Why did HA's Google Rankings (SERP) drop and how to bring it back?

[Winston]

If anyone is interested, here's a list of the probable 200 factors that Google uses to rank your site. This isn't an official list from Google, it's from a third party analyst. Some are proven but others are speculative and controversial.

Google’s 200 Ranking Factors: The Complete List (2020)
https://backlinko.com/google-ranking-factors

More related links.

11 Things You Must Know About Google’s 200 Ranking Factors
https://www.searchenginejournal.com/goo ... ts/265085/

[Winston]

Does anyone know if SERP boosting services like this are worth it? Can it backfire? Are they considered black hat SEO techniques?

http://www.serp-booster.com/detail.php?id=147

[StanfordGuy]

[Winston]

How is Roosh rebuilding his site? He still uses mybb for his forum. Where is his new site?

So PAG, did you launch the DDOS attack here or not? Doesn't your silence imply guilt? If so why did you do it? Have you stopped?

Should I rebuild my home page with a better CMS? Is that all?

Would implementing this help?

https://www.johnlarge.co.uk/blocking-ag ... pers-bots/

[StanfordGuy]

[Shemp]

Everyone at SwoopTheWorld is laughing at the garish new RVF. Who cares about all that SEO crap if the garish interface drives off all the quality posters? Anyway, selling ads is no way to get rich unless readership is really huge, and it never will be here.

Maybe Winston should try selling consulting services for second passports by investment to guys like Contrarian Expat. CE appears to have pension money thanks to his 30 years of ass kissing as a flunky civil servant, so best hurry up and get there before someone else does the separating of money from fool.

[StanfordGuy]

Everyone at SwoopTheWorld is laughing at the garish new RVF. Who cares about all that SEO crap if the garish interface drives off all the quality posters? Anyway, selling ads is no way to get rich unless readership is really huge, and it never will be here.

Maybe Winston should try selling consulting services for second passports by investment to guys like Contrarian Expat. CE appears to have pension money thanks to his 30 years of ass kissing as a flunky civil servant, so best hurry up and get there before someone else does the separating of money from fool.

SwoopTheWorld? That's a total retard farm https://culturewhiz.org/forum/topic/wha ... comment-59 that site is going no where.

Anyway, that is why I said this site needs to be rebuilt. My software would actully be perfect here.

[Winston]

Bad news folks. It seems our SERP or google search rankings have taken a nosedive. For example, I used to rank #1 for my own name "Winston Wu". If you googled it, it would show my About Me page under HA. We also used to rank #1 for "American women suck" too on Google. A blog article would come up as the #1 hit for that. Now when you google that term, this site doesn't come up at all. The only thing we rank well for now is "happier abroad". That sucks. What happened? Did Google almost deplatform us for hate speech or offensive speech? I searched online and found this article on BBC that says Google now removes listings it considers hate speech or offensive or containing fake news or conspiracy theories.

Google search changes tackle fake news and hate speech
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39707642

Maybe that's why our google rankings have taken a nosedive? What can we do? If so, any improvements to this site is not likely to help much if we've been severely penalized for hate speech or offensive speech or promoting conspiracy theories. Should we move all those threads relating to that into the NSFW section? Would that help?

We still have regular traffic since this site is still popular with expats and misfits and freethinkers and HAers and other eccentrics. But search engines don't rank us well now for some reason. They've almost put us at the bottom of the barrel, even for keywords we used to rank #1 for. That's really bad and sucks.

[Winston]

Lol, go and look!

https://www.rooshvforum.com/

He paid over $160 for forum software from xenforo. Pages served by XenForo contain extensive metadata including specific fields for Facebook's OpenGraph and Twitter Cards, so that when links to your community are shared, any unfurling services will get a great preview of your content. His new forum software give him friendly URLs that resembles a file path including the title of the content, with no query string gobbledygook attached. Great for SEO. Also, every page in XenForo is built using fully semantic HTML 5, so search engine robots can dive right in to the content they are meant to be reading without getting bogged down in navigation or interface chrome.

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/h ... umb.12347/

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/s ... -html.892/

People here said I didn't know what I was talking about ( low IQ) but Roosh followed my lead. He wants to make boat loads of money!

