Ask Enquiro » Yahoo

What the Yahoo/Bing Merger Means for SEO

Charlotte Bourne — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 18:02:03 +0000

Yahoo! and Bing announced their intentions to merge in mid-2009 and that transition is starting to come to fruition. As of June, comScore reported that 64% of searches occur on Google, 18% on Yahoo! and 12% on Bing. Assuming no one migrates from Yahoo! to Google after the transition, Bing will be powering 30% of all search results in the U.S. Yahoo! confirmed last week that they are starting to conduct systems integration testing with Bing, though if recent ranking results from Yahoo! are any indication, there has been algorithm testing taking place for the past couple of months. Systems integration testing is expected to take place in June and July with the actual transition to Bing results taking place in August and September (the PPC transition is operating on a slightly different timeline). If there are any problems, Yahoo! will pause integration during November and December as those are critical months for online retailers who could see a impact on their bottom line if there were major changes in organic search results driving traffic to their sites. While Yahoo! search results will be powered by Bing, it should be noted that the Yahoo! user interface will not be changing and will not show the same related search results, quick tabs, and categories that Bing does.

The web crawler that fuels Bing’s search results will also be changing. As of October 1, MSNbot 2.0 will be replaced by “Bingbot”, which is currently being tested. For websites that have a crawl exclusion set up in their robots.txt file, Bing has said that the Bingbot will follow exclusions set up for the previous MSNbot – no change is required to the robots.txt file by webmasters though eventually you will want to have this updated. If you have directives in your robots.txt for both MSNbot and Bingbot, the new Bingbot will ignore directives for MSNbot and only follow directives for Bingbot, so make sure you don’t have conflicting information for the two different bots as different directives won’t both be followed.

The basics of SEO optimization are the same for Google and Bing: original content with targeted keywords, quality links, and well designed, cleanly coded sites. There are some differences in the Google and Bing user interfaces – Google’s blended results versus Bing’s related search results, quick tabs and categories – which means there are some different tactics for optimizing for some of the ‘finer details’ of SEO. If you don’t already have your website set up in Bing Webmaster Tools, you should make sure your site is set up and there are no crawl errors occurring that would prevent your site from being indexed or ranking well. I’ve noticed that Bing’s geotargeting can sometimes be off for foreign sites, so make sure Bing correctly recognizes the country and language your site is targeted to. If you are wondering how well you will do on the new Yahoo! search results page, check your current Bing rankings as these will be similar once the transition is complete.

Changing the Game of Search

admin — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 21:23:19 +0000

Enquiro’s CEO, Gord Hotchkiss, was recently interviewed about the evolution of Search by Byron Gordon of SEO-PR. The video interview had very convenient timing as it was released just days before the official announcement of the Yahoo/Microsoft search deal.

A regular speaker at industry events and contributor to Media Post, Search Engine Land, and AskEnquiro, Gord has not shied away from voicing his opinions on the need for another dominant search engine. He challenges the engines to rely less on static technological advances to gain market share, and points out how neurology, psychology, and usability affects habits related to choosing a search engine.

“We need an arms race in search,” Gord states. “Search habits only change if there is a huge reason to do so.”
Gord goes on to discuss Microsoft’s attempt to acquire more of the search engine market share with the release of Bing. “The bar must be raised to a point where someone would never think of going back to Google [when performing a search] because the experience was so much better.” He questions Microsoft’s current advertising campaign as promising something that has not quite been attained, “If you use Bing you’ll have a good search experience, but you won’t have an amazing search experience that will make you go ‘Wow, I’m never going to use Google again’ and that’s what it’s going to take to change the game of search.”

The Ebbs and Flows of Market Share

Gord Hotchkiss — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 17:29:57 +0000

It’s been just over 6 weeks since the birth of Bing. While I didn’t actually say Microsoft’s new search baby was ugly, I was less than optimistic about it’s chances of unseating Google in a popularity contest. So, with every measurement panel carefully following Bing’s debut, I think it’s time to see just how little engine is doing in the search (oops, make that “decision”) sandbox.

