Hubtrail FAQ's
67This hub lists frequently asked questions about hubtrails - the place that links the World in hubpages!
1. What is Hubtrails?
Hubtrails is a collection of travel hubs from around the world. They are written by many different hubbers.
2. Can I join anytime?
Yes, write a travel hub and join it to the trail.
3. I’ve already published a travel article at hubpages can I include it in hubtrails?
Yes, you can include it.
Just add the appropriate tags, RSS feed and the search engines will pick it up.
Capstone Hubtrail Hubs
4. What is a capstone hubtrail?
A capstone is a general or overview hub of a country, state or city e.g. in the United States, hubbers have written capstones for Alabama, Arizona, Florida etc.
In Europe there are capstone hubs for Paris and Ireland to name just a few.
There are country hubs for New Zealand, France and USA to name just a few.
5. Do I have to write a capstone before I can publish my hub in hubtrails?
No you don’t. However, if you have written several articles for one country, area, state or city then writing a capstone hub for them to go under is good practice.
6. How do I find out if someone else has written a capstone for my country/state?
A quick search on HubPages for the appropriate tag e.g. Hubtrail-Pennsylvania will show all hubs written for that state.
7. Where can I go for more hubtrail information?
Ohma has written an excellent hub outlining the important information for hubtrails. Ohma came up with the idea for the hubtrail.
8. Is there a world map showing hubtrail hubs?
Yes there is. Check the link here.
9. I’ve published my hubtrail, how do I get it included on the hubtrail world map?
Once your hubtrail has been published, the hubtrail map administrators will update the map.
10. Why are tags so important for hubtrails?
The Hubpages tags allows us to utilise RSS feeds of similar articles.
It is very important to include the appropriate tags so that your hub can be sorted into the correct feed. The correct tags provide the information so that your hubtrail will be picked up and featured on the websites being used to promote The Hubtrail.
Tags are Important for Hubtrail
What are the Continent tags?
10. The continent tags to use are:
- hubtrail-Asia
- hubtrail-Europe
- hubtrail-Americas
- hubtrail-Australasia (just for Australia and New Zealand)
- hubtrail-Oceania
- hubtrail-Africa
12. What is the RSS feed and why must I include this link?
An RSS feed connects your travel hubtrail to other hubtrail hubs. It will update regularly so the feed shown on your hubtrail will change automatically.
There are two RSS URL feeds you can include in your hubtrail hub.
- One is for hot travel hubs and the link is http://hubpages.com/tag/HubTrail/hot/?rss
- The other is for best travel hubs and the link is http://hubpages.com/tag/HubTrail/best/?rss
You choose just one. Set the number of RSS feeds to 8, and the change the display just the first message.
RSS feeds also creates backlinks for other articles on your page. They are updated frequently.
And finally.....
If you found this hub useful, please rate it up and pass it on to others. Writers love feedback so comments are always appreciated.
If you have any other hubtrail questions, please just ask and I will try to answer them. Thank you.
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Glad you think it will help others Cags. Thanks for your comment and also for bookmarking it.
rated as very useful, it has everything one needs to know to start "hubtrailing".
Fantastic Princessa. I'm glad you think the Hubtrail FAQ's will be useful to users - thank you so much.
Very useful hub.Gives good information for anyone with travel hubs.
I'm glad you think this will be helpful to those with travel hubs selrach. Cheers.
This hub was fun. I enjoyed the information. Thanks.
Wonderful explanation on travel hubs.
Sandyspider - I appreciate your comment - thanks for stopping by.
I've seen so much spread all over HubPages about this project,and this makes everything crystal clear!!
If I may make a suggestion? A list of the "official" continent tags would be a great help! I'm sure it's available elsewhere, but this hub is a great "one-stop shop" and I think it would be a nice addition...
Great job :D
Thanks for your comments Edweirdo. I appreciate that you think its made everything crystal clear!
I also think your suggestion is an excellent one. The cascade effect of continents (other than Europe and the USA) make it a little difficult but I'll look into how I can communicate that simply.
Worldtraveler - I like that you found the information helpful. Thanks for your comment.
Re: Continents
Which is correct? "hubrail-americas", "hubtrail-north america","hubtrail-south america"?
And Oceania - "hubtrail-oceania","hubtrail-australasia","hubtrail-australia-new zealand"??