Sure, you can do that. Should help a bit.

Well I can pay $160 for Xenforo too. Do you recommend I do that? Is it a one time payment only? The problem is, it would change all the URL's here. How would I redirect thousands of internal forum links to it? Wouldn't that be impossible? Wouldn't we have to bite the bullet and just accept a lot of internal broken links?

Why did Roosh move his forum from mybb to xenforo? Mybb also used permalinks (URL's with topic words in them) too, just like my blog does, so why the move? Mybb is also rated very highly.

I don't get what you mean when you refer to HTML 5, metadata, breadcrumbs, structured data, H1 and H2 tags, etc. I thought all you needed was a title tag, and then content below that. We do have title tags in this forum of course. The topic title is in the title tag. Take a look at the html for this topic page for example:

view-source:viewtopic.php?style=11&f=1&t=42494

Code: Select all

<title>(225) Why did HA's Google Rankings (SERP) take a nosedive? - Happier Abroad Forum Community</title>

	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - Happier Abroad Forum Community" href="/forum/app.php/feed?style=11">	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - News" href="/forum/app.php/feed/news?style=11">	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - All forums" href="/forum/app.php/feed/forums?style=11">	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - New Topics" href="/forum/app.php/feed/topics?style=11">	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - Active Topics" href="/forum/app.php/feed/topics_active?style=11">	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - Forum - General Discussions" href="/forum/app.php/feed/forum/1?style=11">	<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Feed - Topic - Why did HA's Google Rankings (SERP) take a nosedive?" href="/forum/app.php/feed/topic/42494?style=11">	
	<link rel="canonical" href="https://www.happierabroad.com/forum/viewtopic.php?style=11&amp;t=42494">

What is wrong with that PAG? The title tag is there. You can see the topic in it. I thought meta tags were optional and outdated? What's wrong with those tags? How does Xenforo or HTML5 do better with tags and headers? Can you explain? This is all too geeky for me. I'm not a computer geek when it comes to things like this. Can you enlighten us and explain in a clear easy to understand manner in laymen's terms?

Now I know it's true that permalinks are better. They definitely rank better when you have the topic title or keywords in the URL's. But this forum doesn't do that, nor can it. Maybe a mod would do it, but it's dangerous to mess with URL rewriting. An older version of phpbb2 used to have a mod that would create static pages with permalinks in them for search engines to eat up, which would create a duplicate of the forum, which means you'd have to block google from indexing the original forum or else both content would be mixed up. But phpbb3 doesn't have that kind of mod.

[Winston]

Here is Roosh's announcement on why he moved his forum to Xenforo:

https://www.rooshvforum.com/threads/for ... 020.37339/

After twelve years on Mybb, the time has come to change forum software to Xenforo, which has more features and is better maintained by its developers. I will be making this change on Monday, May 4 starting around 11am EST. The forum will be offline until the job is complete, about 3-8 hours. All forum posts, private messages, and attachments will be transferred over.

Here are a few new features you'll encounter after the upgrade:

-Ability to tag a member in a post
-Better mobile support
-Option to enable mobile push notifications
-Two-factor authentication
-Automatic embed of YouTube and Twitter (simply post the link)
-Better private message system
-Dark mode theme

You can get a feel for the new software by going to the Xenforo Community forum.

The forum will come back online in a basic state. Then I will spend the following weeks to fine-tune the software and settings. There will be an opportunity for you to request changes or features.

Up to now, the forum has had only a couple of subforums where most of the action has taken place. Everything Else, for example, would fill up quickly with many different topics. After the upgrade, I plan on creating several more subforums where we can have more focused discussions.

I anticipate some members will prefer the old software, but since that version has reached its end of life and is no longer being maintained, it will become obsolete on web servers that introduce new versions of PHP. The change has to be made and we can't leave things as they are.

I've been test driving the new software for the past couple of days and am really impressed with it. I'm sure it will be seen as a much-needed upgrade by most of the membership.

https://www.rooshvforum.com/threads/wel ... -ii.37354/

I just spent the day migrating what was left of RVF I (special thanks to @Nineteen84 for assisting me with the migration). You can see the RVF I archive at https://www.rooshvforum.com/archive. It won't be online forever, so grab anything you need from there by July.

