Show Thread Enhancements - "See More" Google Custom Search (Lite) - Increase Adsense revenue!

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

Pro only features:

• 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.

• Bounce Rate decreased by 2%
• Search page RPM: $9.39
• Adsense revenue: 23% increase

Review: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....2&postcount=89
Review 2: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....1&postcount=86

Results will vary depending on site traffic and subject matter.

Installation

Google Custom Search Setup

1. 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
2. Go to https://www.google.com/cse/create/new
3. Enter all information and click Create
4. Under "Edit search engine" go to "Look and feel"
5. Click "Full width" and click Save
6. Go to "Setup"
7. Click the "Make money" tab, and make sure "Search Engine Monetization" is on and your AdSense account is hooked up
8. On the "Basics" tab under the Details section click - "Search engine ID"
9. Take note of your Search Engine ID

See More install & setup

1. Once you download the package, unzip it
2. Upload gsearch.php to your forum root
3. Install the product xml under the admincp. Plugins & Projects > Manage Products > Add/Import Product (at the bottom)
4. Go to Settings > Options > "See More" Google Custom Search
5. Insert your pub id as noted in the last step of the previous section
6. If you wish to change how the results page looks the template is named see_more_gsearch
7. 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.
• 7/24/14 - 1.2.2 - Fixed character encoding issue - Added Who's Online location
• 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.

[Marv]

Hi tpearl,
always try before you buy

I gave it a try on my httpd and so far it worked - almost - fine. But there is an issue with special chars, like the german ?,?,?,? or @ and € and so on. Sorry to say that, but it messes the whole search site up - from the header to the footer.
May be you could come up with a workaround for that? Would be nice. Thx!

[tpearl5]

Originally Posted by Emad ELsayed

I did this
But the same problem
Strangely there is no problem with English titles

Originally Posted by Marv

Hi tpearl,
always try before you buy

I gave it a try on my httpd and so far it worked - almost - fine. But there is an issue with special chars, like the german ?,?,?,? or @ and ? and so on. Sorry to say that, but it messes the whole search site up - from the header to the footer.
May be you could come up with a workaround for that? Would be nice. Thx!

Try the attached. Make sure to select 'allow overwrite'. I have no easy way to test this since I don't have a site that uses non-english characters.

[Marv]

Thanks tpearl, but this xml isn´t working. With this one the mod isn´t working at all. But - shouldn´t it be the gsearch.php, that needs the tweaking? Just wondering, no offense.

[tpearl5]

Originally Posted by Marv

Thanks tpearl, but this xml isn?t working. With this one the mod isn?t working at all. But - shouldn?t it be the gsearch.php, that needs the tweaking? Just wondering, no offense.

Okay, how about this? I'm thinking it has something to do with the characters not being saved correctly in the code that creates the see more link. gsearch just displays the page and has data passed to it. It already accounts for the character encoding of your site.

[Emad ELsayed]

Originally Posted by tpearl5

Try the attached. Make sure to select 'allow overwrite'. I have no easy way to test this since I don't have a site that uses non-english characters.

Thank you Dear
I hope a solution in the next release
Best regards

[puertoblack2003]

Originally Posted by tpearl5

Did you install the latest version?

yes the latest pro version via email.

[Marv]

Originally Posted by tpearl5

Okay, how about this? I'm thinking it has something to do with the characters not being saved correctly in the code that creates the see more link. gsearch just displays the page and has data passed to it. It already accounts for the character encoding of your site.

Thank you for trying to sort that out, tpearl. Unfortunal, the xml hasn?t changed anything.
If noone else can reproduce this, than may be the error is a local one on my end. But i can hardly believe that. It?s only happening on gsearch.php.

BTW: meanwhile I noticed, that the see more link is placed with the hook postbit_signature_start. Shouldn?t that be postbit_signature_end as default in the lite version? At least the link is displayed between the post and above the signature.

[tpearl5]

Originally Posted by Marv

Thank you for trying to sort that out, tpearl. Unfortunal, the xml hasn?t changed anything.
If noone else can reproduce this, than may be the error is a local one on my end.

BTW: meanwhile I noticed, that the see more link is placed with the hook postbit_signature_start. Shouldn?t that be postbit_signature_end as default in the lite version?

Can you post the URL of a see more link with special characters in it? Are you matching the character encoding on Google Search to that of your forum?

actually it doesn't use that hook at all in the lite version - it's appended to the post to place it after the signature.

[tpearl5]

Originally Posted by puertoblack2003

yes the latest pro version via email.

Can you post the see more link too? Don't need the full URL just everything after and including gsearch.php

[Marv]

Originally Posted by tpearl5

Can you post the URL of a see more link with special characters in it? Are you matching the character encoding on Google Search to that of your forum?

actually it doesn't use that hook at all in the lite version - it's appended to the post to place it after the signature.

May be you got me wrong, tpearl. The search results from the custom search are perfect. The issue is only appearing in the header and in the footer. Parts, which are inlcuded by global.php.
My forum is using 8859-1. In the see-more-link the charset "8859-1" is referenced and thats working. But only for the custom search results - not for the part coming from global.php.