Structure help/suggestions needed

[Divinum Fiat]

Hi All,

I hope this is in the right place (feel free to move if need be).

I need some structure help, if I may. I'm trying to create an entire forum/page/category with posts about personal development products (affiliate links on my part) and can't quite figure out how to structure it. Right now I have created a category with each affiliate description as a forum post. I've tried creating a page with the forum posts but for some reason then the forums don't show up.

So the structure right now is:

Personal Development Tools (should this be a category, page or a forum or even a library post?)
- product 1 (forum post)
- product 2 (forum post)
- etc.

Is this right or is there a better way? Trying to keep in mind that Google search engines will pick up the individual posts too.

Thank you!

 

[Paul B]

Categories are generally used to organise forums.
Typically a category contains a list of forums with a similar theme or topic.

Like this one: http://xenforo.com/community/#xenforo-community-support.22

Or this: http://xenforo.com/community/#official-xenforo-add-ons.54

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Yes, I understand that but that doesn't quite help me think through the best way of displaying affiliate products in the most advantageous ways. I'm also thinking long term, having hundreds of affiliate products, etc. Want to structure it right from the get-go. And because they are not forum posts per se, I want to find the right structure now rather than redoing the work later.

 

[erich37]

do your affiliate links contain pics ?

 

[Paul B]

I'm confused because in your opening post you state:

- product 1 (forum post)

Yet then you state:

And because they are not forum posts per se

So what are they going to be?

I don't really understand what it is you're trying to do.

You basically have two options when it comes to organising: sub forums or prefixes.
If there are going to be hundreds that's a lot of forums.

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Yes, I will create pictures (with links to the direct paypal purchase link).

Brogan, right now I have each affiliate product as a post within a forum. But it's not really a post up for discussion, the affiliate products should be a collective to show all personal development category products. So this will be a growing list. I guess I could create resources posts for each affiliate product with links directly to Paypal, but the problem with that is that the price may change from the vendor side and it would be way too tedious for me to keep track of each "special" they run with affiliate products.

That's what I'm trying to figure out. There seem to be several options but I'm not sure which is the best solution for long term as this is growing and growing.

 

[Paul B]

So essentially they are going to be locked threads?

In which case you just need to decide whether to have them all in one forum or in separate sub forums.
That depends on whether there will be other threads on each product or not.

 

[Divinum Fiat]

I get what you're saying, Brogan, but I'm not even sure they are supposed to be in forums and thread format. That's what I'm trying to figure out. Should they even be in forums? Or should I create articles and use them in a library type format? I'm thinking BIG level, LONG term. Does that make sense?

 

[erich37]

- use some sort of "Media Gallery".
- put up some images and link the images to your Affiliate-ID.
- add some text-description for each image.
- done.

 

[Paul B]

The RM may well be better suited for them and from your explanation it sounds like that would be the case.

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Erich, that sounds like a simple idea, I'm using xenporta with the youtube video library. Not sure how to create a "media library." My bigger concern is the Google optimizations. Can and will Google find and rank each entry as much as if there is text?

Brogan, what is RM?

Thank you guys!

 

[Paul B]

Resource Manager.

http://xenforo.com/community/resources/

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Thank you, Brogan. I have the RM but the challenge I'm facing is that I can't enter a price because they are constantly running specials. So my price would always be incorrect (for the most part). My additional challenge in using the RM is that it always asks for the version, which is not applicable to any of my products or affiliate products.

Another challenge will be the categorizing of resources. I will have hundreds in there but I would for sure have to break them down into categories. I don't think this can be done yet, right?

My second question, however, is how Google indexes those individual resources compared to individual forum posts?

 

[erich37]

not sure why you want to post or show the "price".
Just put up the Affiliate-ID either into a Link or as a Link for an image.
Also, why do you want to link to Paypal, when you just Link to the company running the Affiliate-Program ?
I think linking directly to PayPal is a little obvious and probably counterproductive.....

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Thanks Erich. Yes, I could leave the price open. Some of the posts I wanted to run as a test and write them in a way where they would want to buy immediately, not get redirected to another sales pages one more time.

What I still don't understand is how the Google engines pick up the various entries. If I use posts in a forum the path will be ...com/forum/threads/title, which seems awfully 'buried' for Google to find an affiliate.

In other words, is a url is ...com/threads/name_of_affiliate better or ...com/resources/name_of_affiliate or even if I create a page listing all of the affiliates, ...com/pages/all_affiliates.

 

[Paul B]

Google will find and index them regardless of the URL so don't worry about it.

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Awesome, that's what I wanted to know, thanks Brogan and everyone!

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Oh, I forgot to ask a question about the resources. I can't see how many times a resource has been viewed, unlike with a post. That was another deterrent for me. Is there a way to program so that 'total views' can be shown?

 

[Paul B]

That is not currently implemented but I believe a suggestion has been made.

 

[Divinum Fiat]

Thank you, that would be great indeed.