Forum Changes

[Kevin]

A couple of sub-forums haven't got 10 threads for a long time, they don't seem to deserve a dedicated forum (my bad). I have deleted them, their posts were merged into 'General Discussion' and 'Other Diseases' respectively.

[scorpiotiger]

which ones?

[Kevin]

The sub-forums and thread count are:

Vaccinations 5 threads
Lyme Disease 5
Thyroid Disorders 3
Osteoporosis 6
Hepatitis 4

The Google cache still shows the deleted forums, it may be updated at any time:
https://209.85.165.104/search?sourcei...om%2Findex.php

[scorpiotiger]

Kevin.. do you use google tools at all to help manage your forums?

I just used it recently for the opposite reason that most people use it.. I want a site that I'm working on OUT of google. I've got a couple of sites that I've tried to keep out.. and for some reason, they seem to love me.

anyway.. I am trying to figure out why these sites get indexed, even with robot tags saying.. do not index.

so.. on one site, I asked google to delete everything in google for the site. and.. they did it within 24 hours!

also, you can keep the site from being cached, if you don't want it cached. or say to remove the cached, if I remember correctly.

You should check it out.

[Kevin]

Google is the King, I always try to make Google index my sites as fast as possible. Good ranking on Google means success for a site, there is no other way for small websites.

[scorpiotiger]

the site I'm maintaining is for a high school department. it is known to the people that need to know (linked to from the school website).

I am not especially keen to have the information and pictures of these kids accessible world wide. what I'm trying to do is just have the home page accessible, and the rest not indexed.

so.. not every site wants to be indexed.

but.. I've also had sites that I was able to move up in the google ranking to the first page for certain keywords. It is kind of common sense ways of designing pages.. once you figure out how to look at the page from the view point of the search engine. Search Engine intelligence is a very interesting topic.. especially when it comes to something as vast as the internet.

but, I agree.. google is the king now. kind of a wacky, mercurial king at times.. but king.

anyway, google tools are good to look at. I have found it useful in looking at my sites.

[Kevin]

Right, in your case, it's better to keep the SE out. The SE may take a couple of weeks to remove your sites.

Which keyword do you think is the best one for this forum? 'Health Forum'? Hard to rank. 'Alternative medicine forum(s)' has been on the first page of Google.

[scorpiotiger]

the google tools removed the site within 24 hours. less. I was surprised. I had put a robots.txt file in a long time ago.. but for some reason, the picture gallery keeps getting indexed. if it happens again, i guess i'm going to have to contact google to find out.. because they are supposed to follow the robots standards.

I'm keeping an eye to see if it gets indexed again. ack.. hope not.

my advice, as far as keywords? I would say.. the best thing to do is don't be tricky.. be true to your content. think about what keywords you want people to find your site with. What is your site about? ok.. alternative health. like a million other sites. but.. what kind of alternative health. what subjects? and.. for each page where you discuss that subject, make sure you have a title that is descriptive and uses words that describe the content. Also, putting a summary paragraph at the beginning helps. and don't repeat repeat repeat hoping to increase the weight.. sometimes it can work against you. they look for that to identify spammers.

so.. just talk naturally about the subject that you are discussing. but try to have a descriptive unique title to every content page.

for the forum, make sure you have it search engine friendly. and good short descriptions for the different forums.

don't think keyword. think keywords How/when do you want your site to stand out? What is your corner of the world?

also, check your error logs regularly. If you have errors, fix them. If you have pages not found.. put in redirects.

also.. anytime someone links to you (legitimately) from another site.. that helps. and it helps if it isn't a signature line.. but part of the content pertaining to a real conversation.

go to webmasterworld forums.. they have a lot of good stuff there.

[Kevin]

Well said. Thanks!