As you can see, Xenforo software is quite different than Mybb. To help us with the transition, I created a How-To & Troubleshooting forum at the bottom of the main forum page. Use that forum to ask questions about the software (e.g. changing your avatar, embedding videos, etc.). There is also a Sandbox forum where you can test out the features before posting to live threads. This software is new to me so I will be learning with you.

The biggest change I've made is adding over a dozen forums for more focused discussion. The old Everything Else is now Off Topic. A new forum, Culture general, is where most threads you remember as belonging in EE now reside. I've transferred the past 6 months of threads to the new subforums. If a thread older than that gets bumped, I'll move it to the right place. It will take us a while to get a feel for where to post a new thread, so if you post a new thread and it seems to disappear, it's because I moved it somewhere else. Go to your profile to see your posted threads and the new location.

Understand that with RVF II, I did not try to copy/paste the old forum. That forum is dead. This is a new platform with a new focus, so I ask that you use the forum for one week before making any suggestions or feature requests. In one week, a new area will open for you to do so. Use the How-To & Troubleshooting forum to ask questions about the new software or report any problems in the meanwhile.

Lastly, I have locked threads that have not been bumped in the past 5 years. If you wanted to reply to an old thread, simply start a new one.

I hope you enjoy the new forum!

His old forum archive is here: https://www.rooshvforum.com/archive

It looks like Roosh forum has more topic categories now, like we do, not only 4 like before. So that's an improvement. He's followed our lead. lol. See here: https://www.rooshvforum.com/

The Xenforo theme does look nice. Like web 2.0 graphics. I will do some research to see if we could move this forum over to there.

Btw doesn't Roosh's forum also get hit with google SERP penalties for having hate speech or offensive content on there too?

[Winston]

Just posted this in the Google Support Forums:

https://support.google.com/webmasters/t ... 2353?hl=en

Dear Support,
My site seems to have taken a nose dive in Google SERP. I don't even rank for my own name anymore. I used to rank #1 for my name and other keywords. But now I rank for nothing except my domain name. Even the most popular posts or articles that went viral in the past are not even on the first few pages of Google anymore. What can I do? Here is my website:

https://www.happierabroad.com

I still have decent page rank, but the search rankings in google are bottom of the barrel now. I do have some controversial and offensive content in my forum, since we are a free speech forum. Is it possible I got penalized for that? If so should I move the offensive posts into a private board? (keep in mind that offensive does not mean false, and preserving free speech is essential to democracy and liberty, so it's a matter of principle to us) This BBC article I found said that Google is deranking sites that contain offensive content or content that promotes conspiracies: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39707642

Could that be what brought my SERP down? I also heard that Google is deranking all independent sites too and only promoting big corporate sites. Is that true? I put my site under https already and also made the forum mobile friendly, to remove some Google penalties, but it doesn't seem to have helped much.

Another issue I know of is that MyWOT (My Web of Trust) has slandered and libeled my site and labeled it as "dangerous and untrustworthy" simply because they dislike the content and are biased against it, which is wrong of course, since just because they disagree with my content or views, doesn't give them the right to slander or libel us or spread lies about us. We do not take credit cards or steal information, nor do we do anything illegal. So there's no valid basis to claim that our site is "dangerous or untrustworthy". It's pure hatred and subjectivity and bias from the moderators of MyWOT. So I suspect that if Google SERP is based on MyWOT ratings, then that may be what caused the nosedive in SERP too? Do any of you know if MyWOT ratings affect Google rankings or SERP?

If so, what can I do about it? Should I contact the admin of MyWOT and report the slander on their site? Or report it to their webhost? What can you do if a site like MyWOT slanders you? Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance for any help or suggestions.

