Integration with vBulletin - Zoints Thread Tags - GREAT for SEO

Demo:

http://network.zoints.com/tags

If you choose to send tags to Zoints (optional) you can see what we do with them and how we send you traffic and nice inbound links: http://zoints.com

A great article on the importance of tagging can be read here.

The Zoints Thread Tags System will improve forum side search, SEO, and traffic for forums that choose to utilize it. And in my opinion, it's just plain cool

When a member creates a new thread, they can now input a series of "tags". Tags are simply keywords that describe the thread.



If you then go to your-forum.com/tags you will be presented with what is called a "tag cloud". The more times a tag is used, the larger the text grows. As you can see, the tags are also searchable.



Clicking on one of the tags in the cloud then lists all of the threads that are tagged with that particular keyword. The default option lists tags in a forumdisplay format. There is an option in the admincp to use a simple format.



Clicking on the thread title of one of the above threads then takes you to the thread. If you have the option on, the tags the thread are tagged with are also listed above the thread. Clicking one of those tags takes you to all the threads on the forum tagged with the same tag. Search engine spiders are going to have a field day with this



The thread starter and moderation staff have a slightly different view which allows for administration of tags:



The forum's tags are also searchable via the search dropdown. The advanced search option allows for a variety of additional criteria to be seached for. Your members create a whole new (and highly efficient) forum search engine!



If you have the option on in the admincp and register your forum, once every hour, your tagged threads in publically viewable forums are linked via the corresponding interest tag on the Zoints Forum Network. For example, if you go to http://zoints.com/tag/children you will see what is pictured below. Not only is this a great relevant inbound link for SEO, but you will get traffic from Zoints direct to these threads!

Another example of this in action: http://zoints.com/tag/music




The admincp options

















Official support for this modification will be at http://network.zoints.com in this forum.


Change log:
2008/05/01 - 1.2.3
* vBulletin CSRF Protocol Compatible
2007/12/24 - 1.2.2
* Security patch

2006/10/24 - 1.2.1
* Bugfix: breaking inline moderation when tag cloud below posts
* Bugfix: ajax input not working when tag cloud below posts
* Bugfix: seo hook effective for "results as threads" option
* Bugfix: Autogenerated tags have "quot" removed
* Bugfix: Automated template edit screwing up styles
* Improved instructions for manual template edits

2006/10/19 - 1.2.0
* Option to display results as threads
* Advanced search page
* Popular tag cloud pagination
* Popular tags displayed in forums
* Option to display tags in showthread at the top/bottom
* Fix for vbadvanced products navbar links
* Other minor fixes and tweaks

2006/10/02 - 1.1.2
* Bugfix: Foreign language characters in thread description
* Bugfix: Commas showing up when removing first tag in showthread via ajax
* Removing some redundancy in the tags AJAX removal

2006/09/30 - 1.1.1
* Bugfix: Preventing all HTML from being parsed inside tag descriptions

2006/09/30 - 1.1.0
* Adding and deleting tags from showthread via AJAX
* Mass-deleting single tags from entire cloud for admins
* Automatically generate tags for older threads (with option to show or hide on main cloud)
* Automatically stripping out tiny (2 or less characters) tags

2006/09/28 - 1.0.8
* Minor bugfix

2006/09/28 - 1.0.7
* Bugfix for required tagging

2006/09/28 - 1.0.6
* Character replacements
* Tag limit per thread
* Option to require tags for a thread
* Bugfix where stopwords may not have worked properly
* Bugfix for vBSEO / main cloud not showing up

2006/09/xx - 1.0.5
* Unreleased dev build

2006/09/23 - 1.0.4
* Ability to add multiple tags via showthread.php
* Ability to exclude certain forums from utilizing tags
* Addition of custom hook for developers to change thread urls

2006/09/21 - 1.0.3
* Ability to add and remove tags from showthread.php
* Bugfix for older versions of mysql

2006/09/21 - 1.0.2
* Small bugfix

2006/09/20 - 1.0.1
* Showing tags list on showthread.php

2006/09/20 - 1.0.0
* Initial release

[dealxa]

i installed this hack but i have a problem;

http://www.hayalbahcesi.net/tags/cilekes/

this link tag => cilekes

when i clicked this link, i went to forumhome why am not i going to tags url?

