Forum:CT Archive/Main page pagetitle

I'm working on some projects to raise the Google ranking for all of Wikia's wikis -- we have a lot of amazing stuff, and it's not showing up where it should in the search results. It might not seem that important at first, but 50% of the people who come to Wookieepedia are coming in from Google searches. About 25% of people use bookmarks or type the address into their browser, and about 10% come from Wikipedia links. Google is by far the #1 way to attract new readers, which means new contributors and a stronger community.

Until recently, on a search for star wars, Wookieepedia was coming up as #26 -- the third page of results. We've done some back-end work that's helped quite a bit, and now it's up to #13.

That's nice, but it's still on the second page, and it's under some stuff that's just ridiculous -- like "Star Wars ASCIImation" and "Star Wars in 30 seconds with bunnies". Wookieepedia should be in the top 10 when people are looking for information about Star Wars.

There are a couple reasons why those are above Wookieepedia right now -- people link to those pages using the phrase "Star Wars", and those pages have "Star Wars" as the first words in the pagetitle. Google pays a lot of attention to the pagetitle -- the theory is that if "Star Wars" is important to the website, then it should be at the front of the title.

So I'd like to propose an experiment, to see if we can raise the Google ranking. For two weeks, I'd like to change the pagetitle on the main page to say "Star Wars Wiki - Wookieepedia", instead of "Wookieepedia, the Star Wars wiki". This will only affect the main page -- every other page will still say "Wookieepedia, the Star Wars wiki". I'd like to try it for two weeks, to see if the ranking goes up significantly. If it doesn't, then we can forget the whole thing. If it does, then we can talk about whether it's worth doing permanently.

I know that people love the name Wookieepedia, and identify really strongly with it. I love it too, and I'm not trying to get rid of it. I'm just trying to come up with a way to respect the name, and still raise the profile of the wiki so that we can continue to bring in new contributors and build up the community.

What do you guys think? -- Danny (talk ) 17:44, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * To clarify, are you talking about the title at the top of the browser window or MediaWiki:Pagetitle (or are these one and the same)? The way we've designed the main page, Pagetitle is essentially hidden beneath the other content right now, so it shouldn't really matter to anyone what it says. Btw, it looks to me like we're #6 in Google results. —Xwing328 (Talk) 18:07, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Those are the same -- MediaWiki:Pagetitle controls what's at the top of the browser window. You may be thinking about MediaWiki:Mainpage, which is the title for the main page. So, yeah -- we're talking about the same thing. I'm glad you're seeing it as #6 -- Google servers show different results as they catch up to changes. #6 would be great -- I'm still seeing #13 here. -- Danny (talk ) 18:44, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for clarifying. —Xwing328 (Talk) 19:13, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Voting
It seems like a waste of time to me to run a CT for 2+ weeks deciding whether or not to test something for 2 weeks, but that's what us admins have apparently decided to do. —Xwing328 (Talk) 19:13, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Part 1, Testing
If approved, we will switch the text at MediaWiki:Pagetitle from Wookieepedia, the Star Wars Wiki to Star Wars Wiki - Wookieepedia. This will only affect what you see at the top of your browser when visiting Wookieepedia and what search engines display if Wookieepedia is one of your search results.

Allow 2-week testing

 * 1) —Xwing328 (Talk) 19:14, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Part 2, Implementation - This vote is not yet open!
Assuming testing proceeds and Wikia deems the test successful, this vote will decide whether or not to keep the new text at MediaWiki:Pagetitle.

Discussion
If you look at search results for star wars, almost everything that comes up besides us starts with the words Star Wars. It makes ours stick out a bit being unique, starting with Wookieepedia. If these other changes you all at wikia have made improve our ranking to at least #6 without having to change the title, I personally would be happy with that ranking. —Xwing328 (Talk) 19:13, 2 June 2008 (UTC)