Ben Panter
24-12-2006, 09:32
If you have a play with Google and diving topics you can see that we're often rated very highly - but not for things that you might suspect! A few suggestions (entirely voluntary!) to help us both index our site and improve the BSAC forum's standing in search engine ratings:
Thread titles: A thread title that is short and descriptive is ideal. We occasionally tidy them up, but the majority are left as they are. You probably won't go far wrong if you think of them as the headline for the article that will follow - whether that article is written by you or by other members of the forum. 'How should I pick my fins?' or 'Whale stranded in the Thames' are far better than 'Quick Question' or 'Help!'. To get an idea of why this is handy, try out the search feature in the blue bar near the top of the page.
Linking to the forum: Please do! If you have a branch or personal web page then we're very happy to having incoming links. It would help if they were a little more descriptive than just 'BSAC Forum (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/)' - even something like 'BSAC Diving Forum (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/)' helps, but 'British Sub-Aqua Club Diving Forum - advice on UK and World diving (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/)' would be even better.
Linking to the websites: Would be great - the main site for attracting new members is www.bsac.com, while the main site for current members is www.bsac.org. The advantage of linking to the .com site is that it also contains elements like the Travel Club and the Gallery, also very interesting to Googlers. As with the forums, if you can make the link something like The British Sub-Aqua Club, UK and Worldwide club for divers and diving training (www.bsac.com) rather than just BSAC (www.bsac.com) it helps when people search for 'UK Diving' rather than just 'BSAC'
Linking to posts: Again, having a internally referenced website helps with navigation and search indexing. If you can, it helps if the link is textual rather than just a url - something like A thread about helping the site become famous (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=6581) rather than http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=6581 helps.
Linking to outside sites: Yes please! If you link to an outside site and can manage to use the same technique as above it helps them and it helps us. For instance if you can make the link read Yorkshire Divers - another great UK diving forum (http://www.yorkshire-divers.com/) rather than just http://www.yorkshire-divers.com/ it improves both their and our standing in the rankings. It also helps people to know what to expect when the click, always handy.
Signatures: We're happy for non-commercial links in signatures, and as long as the poster is a regular contributor and the link isn't too blatant we've no issue with commercial signature sites either. This is entirely at the admin team's discretion, and we expect a link in return on the advertised site.
All this is voluntary, if it makes no sense to you then don't worry, posts and links are welcome in whatever format they arrive.
Cheers,
The Admin Team
Thread titles: A thread title that is short and descriptive is ideal. We occasionally tidy them up, but the majority are left as they are. You probably won't go far wrong if you think of them as the headline for the article that will follow - whether that article is written by you or by other members of the forum. 'How should I pick my fins?' or 'Whale stranded in the Thames' are far better than 'Quick Question' or 'Help!'. To get an idea of why this is handy, try out the search feature in the blue bar near the top of the page.
Linking to the forum: Please do! If you have a branch or personal web page then we're very happy to having incoming links. It would help if they were a little more descriptive than just 'BSAC Forum (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/)' - even something like 'BSAC Diving Forum (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/)' helps, but 'British Sub-Aqua Club Diving Forum - advice on UK and World diving (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/)' would be even better.
Linking to the websites: Would be great - the main site for attracting new members is www.bsac.com, while the main site for current members is www.bsac.org. The advantage of linking to the .com site is that it also contains elements like the Travel Club and the Gallery, also very interesting to Googlers. As with the forums, if you can make the link something like The British Sub-Aqua Club, UK and Worldwide club for divers and diving training (www.bsac.com) rather than just BSAC (www.bsac.com) it helps when people search for 'UK Diving' rather than just 'BSAC'
Linking to posts: Again, having a internally referenced website helps with navigation and search indexing. If you can, it helps if the link is textual rather than just a url - something like A thread about helping the site become famous (http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=6581) rather than http://www.bsacforum.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=6581 helps.
Linking to outside sites: Yes please! If you link to an outside site and can manage to use the same technique as above it helps them and it helps us. For instance if you can make the link read Yorkshire Divers - another great UK diving forum (http://www.yorkshire-divers.com/) rather than just http://www.yorkshire-divers.com/ it improves both their and our standing in the rankings. It also helps people to know what to expect when the click, always handy.
Signatures: We're happy for non-commercial links in signatures, and as long as the poster is a regular contributor and the link isn't too blatant we've no issue with commercial signature sites either. This is entirely at the admin team's discretion, and we expect a link in return on the advertised site.
All this is voluntary, if it makes no sense to you then don't worry, posts and links are welcome in whatever format they arrive.
Cheers,
The Admin Team