This will be hard without a rating feature
yeah, but there is lots of empty space in the thread-list to include such a "Rating Feature" for each thread.
Even still a lot of empty space on fixed-width-styles.....
After all, if a thread can have "Prefixes", why should a Thread not have "Stars" ?
Having the "Likes"-feature as it is currently implemented is just fine and sufficient.
But our internal idea here at xenforo.com to "Like the first post of a thread if you want a certain feature to be implemented" lacks a bit of understanding and not many users here know about this.
The "Star Ratings" for a Thread could eliminate this internal idea for "Like the first post of a thread if you want a certain feature to be implemented".
I think it would be visually attracting to also show "Stars" for each thread. Users would click much more into threads if they see some "Stars" and they would submit their "Star Rating".
There is no need for implementing a "Rating Comment System" like we have at the RM, just implementing the stars. Just a subjective star-rating, no Comments-system.
Would be cool to be able to test this here and see if it works from a "user-psychology" perspective.
But the main advantage are in the Google-Search-Results.
That would be the Killer-feature for subjective SEO.
http://xenforo.com/community/threads/subjective-seo-with-star-ratings-for-threads.49877/
So would you rather want to PAY Google to get found or would you rather want to have "Stars" shown at your threads and being CLICKED by users within Google-Search-Results because these yellow stars are shining so bright ?