New GoldWing owners will not find this site!

[nedro]

I was disappointed to see this forum loose its steam rather quickly. So I did a search on google and took a screen shot. Theglforum is nowhere to be found. Is there any way to remedy this? Otherwise all new riders will go to the other site.

[530ktm]

This has been brought up before and apparently it still has not had the boost needed. We certainly do not want new people going to the other place over this one. I think some more techy knowledgeable folks on here would be able to help but it surely needs to be addressed.

[nedro]

Not only that, but when I type theglforum, it always asks me if I mean "thegolfforum".(the golf forum)

[shuckaduck]

I found it after about 30 minutes and going thru a bunch of crap. Had I not been looking for the forum because another member told me it was started by a former member of the other board I wouldn;t have found it, so nedro is right.

[orangecrate]

Good Catch!

[Cruiseman]

Do you guys honestly think that Google is going to rank our brand new forum on the same page with forums that have been around for years and have tens of thousands of pages? There is no way after only a couple of months we can expect to have that ranking.

Everything the support folks at vBulletin tell me about SEO is related the quantity of content.

And, I disagree that this forum is LOSING STEAM.

This forum is going to be what YOU GUYS (and Gals) make it. It is not just going to magically become the #1 Goldwing forum overnight. It's going to take some grass roots effort in the beginning.

You can help by posting more often and posting meaningful, helpful subjects, and referring others to the site. The site will have to build organically at first.

[nedro]

Did not mean to stir the pot. I am genuinely concerned, that's all.
Please delete if you think this thread is damaging in any way.

[Cruiseman]

Did not mean to stir the pot. I am genuinely concerned, that's all.
Please delete if you think this thread is damaging in any way.

Not damaging at all. I am sure a lot of folks are thinking the same thing. Launching a new forum is a struggle. I am going to need everyone's help to pull this off.

[Cruiseman]

This is what I just got when Google 'theglforum'

[Tony in AZ]

ok, here is what I did: On another forum (automotive) I have now place in my signature "GoldWing Forum : www dot TheGLforum dot com"

Will the various web spiders crawling around find the link? Just curious. I am a tech idiot about that stuff on this interweb.

[TheGLForum]

I don't know for sure, but I doubt it. I am not that familiar with how spiders work.

[Matt Caswell]

My Full Time job is at the worlds Largest Internet Hosting / Domain provider where I've been for 5 years. We always get this question from people who launch new websites and then expect that just by having a new website, Google will put them in the top results. This will never happen unless a few things are done:

1. Searching for the domain name "theGLFORUM" is a worthless search because you're using the domain name. If someone knows the domain name, why would they search for it?
2. We want this place to show up when a general search for "GL1800 Goldwing Forum" or like terms are used
3. Google and the other search engines are looking for "new content". They're businesses so they want the search results to be accurate and relevant to the searchers quest
4. Backlinks are a good way to generate this buzz. That means when you post on some other forum or Facebook, if you include a link to this forum, the search engines will pick up on that and the SEO ranking of this forum will start moving up in the results. The way I explain this to customers is simple; "when I was a kid and we went on vacation, my dad would always stop for food at the places that had a lot of trucks around it". Why? because truck drivers can't make money if they can't drive because they got bad food. The same goes for SEO rankings. The more people talking about a specific domain name/site, then the better the ranking.
5. One of the best ways to improve your SEO ranking is with a Facebook business page where people can like the page, you can make posts about the forum, post pictures etc and generate this buzz that is necessary.
6. To let it "Just Happen" will take forever. If we want to push "theglforum.com" to the top, we need to post about it on our facebook pages, twitter etc.

Final Thought: as I've already said and I know Chris is looking into it... making people click 12 times to see "Todays Posts" will cause people to become static and not be an active part of the forum. It needs to be easier to see what you want to see, especially when this forum is competing against other places that do make it easier to see "new posts". Many of the issues on this forum are the fault of the software and I had considered upgrading mine to Verson 5, but after seeing what Chris is putting up with, I'm not going to make that move any time soon.

Matt

[Matt Caswell]

I've posted the forum url on my Facebook personal and business pages. make sure you write something like this to help the SEO: Include the link so it will bring in the site to your post:

Joined a new Honda GL1800 Goldwing forum, http://theglforum.com

[TheGLForum]

Your efforts are greatly appreciated.

[nedro]

Good info Matt!

[wingleader09]

I've posted the forum url on my Facebook personal and business pages. make sure you write something like this to help the SEO: Include the link so it will bring in the site to your post:

Joined a new Honda GL1800 Goldwing forum, http://theglforum.com

Done. Thanks.

[srt8-in-largo]

A search for "goldwing forum" shows "www.theGLforum.com" on the 2nd page of results... not bad for having existed less than a year.

I'll be trying some of the things in post #11... good stuff.

Did not mean to stir the pot. I am genuinely concerned, that's all.
Please delete if you think this thread is damaging in any way.

Your post would have deleted and a warning issued to you on the other site... LAME.

[Matt Caswell]

I'm glad I was able to contribute some information.