Let the Record Show

First of all, much acrimonious commentary has been attributed to me about Bing. I just want to say I never said Bing was a failure, a bad search engine or a step backwards on Microsoft’s part. I simply said Bing would not break the Google Habit, despite 100 million dollars of advertising. In fact, here’s exactly what I said would happen. Driven by the advertising, people would temporarily disrupt the playing out of their habitual Google script, try Bing and find that it wasn’t all that different from using Google, better in some ways, worse in others. Without having a compelling reason to consciously break the Google Habit (which is hard cognitive work) they would just go back on autopilot and continue to use Google. A temporary blip upwards for Bing would soon disappear, at roughly the same time as Microsoft’s $100 million ad budget, and we would all go back to mindlessly Googling what we’re looking for.

Survey Says…

So, what’s happening in terms of market share? Well, the various numbers seem to show that Bing has gained a small uptick in market share (the exact amount is difficult to determine, but Compete puts it at a 0.3% gain in share), Google’s up as well, by about half a percentage point, and Yahoo! and Ask are both losing ground in what seems to be an irreversible death spiral. If you just look at the Google and Bing numbers, the words “I told you so” naturally spring to mind. And this is still with the $100 million tap fully open. Google could come out of this with the biggest net gain, paid for by Microsoft’s ad budget.

But the story gets much more interesting, and more compelling for Microsoft, if you look at what’s happening with Yahoo! and Ask. This is something I didn’t think about in my original forecast, but the logic seems clear in hindsight.

26% Still Up for Grabs

When Bing debuted, there was a 26.7% percent of the US search market not owned by Google, again according to Compete. At the end of June, that shrunk to 26.1%. And that’s the share that Microsoft should be paying close attention to. Don’t worry about breaking the Google Habit. Concentrate on picking off the weaker contenders. And right now, when it comes to search, Yahoo! and Ask are lying limp and lifeless on the side of the road, easy pickin’s for a Bing drive-by. In the past year, Yahoo is down in market share by almost 3 and a half points, and Ask is off by a full point. All of this has gone to Google, plus some. They’re up almost 10 full share points in the past year.

Is Google Domination Inevitable?

If these are the trends, is it inevitable that Google will eventually own the entire search market? No, because we always like alternatives. We get nervous when there is a de facto monopoly, we’ll keep even a weak contender on life support just to give us an alternative. At the height of the Window’s OS dynasty, Mac still managed to hold onto 4.5% of the market and Linux 0.5%. Since then, Mac has come back to take almost 9% of the market and Linux almost a full point (according to Net Applications).

That’s the other thing to remember about humans. If we have a viable underdog, we’ll throw it more than its fair share of support. Case in point: the browser wars. In 2004, Explorer owned 91.35% of the market. The fledgling Firefox was their biggest competitor, at 3.66%. But over the past 5 years, the balance had shifted decidedly in Firefox’s favor: 65.85% for Explorer vs 22.39% for Firefox. The fact that Firefox improved their product at a much more aggressive rate than Microsoft didn’t hurt either.

I believe Google is getting very close to its natural market share cap. And the stronger the alternatives, the lower that cap will be. Yahoo! and Ask have lost their appetite for competing in the search arena, but Microsoft has a viable contender in Bing. I still don’t expect it to break a Google habit, but it could well become our number one alternative when we’re ready for an occasional break from our habitual search rut.

How ironic! Microsoft’s Bing playing the White Knight to Google’s Evil Empire!

Originally published in Mediapost’s Search Insider July 16th 2009

Yahoo Day Parting Has Arrived!

Kyle Grant — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:02:40 +0000

Without much fanfare or publication, Yahoo has released its day parting and demographic targeting technologies. This is a great stride forward for Yahoo and, until now, has been a pain for many search marketers advertising on Yahoo. Yahoo now joins the ranks of the other major Search Engines (Google, Microsoft Live Search, and ASK) with offering a greater level of sophisticated targeting tools to help advertisers eliminate wasted advertising dollars.

