SEO help please

[Cowboy Denny]

When I was with Wordpress I didn't even have to try to get a great Web Search Presence since there are many SEO WP friendly plugins but of course the rest of it is slow and clunky and expensive.

With Invision Community (which I love and have several sites built on) I have almost zero web search presence.  Now I'm not genius or expert web developer but it's a hobby, not a business (kinda) and I'm always learning.

I like to try and solve issues myself (yea I'm that guy that doesn't like to ask for help) but scouring the internet for anything to do with SEO and Invision Community I only find one article really and thats the Help Guide for SEO on Invision Community that doesn't help me at all.

Now I know Invision Community works very well and has SEO since the company's site pops up all over Google (which is AWESOME!) but in my attempt to figure this out myself I'm even more confused.  Below I'm posting a picture or two to help explain my confusion since I'm not sure how else to explain it.

 

This is a working example using Invision Community Blog Post

 

This is real world use of my site which I would love to have at least the above results happening

 

Again, it could be something I'm not doing correctly or something is misconfigured which is why I'm posting this in the HELP section.  Not complaining, just want to know how to get SEO to work correctly.

I have clicked on: ACP -> System ->Site Promotion -> Search Engine Optimization

• Friendly URLs (all three are turned on and yes the .htaccess has been uploaded)
• Sitemap (Use recommended settings? enabled)
• Meta Tags:
  • I've clicked Rebuild Sitemap
  • Clicked Add Meta Tags but I'll be honest, not sure what to do so I followed the hint which is use Live Meta Tag Editor
  • I clicked on Launch Live Meta Tag Editor and it just brings me to the homepage of my site but I have no idea what the expectation is... maybe this is my issue.  Examples would be awesome if anyone has any.
• Crawl Management: Invision Community optimized

 

Currently running: Invision Community v4.6.12.1

Any help, direction to get some google presence without paying these companies a bunch of money for something that I feel should be simple would be MUCH appreciated.

Thank You in Advance

[opentype]

The IPS blog isn’t created with the blog app. That’s why there might be differences in the appearance. 

But I wouldn’t worry about those. Search results are about relevance, not about some “seo magic” in the background. (No matter what SEO plugins promise.) If you want to optimize something, make sure the titles reflect what people might search for and make sure that people will link to your page and your content. Building that up might take years though. 

[Cowboy Denny]

I think I got closer with the Live Meta Tag Editor but still at a loss

If you keep scrolling down on the bar on the right you will see the below options and my comments and questions if anyone might have an answer I appreciate it.

[Jim M]

31 minutes ago, DJ ZAh said:

Meta Tags:

• I've clicked Rebuild Sitemap
• Clicked Add Meta Tags but I'll be honest, not sure what to do so I followed the hint which is use Live Meta Tag Editor
• I clicked on Launch Live Meta Tag Editor and it just brings me to the homepage of my site but I have no idea what the expectation is... maybe this is my issue.  Examples would be awesome if anyone has any.

 

If you are unsure what meta tags are or what to do with them, I would not advise messing with them. The software is optimized with meta tags in mind that search engines and social media sites use and we're always evaluating and updating everything SEO-wise. Keeping the default meta tags will provide you the best results, unless you're explicitly trying to do something.

Like @opentype said, content is king. Make sure your content matches the searches that your users will be searching for.

8 minutes ago, DJ ZAh said:

I think I got closer with the Live Meta Tag Editor but still at a loss

If you keep scrolling down on the bar on the right you will see the below options and my comments and questions if anyone might have an answer I appreciate it.

Tags prefixed with "og:" are related to Open Graph. This is used by external sites to grab information about the page to embed. I.E. when you share a URL on Facebook, you get that embed with a title, image, etc... This is what controls that.

Changing these would not be advised unless you have something explicitly in mind.