[Sssin]

Hello after the upgrade to version 3.6.8 I've lost the tag link on the navigation bar, any help is apreciated.

[Chadi]

Does anyone know how to get this working on forumhome?

$tagcloud is not working alone

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Hi everyone, my name is Reid and I do work for Zoints. I am not an engineer for them but I can help with some of the problems you are facing or will be able to redirect you to someone who can help as well as taking your suggested features and giving them to the engineers who could make them happen.

I apologize that the support here has been lacking but I will do my best in the future to ensure that everyone gets a response in a somewhat timely fashion. I will be going back the last two or three pages to answer the questions that have been left.

Originally Posted by xcingix

I get the message
A forum entry with this specific hostname (www.geekdum.com) has already been entered or is waiting for validation.
I checked my e-mail already. I don't see any validation.

Hi xcingix,

I do remember working on a problem for some forum that had the work geek in it (we have several) so was that you or are you still needed help? If so, open a ticket at network.zoints.com and we should be able to sort this problem out.

Originally Posted by mini2

Hello,

I've searched this thread, and seen requests, but not an answer to these couple of questions.

First one, is it possible (has someone come up with a solution) to have the list of tags on forumdisplay "weighted", ie more popular tags are larger, as is the case with the regular tags cloud?

And, is there a way to have the popular tags cloud on the forumhome yet?

I've read and searched through this monster of a thread and not seen a solution to either of these requests/tweaks.

Thanks.

Hey there mini2,

I will let the engineers know of that request as I am sure it wouldn't be difficult since that style is used elsewhere in Zoints. I can't guarantee anything, but I can also see the use some might have for that and hopefully it's doable.

In our next release, having the popular tags cloud on forumhome (and with popular ones more weighted) should be a reality as I've seen it on a test release we have.

Originally Posted by Hayko

this plugin useful or beneficial for all forums ?

Hi Hayko,

It's kind of like the 'Different Strokes for Different Folks' as I can't imagine every forum needing it, but I think most forums find it useful and depending on how much the users use it, it can become quite a nice indexing system for them and future members versus using just the search system. If the tags are accurately used, it builds a link from one to the next that if a user was interested in one thread, he might be interested in another thread although he was able to find it through the tags system much more easily.

Think about a person interested in dogs on a forum, they can search for "dogs" and get all the threads with the word "dogs" on it. That's great of course, but what about a thread talking about German Shepherds where the word "dogs" was never mentioned, if tagged with it, a user could find it through that link better than the search system.

I hope that answers your question.

Originally Posted by MotMann

? What i must do, that Tags autom. generatet, if user post new Thread?
? What are the best settings, if i use vBSEO?

Hi MotMann,

At this time, making automatically generated tags in the way you mention is not possible. You can go back and tag old threads, but that's about it.

As for tag settings for vBSEO, there is quite a few threads on network.zoints.com so I would advise you to go read through some of those to see if you can find a solution that satisfies. Frankly, I forget the various suggestions I used to get my forum's tag system to display the way I wanted so I don't want to lead you down paths that I am unsure where they go to.

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by mfyvie

Additional Functionality for Zoints Thread Tags

Would you like to give additional users or user groups the ability to add or delete tags in areas which they don't moderate?

If so, you can use the attached extension for Zoints Thread Tags 1.2.1 which will give you that ability via additional options in the AdminCP.

Please see the attached file for full instructions and follow them CAREFULLY.

No support will be provided for this extension - if it doesn't work for you - I'm sorry. This extension is not endorsed or supported by Zoints. I simply built this for myself, and am sharing it.

Note that any future upgrade to Zoints Thread Tags will erase many of these edits and they will have to be redone.

Hopefully Zoints will like this idea and incorporate these changes into their next version!

I haven't used it, but that seems like a pretty cool addition mfyvie! We always love it when you guys try your hand at improving the products. I will give the link to your post to the engineers in case they feel like they can draw inspiration from that for a future feature in a release.

