XMF ID?

[Dean]

the intention was never to retain thie current name as it was seen
as too close to the crippled (apparently permanent) .com forerunner.

Can I make a comment on this. For fear of loosing members again, would it not be best to keep using the address we now have?

My thoughts too Robert, it would knock us off the radar of search engines for a while too would it not?, see what Ciaran says.

D

[ex-em]

This is where I got to with the .co.uk sticker/banner and I have a slightly
different forum banner too (when I find it);



Ciarán is the man to discuss this with; the intention was never to retain thie current name as it was seen
as too close to the crippled (apparently permanent) .com forerunner.

Andrew

tahts a really good looking sticker, would suit any colour xm !!! i think we should keep the current name.

[xmexclusive]

Hi All

Lots of concerns expressed here that would be considered before any move was made.
Search engines build their ratings on relevant hits.
With the original and our current name the only bit that the search engines latch onto is "XM".
Current members will always know where to find us whatever we do with the name.
Potential members and information seekers are much more likely to use a few more search words.
Typically "Citroen XM" or "Citroen Cars" are more likely to be used by individuals looking for XM information.
The more key search words in the title that are regularly repeated in the site text the higher the search machine ranking.
Some key words can get negative search ranking and I believe "Club-X" falls in that category.
Most of our current seach ranking has been generated by our content not our title.
It is worth mentioning that .com sites always search rank higher than .co.uk with search engines.
If Club-XM.com comes back live we will quickly become second rank.
If we do name change then we should keep the old name up and running as a web page that links directly to the new one.

John

[andmcit]

If we do name change then we should leave keep the old name up and running
as a web page that links directly to the new one.

John, a decent web man will make the selection a seamless jump in less than a blink of an eye;
anyone here bank with www.abbey.com, er I mean Santander?

Andrew

[andmcit]

Just out of interest, I tried Googling "citroen xm" and got this:


No sign of the .co.uk version

and "citroen xm help" got this:


although "Citroen xm forum" does find us here:




Andrew

[minijet]

.
Seems to me that all you need to do is somehow incorporate the word 'wikipedia' into the name of your website you'll always come up first on any web search.

anyone here bank with http://www.abbey.com, er I mean Santander?

Not any more!

Paul

.

[Ciaran]

Hi guys,

A few very valid points raised here. Regarding the potential namechange, this will be resolved in the next few months, one way or the other. I can't go into specific detail at the moment but will explain everything when we know more about the potetial outcome, not meaning to be cryptic, it really isn't as exciting as it sounds

Rest assured, if a name change does take place, the current URL will be kept live, and any visitors to it will be directed seamlessly to the new URL, whatever that may be.

John hit on a good point about the search engine ranking, which is something we definitely need to address, pending outcome of the above.

Regarding stickers etc, I'm all for them, and loved the ones Andrew designed previously. If anyone wants to make / order some, please don't feel you need my permission or anything else, and the 'www.club-xm.co.uk' URL will continue to work regardless of whether the site name changes in the future.

Ciarán

[Dieselman]

Just my 2p.

Club-xm.co.uk works well and is descriptive of the club and since club-xm.com doesn't look like being revived why bother changing it? I guess Noz hasn't shown any dislike of club-xm.co.uk

[ex-em]

This is where I got to with the .co.uk sticker/banner and I have a slightly
different forum banner too (when I find it);



Ciarán is the man to discuss this with; the intention was never to retain thie current name as it was seen
as too close to the crippled (apparently permanent) .com forerunner.

Andrew

hi andrew, any joy with making the stickers?

[andmcit]

I can get some up to date quotes on a rear screen sticker that'd be the size it's displayed on my screen here at 270(ish) mm.
Mind, this isn't purely my 'show' - I just contributed an idea as it's what I do for my day job and I like Citroens! If there are
differing ideas/designs from anyone else great - Phil has offered to make a proposal and I don't want to appear this isn't an
open discussion - one thing I've learned in my work is that different designers can have a massively different idea/design with
the exact same information and there is no right and no wrong and a choice is usually down to a purely subjective opinion from
the client or mass vote...

Andrew