Removed vbSEO- Site Indexing TANKED- any fixes?
 

I was Forced to upgrade by my server company because their server couldn't handle the load of running vbSEO and they kept stating that there were security issues (which is kind of ironic considering I didn't get hacked until AFTER I upgraded!!) I digress,

In any case, I removed vbSEO and as I feared, my website ranking has completely tanked out and set me back to the same level of traffic I was at about 7 years ago. Instead of thousands of my pages being in the top 5 in a google search, NONE of them are.

I'm still submitting site indices, but they're not showing friendly URLS, they're showing content.php/r=3434

Is there any way to actually achieve listings using vbulletin????

Yes, I can help.
Need to write complex forwarding rules
Due to the different settings on each site, these rules are unique to each site

I need to see
- Your Site
- Access to google webmaster

I'm currently using complex rewrite rules in the .htaccess to prevent broken urls from the removal, but they don't show the old .html extensions anymore which is what I'm looking to achieve.

I don't use Google Webmaster.

The .htaccess looks like this:



The old VBSEO CMS url's Appeared Like this:
and it displays in the browser url like this:
I would like to change it back so that it looks like this

In the browser bar and in the search engines. I purchased dbSEO & imported the settings from vbSEO, but it didn't work, the CMS options in dbSEO aren't the same as they were in vbSEO- they don't allow the CMS Section Names to change.

Use dbseo as vbseo does have security problems

Or upgrade to xenforo which has an importer for vbseo url's.

Also I'd suggest using google webmaster tools and google analytic regardless of what you choose.

Any change in url structure at all will always have a short term hit to your rankings. Moving to another software (all together) wont help, neither.

How long ago did you migrate away from vBSEO?

Not necessarily, not in my experience (https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?p=2534340)

There are redirects in the suggestion I posted, so it may still hurt but it wouldn't be near as bad as any old links would still redirect to the correct content.

Every site I've worked with has generally had a small dip (days/weeks) until things recover/change over. even with 301

I realize that, which is why I removed it several months ago, unfortunately, it's caused a massive tank to my SEO.

4 Months and I've seen a 500% DECREASE in traffic/ ranking and consquently site revenue.



As far as I know Xenforo still doesn't offer a Content Management System.. is that correct?

Um, we're not talking about SMALL dips here, we're talking about night & day difference.

There are a few options if you're after a portal type page or articles but I don't want to link them from here since this is a vb support site.. but yes, IMO there are a few options for a CMS with xf.

Thank you, I've been looking into them. I found 2, one is more like a pinterest style and the other may work. Still checking into the SEO possibilities of their software as well.

Either way you go now after 4 months you may have some work ahead of you. You may need to start rebuilding links and start rebuilding your SEO after you sort how you want your links to be and how you want your SEO to be on the site.

Then you did not redirect properly. If you just turn vBSEO off, then this is exactly what will happen. Changing your URLS now yet again, without proper redirection in place (and it may be that you now have to cater two redirections - for the vBSEO and for the current URLs), will result in further backlash.

This is a vBulletin site. Be nice if you could give the XenForo propaganda a rest just for five minutes and let people actually assist the original poster, who will continue to have exactly the same issue if he switches software.

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So, just to be clear then, the answer to the question "does XenForo have a Content Management System" is "No".

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I agree. At this stage the original poster should focus on the current URLs rather than changing again.

Yeah that is pretty much what I was getting at with my post although I did not say it as well lol. I do not think it would matter what you were using at this point since it had gotten screwed up to begin with your would still have the same issue. you now have work ahead of you to go and fix the problem and readdress the URL'S properly.