Originally Posted by Calibre_k

How can i get rid of the Search Tags box?

When i add a tag i see the 2 boxes Tags: with an add button how can i delete the extra one?

Also when i add tag And try to view I get error: (tags/index.php/add/ in browser link) No input file specified.

To get rid of the search tags block on the navbar, I don't believe there is a really easy answer to that. I am afraid you have to refer to your readme file included with the download package on how to disable automatic template edits and the corresponding manual edits that go with them.

I would suggest opening up a ticket at network.zoints.com if you haven't already so we can try correcting those two errors..

Originally Posted by SBlueman

I have two questions:

Is there any way to create RSS feeds for each topic tag?

Second....when you click on a particular topic tag to see other topics with the same tag, is there a way to get the post icons to show up? Right now it's only showing the default icon on my site:

http://gridironfans.com/forums/tags/...p/transaction/

Hi SBlueman,

I recognize your request, I believe you're SteveRobWhatever, or something like that at the support forums. Anywho, both the suggestion and the bug fix have been mentioned to the engineers in the past so hopefully it gets corrected in the future.

Originally Posted by Robi_Kenobi

I've installed it too, running great so far.

But is it not possible to search for a list of tags in the advanced search.
I mean for example search all the threads wich have Tags "aaa" and "bbb".

If i search for two or more tags at the same time i always get an empty search result.

Without this the whole "tag search" thing it is quite senceless for the forum users, i think.

Hey Robi,

I will link the engineers over to here to see if that's not possible for a future release because I certainly can't help to get that working as such for you.

- Reid

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by PlymWS

Would it be possible to create an option to search for threads that haven't been tagged ?

I installed this with about 1000 threads already on my board. It would be helpful to be able to search for threads with no tags so I can tag them easily.

Hi PlymWS,

djbaxter is correct in saying that the easiest way to do that and the only way we really have to do it is through the automatic tag generation. Other than recommending to recall the date you installed the system and going to each forum with using the display options to sort by the thread start date to try to find them all, I really don't know of a truly easy way to do it. If there is though, please let me know so I can help users in the future with the same request.

Sorry.

Originally Posted by nocte

I have the same problem. the replacement just don't work with the ajax tag saving on showthread. On newthread.php and editpost.php they work!

Hi Nocte,

Thanks for letting us know about the problem with the replacement characters. I don't know how difficult it would be to make it work with the ajax, but I'll let the engineers know and hopefully they can find a way so everyone can use the tags system for their full benefit.

Originally Posted by chadi

Anyone figure out yet how to get this to work on forumhome?

Hi chadi,

Like I mentioned in a post or two above, this should be functionality you will see on the next release.

Originally Posted by perfphysio

Again any word on the next release. Users are going crazy messing up the tags index and I don't want to switch it off but I do want to enable only admin and moderator access to set tags for posts. Please help on this one as it has been asked for since 2006

Hi perfphysio,

I am sorry, but I am bit confused about your post. In regards to a new release, right now Zoints Local is our number one priority but we do have a release that has been testing for quite some time, so once the engineers fix the problems we're aware of, we'll get it out to you as quickly as possible. In said release, we do have the option to limit by usergroup who can add and who can delete tags so hopefully we can get that out soon.

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by obmob

Hello guys, just installed this interesting mod... but i can't find the vBAdvanced module...

Is there one for the new vbA?
Thanks

Hi obmob,

In case you or anyone else is still looking, here's the link to this nifty little add-on to your vBadvanced setup:

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...ghlight=zoints

Please read that thread because there is a fix that was at least applicable to my forum and other forums to make it work with their latest release.

Originally Posted by exes_slayer

great mod!
+ marked as installed

Thanks!

Originally Posted by MadKad

any one got any help with

http://network.zoints.com/showthread.php?t=3746


?????????

Thanks

Hi MadKad,

Unless I am missing something, when viewing the link to your forums you posted with the tag /html/, it seemed to be working fine for myself. Did you correct the issue somehow?

Originally Posted by turbia

Great mod! thank you very much!!