It's just a bit confusing knowing which to use once we get beyond the obvious Europe, Asia, Africa...
Not that it's your duty to figure this out ;)
Just wondered if you knew better than I do which ones are preferred...
Re Continents. There are a few definitions of what is a continent. However, Hubpages uses six - Africa, Asia, Europe, Oceania, South America and North America.
The answer to your question will depend upon what you are writing about. I am not sure why some people are tagging their hubs "americas" but maybe that's one of their keywords. Its not used in the categorisation of Hubpages.
When I write about New Zealand - I select Oceania, Australasia (NOT Australia) then New Zealand. After the Oceania level there are other choices which can be made. Instead of choosing Australasia, the other choices are Melanesia, Micronesia or Polynesia - these would direct writers to other countries.
If its for the hubtrail project you certainly want to include that tag.
I'm not sure if this is even more confusing. Why don't you post a comment here about what you are writing and I'll try to help - if I can!
Thanks travel! You seem to be going in the same direction that I am!
So here are examples: I have 3 hubs about USA travel, and one of them includes a road trip to Alaska, which means it covers USA and Canada. So I used the tag "hubtrail-americas" because I saw that others were doing so. I also used hubtrail-usa" and "hubtrail-canada". That lead to the question, Is there a "hubtrails-north-america" tag?
Similarly, I have hubs about Australia and New Zealand. NZ is not part of the continent of Australia, so is it considered "hubtrail-austalasia", "hubtril-oceania", hubtrail-oceania-austrlaia-new-zealand"?
It just seems sort of random and disorganized (but that may just be my own ignorance shining through!)
If I understand properly, the whole point of the tags is to create RSS feeds to link related hubs together. In that case, the correct tag usage is essential. If I write about NZ and use "hubtrail-australasia" and someone else uses "hubtrail-oceania" then the relationship of those two hubs will never be realized...
That was the point behind my question: Is there a consistent set of "official" continent tags that we all should use? Because once you get beyond the obvious ones like Europe, Asia, Africa, it gets blurry!
Now I hope I haven't confused the issue ;)
I posted the answer to this in the forum thread for Hubtrail. If it matters. :/
I'm confused why you would need a tag called "hubtrail-oceania-australia-new-zealand". You would need far more tags if you use that system. Far better to have a separate tag for the continent, a separate tag for the country and a separate tag for the city/location.
Yes Marisa. Actually the tag is hubtrail-australASIA and NOT australia!
I'm about to alter the graphic after our discussions via email this morning.
If you like, check it out again in an hour but I'm on the way to the airport so I may not get it done in time!
Thanks for your suggestions.
thanks, great explanation. Ive been doing a capstone for australia.. and hope it works out ok .. its the competition that makes me a little nervous.
Good news Salt and I'm happy these FAQ's were helpful. Don't be nervous about the competition there are many opportunities for us all here. The more the merrier on hubtrails. Welcome!
Thanks for the FAQ. I had a few questions about hubtrail that were answered in the comments.
I'm glad that your questions about hubtrail were answered here NS. Thanks for commenting. Welcome to hubtrail.
Great summary Travel! I've been a bit confused (yea, some friends would say - what else is new?!?) but this has helped. Been wondering about all the sites, and now I can go and check them out for my hubs. Rated you up, up, up! Have a great weekend!! :)
Cheers for the "up" rating. Good that this helped and happy browsing the other sites listed!
@travelespresso, I just noticed something. Both your and Ohma's Hubs say that only Capstone Hubs can use the continent tag. That means only Capstone Hubs will be listed on my website, because I only use the RSS feeds from the continents.
It may be that putting the continent tag on everyone's Hubs will stuff up the other websites (like Ohma's and Haunty's). I suggest you have a chat to Ohma and work it out. It's not really anything to do with me - as it turns out, I haven't been involved in Hubtrails at all, I just set up the website to give you backlinks.
Also, having tags or not will make no difference to getting picked up by search engines.
Thanks Marisa. I'll go back to Ohma regarding capstones and continent tags as I changed this at her request. I too did this to help clarify some issues with many questions in forums. It seems to have gone some way to doing that but there's still the odd glitch here and there.
We all appreciate that your site gives every hubtrail hub a backlink.
