of the forum itself, which is entitled SENIORSonly Club. The search engine would recognize the three words: seniors, only, and club. Google, being more sophisticated than the others, is beginning to recognize synonyms as well.

Let's imagine that the company had filing cabinets representing each of its clients. If a filing cabinet were labeled with the name of a specific client, but the filing folders and papers within it consisted of stuff that had nothing to do with that client, it would be pretty much useless to anyone. There too, if the content of this forum had nothing to do with seniors, only, or club, then the search engines might have trouble knowing what it is really about, and might just decide that it's useless. This is part of the reason why many of the pages that come up when someone is searching on topics relating to seniors are pages that are entirely about seniors, such as nursing homes, senior care services, etc. However, although it is not in the title, most of the other sites that link to SENIORSonly Club use the word "forum" in the link or within the text surrounding the link, so the search engines recognize that it is a forum. I am sure that the algorithm recognizes the forum software platform, as well. So, the forum (as a whole) is likely to come up on searches using words that include "seniors" and "seniors only," particularly when used with "forum," including synonyms.

However, we talk about a lot of things here that are not specifically about seniors.

Going back to the filing cabinet example, the information filed within each filing cabinet would be kept in file folders, which are also labeled. These are, in the order of significance given them by the search engine algorithms, the categories, sub-forums, and thread titles. When the sub-forums and the threads within them are related to the category name and description, the search engine knows what they are about, and is more likely to return these pages when someone is searching for information on the topics discussed there.

Someone who might be interested in any of the topics that we discuss here, but not specifically as they relate to seniors, might use search words that related to these topics. When things are well organized here, those internal pages might come up in the first couple of pages of their searches as well.

To answer your question about remaining on topic, imagine that a thread is started in the "Pets & Critters" sub-forum, and the thread is given a title that includes the words "Springer Spaniels." As long as the posts within that thread are indeed about topics relating to Springer Spaniels, then the search engines will index that thread under the heading of "Springer Spaniels" and when someone is searching for information about Springer Spaniels, depending on the amount of competition for that search term, that thread might come up. The longer the thread is, as long as it remains on the topic of Springer Spaniels, the more weight the search engine algorithms will give to it, as long as the words used aren't copied from somewhere else.

However, if someone were to post in that thread saying, "I like Springer Spaniels but I really prefer Pit Bulls," and then everyone started talking about Pit Bulls instead, the search engines wouldn't know what the thread was about. It would, no doubt, realize that it was about dogs but "dogs" is too general of a term for the thread to every show up in anyone's searches.

This is why when I notice a clear topic change, I will split the thread off, creating a new one about Pit Bulls. But that's harder to do when everyone else chimes in with various other breeds of dogs. The consequences are that, while the thread may have been of interest to those who were participating in it, that thread is not going to attract anyone new to the forum through searches.

As the administrator, I try to arrive at a balance that works, and that's not always easy. If, as you may have seen on some other forums, I were to be heavy handed about it and scold people or send warnings to people about posting off-topic messages, they'd just get mad and not post anything at all, and that wouldn't be much of a help. If I kept nagging about it, even if I tried to be nice, people might not be having any fun anymore, and that would lead to the same results.

So instead, I make a point of mentioning it every now and then in threads like this, but otherwise allow conversation to flow naturally. This forum has been here for a year and I have never sent anyone a warning about posting off-topic. If I were to do that, then someone would be sure to point out that some of my own posts are off-topic as well because, like you, I want to enjoy myself here and there are times when off-topic posts just seem to flow naturally. I do try to make a point of bringing it back on topic with a paragraph at the end, when I do that, but I don't want to sacrifice the natural flow of conversation to the search engine gods.

I have split a few threads up and I have merged a few threads, but only when I can see a clear departure point in the topic. Others, I have just left go, knowing that these threads won't do us any good in the search engines, but that forum members are having fun with it. When I do split or merge threads, I mention it, not in the way of reprimanding anyone but so that they aren't left confused, wondering what happened to their post or their thread.

I try to maintain a balance that doesn't overly annoy anyone, but which will still result in some new people being able to find us from time to time. I am not always consistent and I'm not great at it, but I do try not to be too annoying.

 

In the "Jobs I Have Had" sub-forums, I have created threads for various jobs that I have held in my lifetime, and have started to create threads about places I have lived in that sub-forum. Perhaps some of you might be interested in this stuff, so I had that reason for posting it, but I also enjoyed reviewing these periods in my life. An ulterior motive, however, had to do with search engine optimization. Some of these companies no longer exist, and have not existed for years. Because the companies are no longer around, there aren't a lot of other web sites on the Internet mentioning them. Yet people, like me, who have worked for these companies might, at some point, enter the company name into a search engine and, since these companies haven't been around in a long time, these people are all over fifty. Since they may know me, or at least have that one thing in common with me, perhaps they'll decide to join the forum. As an example, try entering "Klenk Chemical Company" into a search engine field.

The same could be accomplished in the "Restaurant Reviews" sub-forum, particularly when reviews are made of independent restaurants. Since they may not even have their own web page, these will be keyword searches that we could easily compete with.

 

For that particular topic, a very short thread about Springer Spaniels would be buried by all of the web sites of the breeders, the dog show people, and the Springer Spaniel fanatics, whereas a very long and informative thread might have a chance eventually, probably years after we've quit discussing it here. Generally though, short pages that remain on topic are better than long pages that are not on topic, but long pages that remain on topic are better yet. I work web directories for a living, so I have searched on pretty much every topic imaginable and it is not at all unusual for me to find a very brief, but on-topic, page appearing on page one of the search engines. Forums have an advantage in SEO because we have new content every day, and practically every hour. In the past year, I can't think of more than a couple of times when there were no search engine spiders here, so we feed the spiders well. There are twelve here right now.

 

Strictly from an SEO standpoint, the best thing would be to refer to it by its long name in the title: Election Systems & Software and then refer to it within the body of the thread by the acronym. In the case of that company, the search engines will have already spidered the company site and will automatically make that connection. When you include a link to the company site, you cement that connection. When potential keywords are used in the title, they are given more weight, but only as long as it doesn't look forced. Titles consisting of a list of keywords would not do well since Google's automated processes might record that as an attempt to cheat the search algorithm. I wouldn't complain, however you chose to do it.

It's easy to cheat Bing and Yahoo. I could probably get a web site to the top of Bing and Yahoo in a month but the things that I would do to manipulate Bing and Yahoo would likely result in the site being banned by Google, so they work well together in that way. It's best not to manipulate them, but to simply do the things that are likely to have good results eventually.

 

No, I hadn't but I just did.

 

I won't normally be doing this so often, but I noticed some changes from just a few days ago so I thought I'd check them all. There are some ups and downs, but mostly ups. Keep in mind that, depending on how many ads the search result pages show, there are usually about 10 results per page, so in order to turn up on page one, we have to rank between one and ten, and eleven through twenty will get me on page two.

Very few people look beyond the first two pages of the search results, so I want to be at least in the #20 spot. Also, a good position in Google is far more valuable than a good position in Bing or Yahoo.

Some of these are too competitive for us to do well yet, while we're not even optimized for others. We're doing pretty well, actually.

 

Okay, it's been a month so let's see where we are today.