Version: 1.2.3, by tpearl5
Developer Last Online: Aug 2022
Category: Show Thread Enhancements -
Version: 4.x.x
Rating:
Released: 06-18-2014
Last Update: 09-15-2014
Installs: 39
Uses Plugins Auto-Templates
Additional Files Is in Beta Stage
No support by the author.
ForumSetup.net?s ?See More? Google Custom Search will allow visitors to easily find similar content on your site and increase your Adsense revenue! Many sites that have this modification installed have also reported a bump in pages per visitor and a decreased bounce rate as well!
How does it do this? A ?See More? link is inserted in the first post of a thread. If a user is coming from a search engine, the keyword they used to search will be used to link to a Google Custom Search to find more similar content on your site. If the modification cannot get the keyword or a user is browsing your site, the title of the thread will be used instead. The free version of Google Custom Search inserts relevant ads, increasing your Adsense revenue at the same time.
Features:
Displays search results within your site (does not go to Google)
Statistics in Google Analytics
Customize the See More font and link
Change ?See More? text to whatever you want
Change the HTML around the See More link
Option to show popular queries & the time period they are from
Option to show the See More link to members or specific usergroups
Turn off showing the thread title as the See More link
Choose from 4 different locations for the link (before/after first post, before/after signature)
Replace the default vBulletin search box with Google Custom Search
Option to show the replaced search box to members or specific usergroups
Removes link to ForumSetup.net in footer
Case Studies & Reviews
Case Study: cellphoneforums.net
Cell Phone Forums saw a number of different positive metrics immediately after installing See More Google Custom Search. The See More link is set to display just below the first post content and thread titles are turned on.
Bounce Rate decreased by 5.5%
Pages/Session increased 12%
Avg. Session Duration increased 10%
Search page RPM: $15.88
Adsense revenue: 64% increase
Case Study: nikonites.com
Nikonites also did well and saw better numbers with See More Google Custom Search installed.
Results will vary depending on site traffic and subject matter.
Installation
Google Custom Search Setup
First, you'll need to set things up with Google Custom Search if you haven't already. We are already assuming you have a Google Adsense account setup and it is linked with Custom Search
Click the "Make money" tab, and make sure "Search Engine Monetization" is on and your AdSense account is hooked up
On the "Basics" tab under the Details section click - "Search engine ID"
Take note of your Search Engine ID
See More install & setup
Once you download the package, unzip it
Upload gsearch.php to your forum root
Install the product xml under the admincp. Plugins & Projects > Manage Products > Add/Import Product (at the bottom)
Go to Settings > Options > "See More" Google Custom Search
Insert your pub id as noted in the last step of the previous section
If you wish to change how the results page looks the template is named see_more_gsearch
That's it!
Release Log
6/18/14 - 1.0 - Initial Release
6/20/14 - 1.0.1 - corrected issue with Google ID verification
6/28/14 - 1.2.1 - Added option to display popular queries on search results page & choose the period of time they are from ? Caching of search page template ? Fixed validation error with Google Search ID - Fixed an issue where links were not appearing for some setups ? Removed search page centering ? Added support for different character encoding.
9/16/13 - 1.2.3 - Fixed another character encoding issue - Added mobile style support
The lite version adds a link to ForumSetup.net to the footer of the search results page and thread pages. The pro version does not have this and adds some other features. To learn more, please see this page.
Only preg string is not correct. My partner ID is 013849763082920131497:b_pcqr4_9q0. Also, I needed to add partner-pub- prefix before mod started to work. When I look in custom search link, I don't see that prefix. Please, clarify explanation in your mod for others.
As I had already included custom search in my site I needed to change template (removed search code completely, as I had to searches active), but it's probably not relevant to others.
What if the link to see more threads is under every post? Would this help or not? Not sure on this one...
And yes, sign this mod as working with all vB4 versions, it works with vB4 versions other than just vB4.2.2.
Only preg string is not correct. My partner ID is 013849763082920131497:b_pcqr4_9q0. Also, I needed to add partner-pub- prefix before mod started to work. When I look in custom search link, I don't see that prefix. Please, clarify explanation in your mod for others.
As I had already included custom search in my site I needed to change template (removed search code completely, as I had to searches active), but it's probably not relevant to others.
What if the link to see more threads is under every post? Would this help or not? Not sure on this one...
And yes, sign this mod as working with all vB4 versions, it works with vB4 versions other than just vB4.2.2.
Thanks for the feedback! I was unaware that a pub id could have letters in it. I'll get that fixed shortly.
I'm not sure that adding the link under every post would be effective. Honestly, it would probably just add clutter.