Very interesting, and a good idea. I have a few travel hubs that I think I'll try to add to the trail.
Come aboard Paraglider. Hubtrail is a really good way to get the word out on your travel hubs.
I am still quite new to hubpages, I have just started writing my first hubs about the places I love to visit. Thanks to the encouragement of Ethel Smith on hubpages, I have now found this helpful hub and am on my way to see if I can implement the advice - try to insert an RSS feed capsule into my hub, plus the tags!! Thanks again so much.
Alison if you need any more help, ask via the forums or leave a comment here and I'll try to answer it. We're all learning here!
This is great although am late for the hubtrail but am joining since I have some hubs on travel and writing some
There's no time limit on Hubtrail hubs oderog. If you have travel hubs just add the right tags and they will join the hubtrail!
Hi there, just wondering if you clarified with Ohma and that the tag hierarchy is correct?
If so, please correct the reference to my website because the ONLY Hubs that will be picked up by my feeds are the capstones - I use the continent tag.
It would be a good idea to change your illustration because it shows a tag with several hyphenated together, which conflicts with your advice below it.
I love this idea! I'm going to tag some of my travel hubs and create some new ones for the trail. Do you need to have a capstone hub for every area you write about? Is it basically a general hub about the place?The capstone hub part is still a bit fuzzy.
Yes, the hubtrail is a great idea. No you don't need a capstone as other people may have already written one but some of the promotional sites for hubtrail only recognise the continent tags (used for capstones).
A capstone is a general hub about the place. It's probably confusing because the instructions have changed as this project evolves and we are all still learning!
Thanks for commenting and I'll look forward to seeing you on the hubtrails!
Hello Marisa - I'll send another email and copy you in it.
I think what you are saying is your site will only pick up those hubs with the continent tags (as listed in the FAQ's) and the only hubs with the continent tag should be the capstones.
I have made a few changes to the FAQ's including the reference to your site so I'd appreciate it if you'd check it again.
Thanks for your comment.
Thanks for this really helpful hub travelespresso. Thanks to you I am now able to link up some of my hubs to the hubtrail.
Glad you can join us on the hubtrail! Thanks for your special comment.
very helpful...thanks for that. I've added the rss feed and correct tags to a few of my hubs (months ago) and yet still none appear on the hubtrails or any of the other backlinked site... what am i doing wrong? any ideas?
I've read a few of your travel hubs JDW and I've gone to a couple of the backlink sites - Marisa's and Haunty's to see if I can work out the problem. For example, your Sagres Portugal hub has the tags hubtrail Europe and hubtrail Portugal.
Your Sagres hub is showing on Haunty's site but not on Marisa's. I think the reason its not showing on Marisa's is that she hasn't shown Portugal as an option under Europe. Perhaps you could email her and ask if she can add it.
It's my understanding that you also need the standalone tag of "hubtrail".
If you want your hubs to show up on the UrbanChaos Wiki site then you need to follow the instructions he's given on the site. To be honest, that's something I still need to do too!
Hope this helps!
An excellent hub travelespresso. Apologies if this question has already been asked in the comments but there are so many comments here it would take me days to go through all of them. My question is, can you include things such as hotel reviews in the hubtrail, or has it got to be directly related to actual holiday destinations? For instance, if I want to write a review on a specific hotel from a well known chain (that I stayed in whilst on holiday in Egypt), can I add that to the hubtrail? Thanks in advance for your answer.
I think that a hotel review is directly related to travel and the "travel experience" so its fine to include it in hubtrail! Thanks for your comments and I'm glad you found the information helpful.
Thanks for this, I reckon I might give it a go then as I have been intending to write it for a long time.
Go for it MH!
Bumping this as it's half way through the September hmts contest - and the hubtrails fits in with that perfectly.
I've spent today boning up on this, adding tags to my hubs already published and checking they're working. All seems OK, I've got one question but I'll leave that and see if I can figure it out myself.
Good backlinking opportunity.
Cheers
Great to have you aboard hubtrails and you are so right, this is an easy backlinking opportunity. Thanks for your comment CornwallUK.
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Cagsil Level 7 Commenter 2 years ago
A Great Hub Travel. No pun intended LOL! This will be of great help to others and you(&Ohma) did a wonderful collaboration on it. Excellently done! :)