Topic: portals

[DWFII]

Probably a dumb question but...


What is a portal and why do I need one? Or do I?

[Gluz]

A portal is the front page of your site, if your forum is in your rood directory then you can see that it enter directly to the boards, but with a portal, you can build some front page with information, news, articles and much more.

Do you need one? If you are good with how your front page looks, probably not, but if you want to add some information to it, then maybe a portal will be useful to you.

[DWFII]

^ Thank you.

[FractalFrank]

Instead of starting a new thread I'll catch on here:

I'm in a heavy discussion to start use a portal with my admin-partner.
He says that a portal "hijacks the index.php" and that this is bad for so many reasons, be it SEO, be it the different url for the forum index, but mainly:

I had no issues with the portal until I saw it removed the forum from the index page.

That is no way to design a site.
That is such a basic element of web design that I'm shocked you would even consider it.

It is so wrong it is 100% unacceptable in my book. It doesn't need further explanation.

so is this really as bad as he puts it?
He keeps repeating that it is, without bringing proper arguments to back up his opinion.

Some input from experienced users would be very helpful.

Thanks a lot!

[Arantor]

No, it really isn't.

Google largely doesn't care any more about that, besides you'd still be linking prominent new content on the front page, and since there is a forum tab, all the content is still discoverable.

And all of this debate pales into insignificance when you realise that Google strongly dislikes user generated content, like forums, because people don't write juicy organised SEO-ful posts in the first place.

[lurkalot]

I would also say, it depends on how you use the portal, I mean if you just want to add a few blocks top / bottom, or either side of the existing forum, plus add all the other features that come with it, then the url will be the same anyway.

I you use it as a front page then the forum url changes.  Basically, you don't have to have a separate front page to use a portal. 

[Shambles]

I care more about what my members see, than what Google's algorithms prefer.

My simple portal gives visitors a perfect flavour of what's lurking inside, and as we're a subscription-free website we couldn't care a hoot if that puts us down the rankings.

[Arantor]

It also depends on how you grow your member base - or even whether you care about growing your member base - as to whether you need to care about Google.

[FractalFrank]

Thanks for your input!
I tried to explain the seo point to him already - good to see you saying the same.

Are there any other issues/problems that result from using a portal as the home site?
He basically insists hat you "just don't do that in webdesign" without backing that opinion up.

The reason I want to use the portal (adk) is to get a (collapsable) sidebar on the left with some additional controls, and most important, it solves my "recent topics" problem perfectly.

That recent topics list now shows at home. But at the "cost of moving the forum index to index.php?action=forum

I haven't found a possibilty in ADK to keep the front page untouched while adding the recent topics list on a seperate site or the sidebar on other pages.

[feline]

There is a lot of other Portals they have a "Block" to show a short "recent-topics" list on a Sidebar, so you must not use a Frontpage. I don't known if ADK that have .. but our Potal have it ..

Fel

[lurkalot]

Just coming back to this. 

Remember, you don't have to use a portal as a portal, it can be useful just for adding other features to your forum, such as a downloads system, shoutbox to your forum, or adding extra pages or articles.  And for adding things like adsense etc.  Or a sidebar to the forum.  You don't have to use a front page at all.

[aegersz]

It also depends on how you grow your member base - or even whether you care about growing your member base - as to whether you need to care about Google.

I use AWSTATS to monitor the search phrases and keywords that lead people to my site. some of those are completely over the top and bizarre.

I do care about Google otherwise people wouldn't find us ... membership rates are erratic but steady with close to 2000 members.

[lostpathway]

Sounds like you're mostly having an issue with your co-worker, but even if you get a few more clicks from google, what about the actual retention/capture rate of those users? A more fully-featured and good-looking site would presumably keep more of those users.