[Winston]

Looks like you got a point PAG. Roosh's forum does have more metatags. Look at the source code for one of his forum threads below.

view-source:https://www.rooshvforum.com/threads/wel ... -ii.37354/

Code: Select all

	
<title>Welcome to RVF II | Roosh V Forum</title>

<meta name="description" content="I just spent the day migrating what was left of RVF I (special thanks to @Nineteen84 for assisting me with the migration). You can see the RVF I archive at..." />

<meta property="og:description" content="I just spent the day migrating what was left of RVF I (special thanks to @Nineteen84 for assisting me with the migration). You can see the RVF I archive at https://www.rooshvforum.com/archive. It won&#039;t be online forever, so grab anything you need from there by July.

As you can see, Xenforo..." />

<meta property="twitter:description" content="I just spent the day migrating what was left of RVF I (special thanks to @Nineteen84 for assisting me with the migration). You can see the RVF I archive at https://www.rooshvforum.com/archive. It..." />
	
<meta property="og:url" content="https://www.rooshvforum.com/threads/welcome-to-rvf-ii.37354/" />
	
<link rel="canonical" href="https://www.rooshvforum.com/threads/welcome-to-rvf-ii.37354/" />
	
<link rel="next" href="/threads/welcome-to-rvf-ii.37354/page-2" />
	
<meta property="og:site_name" content="Roosh V Forum" />
	
<meta property="og:type" content="website" />
	
<meta property="og:title" content="Welcome to RVF II" />

<meta property="twitter:title" content="Welcome to RVF II" />
	
<meta name="theme-color" content="#185886" />

I noticed that his structured data and meta tags contain stuff targeted to twitter and og and whatever. So that makes a huge difference in SEO and SERP? Is that what you call HTML5 too? Is that also called structured data?

[Winston]

Posted for reference only.

Website penalty checkers

https://mxtoolbox.com/domain

https://feinternational.com/website-penalty-indicator/

The Step-by-Step Guide to Improving Your Google Rankings Without Getting Penalized

https://neilpatel.com/blog/improve-goog ... penalized/

[Winston]

Would this meta data mod help our SEO, PAG?

https://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/exte ... escription

A meta description is often displayed in search engine results (such as Google) below the page title.

This extensions adds a meta description for the forum and the topic pages. The description for forums is based on the forum description. The first 250 chars of the first post is used as the description for topics.

Or this one?

https://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/exte ... o_metadata

Add dynamically generated meta tags and microdata (Open Graph, Twitter Cards and JSON-LD) of your forums and topics to improve SEO of your board and show correct information when you share it though social networks, including (but not limited to) Facebook, Twitter and Vkontakte.

Features:
Dynamically generated Open Graph, Twitter Cards meta tags and JSON-LD microdata from your board data and current page
Dynamic description
Set default image for Open Graph and JSON-LD
Set how description will be generated
ACP settings to enable/disable Open Graph, Twitter Cards and JSON-LD
Support for attachments, for topic image
Generate meta data for specific posts

Requirements:
PHP 7.1.3 or greater
phpBB 3.3 or greater

Translations:
Spanish (Formal Honorifics) [es]
Spanish (Casual Honorifics) [es_x_tu]

[Contrarian Expatriate]

Everyone at SwoopTheWorld is laughing at the garish new RVF. Who cares about all that SEO crap if the garish interface drives off all the quality posters? Anyway, selling ads is no way to get rich unless readership is really huge, and it never will be here.

Maybe Winston should try selling consulting services for second passports by investment to guys like Contrarian Expat. CE appears to have pension money thanks to his 30 years of ass kissing as a flunky civil servant, so best hurry up and get there before someone else does the separating of money from fool.

SwoopTheWorld? That's a total retard farm https://culturewhiz.org/forum/topic/wha ... comment-59 that site is going no where.

Anyway, that is why I said this site needs to be rebuilt. My software would actually be perfect here.

I have Shemp's posts on ignore. So when I see my name quoted in his post here, I'm tickled that he is STILL obsessed with me, my professional background and my wealth. I'm sorry that my 6-figure pension and my 6-figures of passive income streams bother you so darn much.

By the way, if a Paraguayan passport sends you into a tizzy so much (why I don't know), I would hate to see your reaction if I disclosed here how many other residencies and passports I have already.

Gotta love my forum fanboys.