Installed

Thanks turbia, we really appreciate it.

Originally Posted by BrettMo

When is the next version coming out where you can enter the page header information?

Also, if the next version allowed the first X number of words from each related posting to appear in the key word page, it would certainly increase the SEO value of the page.

Looking forward to the next version...

Hey Brett,

What do you mean by page header information? Obviously it's a bit self-explanatory to a degree, but since I was not one of the staff members who worked a terrible amount with the thread tags system, perhaps you're referencing something I have not been familiarized with yet. And I'll mention your suggestion to the engineers as we all know how important it is to fully maximize your page's worth through SEO.

Originally Posted by dtv100

with this tag system can I connect 2 of my site to show tag from each other?

Hi dtv100,

I suppose there might be some possibility if they share a database. But I would be pretty certain that it would require a lot of editing to make it inter-connected between two sites. I would suggest opening a ticket at network.zoints.com to speak with someone who knows the system at a more advanced level than myself to see if it is possible.

- Reid

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by SBlueman

I wanted to share how I share the Zoints Thread tag mod on my NFL forum, maybe it will help others.

I run a NFL Football Forum at GridironFans.com, and we pride ourselves in bringing all the latest NFL news to the members of our community. We have one forum (unfortunately I am limited to being able to post news in one forum because of the current setup of the vbAdvanced portal system) where I post all the NFL news. The forum is closed to posting new threads to everyone except for a group called "NFL News Reporters". When this group posts news they are required to use a post icon for the team they are posting about and then they are required to enter topic tags. Now this is where I differ from the current setup most of you know. .....

I would just like to thank SBlueman for this contribution and recommend it to other forums. I run a sports site as well and this has been a welcome addition that has quite a bit of use while being very simple to add and edit.

Originally Posted by dealxa

i installed this hack but i have a problem;

http://www.hayalbahcesi.net/tags/cilekes/

this link tag => cilekes

when i clicked this link, i went to forumhome why am not i going to tags url?

Hello Dealxa,

You have been getting help at network.zoints.com with this, correct? If not, I will see what I can do but opening a ticket there would likely be your best bet for the fastest resolution.

Originally Posted by Sssin

Hello after the upgrade to version 3.6.8 I've lost the tag link on the navigation bar, any help is apreciated.

Have your tried looking through the readme regarding template edits for this? If so and it failed, I should be able to write you up something to correct this problem.

- Reid

[SBlueman]

Hey people.....I figured out a way to have RSS feeds for your Tags! Read on:

I found Dapper.net and it worked like a charm. All I had to do was do a small template edit to not show the "Sticky" text on sticky threads. Here is what I did:

Step 1: Edited out "sticky" from any sticky titles so when you went to the tag search page (example: Link to "Chiefs" tag on my site) the word "Sticky" did not show up.

Step 2: Go to Dapper.net and register.

Step 3: Click on the "Content Owners" tab and select "Content Distribution".

Step 4: Enter your main domain name on the next page.

Step 5: On the next page, select "Create a Dapp"

Step 6: In the enter URL field, enter in the thread tag search link (example: http://gridironfans.com/forums/tags/index.php/chiefs/)

Step 7: Follow the steps from there (the site pretty much walks you thru it all) and enjoy!

Check out their demo movie: http://www.dapper.net/dapperDemo/

This has rocked for me. I have been able to create this page:

http://gridironfans.com/forums/view.php?pg=rss

To list all the news feeds on my site. I just switched hosts and the name servers are still propagating but they worked perfectly before and will work like a charm again. The only drawback is that the feed will only display the headline, but it's better than nothing.

[The Librarian]

I'm running vBulletin 3.6.8 and using this mod. I haven't noticed any problems with it, but I just went into my cPanel error log checking on something and found it FULL with nothing but errors related to this mod.

Here's what they all say: (names and numbers changed to protect the innocent, of course. )

[Wed Aug 29 21:26:27 2007] [error] [client 00.000.00.00] File does not exist: /home/nnnnnnnn/public_html/forum/tags/zointstags.js

Could you tell me how to repair this problem, please?

Thanks.