Credit: Bocavelhma
Yahoo! Because We've Got You Too
Yahoo answers is a great resource for Q&A when you just can't seem to find the information you're looking for. Aside from authority sites such as Wikipedia or dedicated niche forums, where else can you find out how to make falafel the egyptian way? Obscure perhaps, but potent? Surely! When used appropriately Yahoo Answers can be the hub of piggybacking long tail searches to your own niche site.
The Requirements
- Thy site must have quality content and reasonably attractive/usable design
- Thou must observe the Social Media Optimization laws of linkable content ( Pictures, Scannable Text, Viral Content)
- Thy site must be completely relevant to the Yahoo Answers page linking to it.
Let's Begin
- Find a Need - Search Yahoo Answers for open questions that are of interest to you. You may use several criteria to selectively choose which questions to answer and which one's to avoid. In my opinion, a niche with medium competition and an affiliate program to boot works the best!
- Address the Need - Don't spam the answers by any means. As a Social Media Citizen, you're obligated to enhancing the collective user experience first, and then meeting your own needs. Luckily for us, it's completely feasible to serve both needs and create a win-win situation for those that seek our answers, and for we who provide them.
- Call To Action - The answer is only the bait my friend 🙂 . In the grander scheme of things Yahoo Answers is only meant to be an entry point that leads to your network of pure information goodness.
The Results
- You just leveraged a high authority site to create a win-win situation for yourself and those that seek the information you provide. Go give yourself a pat on the back!
- Within a week's time, you'll be beating the rest of your competitors for the same long tail search phrase because they simply cannot compete with Yahoo Answer's ranking.
- You thank me because you can now rank for 'the best entry level motorcycle' for the 17 year old looking to buy their first bike and your e-commerce site fits the bill
Good luck in conquering those long-tail searches folks!
Yes, Yahoo Answers is OK, however I don’t like the Points system. I racked up tons of points and my “reward” was a downloadable Yahoo! Screensaver. No thanks…
I racked up 5 million points on Yahoo! Answers and I’ll I got was this lousy T-shirt.
No, I actually do like Yahoo and LinkedIn Answers. Great advice in this post. Thanks
@ Dara – To each their own I suppose! I agree that it might not be as lucractive for a community member to contribute to Yahoo Answers, but as an SEO, I simply aim to piggyback off their authority site to rank for certain keywords 🙂
@ Jordan – Thanks for the comment mate! Glad you liked the post 🙂
Interesting post. I guess you need to be a bit selective with your posts though. Long tail terms can be so niche that they will only ever be searched for by a few people.