Social Network Marketing Tycoon

**Lashtal** · 09-20-2010, 05:28 AM

which is better, and WHY?

it's my understanding that vBulletin, with vbSEO installed will do wonders for SEO... and many people swear by it.

---

HOWEVER...

I also noticed that phpBB3 is FREE, and that there are also SEO mods which can be installed in order to become more SEO friendly, though I personally have never tried them.

SO...

I was curious to know if anyone here has compared the two, or know anything about this matter a little further?

Thanks,
Lashtal

**~kev~** · 09-22-2010, 09:17 AM

My suggestion - stay away from phpbb all together. Over the years I have seen too many phpbb forums hacked to suggest it to anyone.

Its been a long time since I have used phpbb - because of the security thing. But when I was using it, it did not seem as flexible seo wise as vbulletin.

Its a common myth that you "have" to have vbseo installed to do anything. That is simply not true. I see a lot of high ranking vbulletin forums that do not have vbseo.

And since vbulletin 4 supports search engine friendly urls, there is no need for vbseo on that either.

There are a lot of vbseo fans out there, and I can see why they use it. But you do not have to have it installed to rank well.

**usearchme** · 09-23-2010, 06:06 AM

Yup I agree with the above Ive had phpbb forums before and they are simply not a patch on vbulletin, the spam issues are major, vbulletin has ways of blocking everything unlike phpbb.

As far as SEO goes, vbulletin is fine but forums are pretty hard to do SEO for as they tend to have different subjects, I use the SEO plugin for vbulletin which is excellent, as you can also NO FOLLOW all the links on your website, which ends any spam worrys, with phpbb I was constantly removing spam daily and it was v frustrating.

Woc

**ThailandForum** · 09-23-2010, 06:49 AM

PHP BB are too easy to hack, pay the money and get vb, as for seo, forums are pretty crap due to being dynamic, stick up some static landing pages.

**Lashtal** · 09-25-2010, 07:31 AM

I know nothing about SEO whatsoever (and perhaps one of the only ones proud enough to honestly admit that?, lol)

So, let's say I have a full-fledged vBulletin forum set up right now... how do you recommend I set up the landing page(s)?

For instance: a (static, well-optimized) landing page, that gives a link to the (dynamic) forum itself?

Basically, I want people posting in the forums as much as possible... so I kind of want to do As Much As Necessary with the static landing page(s), without taking Too Much attention away from the forums... as this is what I want the total focus of the site to be centred around.

**ThailandForum** · 09-25-2010, 07:57 AM

http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=103076

**ThailandForum** · 09-25-2010, 08:00 AM

here's a static page I have been working on http://teakdoor.com/view.php?pg=surin all the links are internal links to either forum threads or other pages on the site.

The pages can be done in bb code, html and php, just check the box to include forum header and footer and your ready to go.

**Lashtal** · 09-25-2010, 09:30 PM

Okay.

**dWhite** · 09-25-2010, 09:47 PM

The SEO mods for phpbb are a pain in the butt to install, seeing as you have to manually spend a few hours editing EVERY file in your template as needed by the instructions.

On the other hand, vBulletin has the auto installation thingy like SMF and MyBB have which is better in the long run (and vBSEO is commercial, so you get priority support for it and updates).

**Lashtal** · 09-26-2010, 02:10 AM

That's right...

I had to install about 4 different SEO modifications for my phpBB forum, and I still doubt it's efficacy.

**tsak** · 09-26-2010, 06:12 PM

I would go for bulletin.. I found it easy to use. And it is much more stable thatn phpbb

**merockysingh** · 09-27-2010, 05:22 AM

I think vbuelltin is the best software because it is having maximum option of tweaking your posts.

**chrishirst** · 09-29-2010, 06:57 PM

SEO is not about what forum software you use!

**pow-wow** · 11-08-2010, 04:34 AM

vBulletin More SEO friendly than PHPBB, it has less spam and easier to moderate using its administrative features.

**my1ken** · 11-09-2010, 11:36 AM

can't say but most use Vbulletin

**Digital Friend** · 04:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrishirst

SEO is not about what forum software you use!

Sure, you can optimize both vBulletin and phpBB forums, but I prefer vBulletin,

It's more user friendly software and doesn't have as much vulnerable spots as phpBB forum software.

**JJlove** · 11-17-2010, 08:00 AM

My suggestion - stay away from phpbb all together. Over the years I have seen too many phpbb forums hacked to suggest it to anyone.