First of all, major kudos to the team for creating an amazing site in such a short time frame. I know there have been shenanigans within the community lately, but its nice to see someone step up and give this game the site it deserves.
With that said, I think it's important to focus on improvements so that the site doesn't end up like some other sites which shall go unnamed. ;-)
I'm a web developer/consultant myself, so I thought I would get the ball rolling with some suggestions for search engine placement. Search engines like google are going to be the easiest way to allow new people find the site, and I assume that increasing visitors would be any site's goal :-)
Currently a search for "Soul Calibur 4" turns up the wikipedia article, the official site, and a bunch of random videos and articles.
You're right to feel overwhelmed about turning up on this search. Google lists results by traffic and relevance. 8wayrun has plenty of the latter but little of the former.
Before you dismiss it, though, keep in mind that the wikipedia article at the top of that search is editable. Of course, you can't just insert your own links at random. You could, however, add a citation to an entry provided that 8wayrun contains an article containing unique information about the game, such as an exploit, for example.
The biggest thing to focus on for search engines, however, are the targeted-searches.
"Soul Calibur forum", for instance, returns links to CaliburForum first, and then to SoulCaliburUniverse, but then degrades into a list of popular but less relevant sites. There is definitely room for a site like 8wayrun on a result set like this!
At first you might feel just as overwhelmed as the generic search list, however you can see that CF and SCU rank ABOVE mega sites like Gamespot and GameTrailers. This is because they are RELEVANT due to their inclusion of the words "Forum" in either the title of their site, the text that appears on their site, or both!
8wayrun, on the other hand, only has "8wayrun" in the title of the home page! There is no text linking to the forum--only a PNG image with no alt-tag! When you navigate to the forum, the title says "8wayrun - Powered by vBulletin". Obviously a google search for "soul calibur forum" will never return this site!
Now, consider changing the home page title to "8wayrun - The primier destiation for all things Soul Calibur! Forums, chat, wiki, strategy, cheats and more!".
Regardless of whether you like that particular phrase, look at what we've done for google: We've now included several key terms including the actual name Soul Calibur itself, while also providing a bit of marketing for the title when it appears in a search list.
Also, consider going to each page and giving it a very specific title. So, for example the forum could be titled "8wayrun - Soul Calibur Forums". Remember, even though we are on a sub-page of the site we still want to include some other keywords like the name "Soul Calibur" since the 8wayrun brand itself does not provide this. It does not, however, need to be as verbose as the home page.
Lastly, lets take a look at the actual content of the site. As mentioned, there is no actual link to the forum which is readable by Google. You can keep the image, but remember that the "alt" tag is what will be read by google.
Also, there is another more important problem: Google is trying to read the text on your home page to determine the relevance of any search query made against it, but the site opens up with a bunch of arbitrary vBuletin links, followed by recent posts. There is no sentence or paragraph introducing the site.
Adding one could provide several benefits: for one, it will honestly help new visitors understand the site they have stumbled on. Secondly, it will provide text to google which is infinitely more relevant than any meta tag you might try to feed it behind the scenes (this data is weighted in a search, but not heavily).
Lastly, it will provide even more motivation for google to link out to important areas of the site, and can allow you to not only tell people about the forums but to provide an anchor link to them as well, which will finally give google that distinct text link which weighs so highly in search terms.
Well, I think I've rambled on long enough for an opening post, but I hope this information serves useful in some way, and again keep up the good work and good luck with the new site!
With that said, I think it's important to focus on improvements so that the site doesn't end up like some other sites which shall go unnamed. ;-)
I'm a web developer/consultant myself, so I thought I would get the ball rolling with some suggestions for search engine placement. Search engines like google are going to be the easiest way to allow new people find the site, and I assume that increasing visitors would be any site's goal :-)
Currently a search for "Soul Calibur 4" turns up the wikipedia article, the official site, and a bunch of random videos and articles.
You're right to feel overwhelmed about turning up on this search. Google lists results by traffic and relevance. 8wayrun has plenty of the latter but little of the former.
Before you dismiss it, though, keep in mind that the wikipedia article at the top of that search is editable. Of course, you can't just insert your own links at random. You could, however, add a citation to an entry provided that 8wayrun contains an article containing unique information about the game, such as an exploit, for example.
The biggest thing to focus on for search engines, however, are the targeted-searches.
"Soul Calibur forum", for instance, returns links to CaliburForum first, and then to SoulCaliburUniverse, but then degrades into a list of popular but less relevant sites. There is definitely room for a site like 8wayrun on a result set like this!
At first you might feel just as overwhelmed as the generic search list, however you can see that CF and SCU rank ABOVE mega sites like Gamespot and GameTrailers. This is because they are RELEVANT due to their inclusion of the words "Forum" in either the title of their site, the text that appears on their site, or both!
8wayrun, on the other hand, only has "8wayrun" in the title of the home page! There is no text linking to the forum--only a PNG image with no alt-tag! When you navigate to the forum, the title says "8wayrun - Powered by vBulletin". Obviously a google search for "soul calibur forum" will never return this site!
Now, consider changing the home page title to "8wayrun - The primier destiation for all things Soul Calibur! Forums, chat, wiki, strategy, cheats and more!".
Regardless of whether you like that particular phrase, look at what we've done for google: We've now included several key terms including the actual name Soul Calibur itself, while also providing a bit of marketing for the title when it appears in a search list.
Also, consider going to each page and giving it a very specific title. So, for example the forum could be titled "8wayrun - Soul Calibur Forums". Remember, even though we are on a sub-page of the site we still want to include some other keywords like the name "Soul Calibur" since the 8wayrun brand itself does not provide this. It does not, however, need to be as verbose as the home page.
Lastly, lets take a look at the actual content of the site. As mentioned, there is no actual link to the forum which is readable by Google. You can keep the image, but remember that the "alt" tag is what will be read by google.
Also, there is another more important problem: Google is trying to read the text on your home page to determine the relevance of any search query made against it, but the site opens up with a bunch of arbitrary vBuletin links, followed by recent posts. There is no sentence or paragraph introducing the site.
Adding one could provide several benefits: for one, it will honestly help new visitors understand the site they have stumbled on. Secondly, it will provide text to google which is infinitely more relevant than any meta tag you might try to feed it behind the scenes (this data is weighted in a search, but not heavily).
Lastly, it will provide even more motivation for google to link out to important areas of the site, and can allow you to not only tell people about the forums but to provide an anchor link to them as well, which will finally give google that distinct text link which weighs so highly in search terms.
Well, I think I've rambled on long enough for an opening post, but I hope this information serves useful in some way, and again keep up the good work and good luck with the new site!