We have been working quite closely with our Yahoo Representatives who have been up until this point been assisting with manually day parting our clients’ campaigns. With Yahoo we have seen, through the implementation of manual day parting, an increase on Return on Investment of over 300% by only running ads within the hours when our target market has proven to be online. With a now automated system for advertisers to implement day parting on campaigns we can all now enjoy even greater control over campaigns and optimization best practices. This technology is of specific assistance to B2B marketers who are primarily targeting persons during work hours.

Here are some screenshots of the Day Parting Interface:

On the Campaign-Level view of the Yahoo UI, day parting can be easily seen through the incorporation of these icons beside your campaign names:

To access the day parting controls, enter into your campaign settings. On the right side of the page, you will see your settings for demographic targeting, geo-targeting, and day parting. Simply click edit and the pop-over appears as the following image depicts to edit the day parting.

Simply, click on the day and the controls for editing the day parting settings will appear.

Click save and you are done.

This is a great new functionality to Yahoo and we are excited to be able to expand day parting for all of our clients to further achieve our campaign goals.

Thanks Yahoo!

To Google’s Competitors: Please, this Year, Do Something Amazing!

Gord Hotchkiss — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 18:10:08 +0000

A month ago yesterday, I was on stage in Park City, Utah at the Search Insider Summit with Danny Sullivan, Jeff Pruitt (SEMPO President/iCrossing) and John Tawadros (iProspect) talking about Google’s domination of the search space. Both Danny and I took Microsoft and Yahoo! to task for not mounting a more significant challenge to Google’s dominance. It could be my imagination, but it seemed that for the rest of the Summit, I felt a bit of a chill in the air between myself and the Yahoo! and Microsoft reps that ventured to Park City. I suspect the feeling was that as the emcee and moderator, I should have been less opinionated and more neutral. Fair enough, I guess, considering the root of the word moderator. But, with my first column of the New Year, I felt I should clear the air a little bit.

I Like You, I Really Like You…

Really, Microsoft and Yahoo!, I don’t hate you. You frustrate the hell out of me, but I certainly don’t hate you. I root for you constantly. I’ve always been an “underdog” kind of guy. Anything I mentioned on stage in Park City I’ve said directly to your respective development teams in Sunnyvale (Yahoo!) and Redmond (Microsoft). I’ll tell anyone that listens. Ad nauseum, so I’ve been told. In a recent post, Danny Sullivan called it tough love (http://searchengineland.com/tough-love-for-microsoft-search-15968). Danny and I have talked about this and we both really, really want you to succeed. But as much as I’ve tried to give helpful advice, the right people don’t seem to be listening.

Here’s the thing. I love search. I love its potential. I love the way it makes me more functional and sound smarter and better informed. Yet I know we’ve barely scratched the surface. There is so much more to come, but we need to get there as fast as possible. The only way to do that is to have a more competitive market. Google needs to have someone constantly breathing down their neck. The current market domination isn’t good for anyone, especially not the user. I suspect the engineers (not the bean counters) at Google even feel the same way. We need an arms race in Search. Right now, it’s like the US taking on Canada and Iceland (as a Canadian, I can say that). So when I say pull up your socks and take search seriously, I mean it with love.

Bottom Up is the Way to Go

In Danny’s post, he nicely outlines the symptoms of malaise at Microsoft. And lord knows everyone and their dog has been piling on the bash – Yahoo! bandwagon in the last few months, so I won’t go there. The problem, as I see it, is that there’s a gap a mile wide between the top and bottom in both organizations. The result is a dysfunctional culture. The front lines at both organizations desperately want to do something significant in search, but they’re hamstrung by a lack of clear strategic focus from the top. Microsoft is locked in a product development mindset that squeezes anything amazing out before it can even make it to beta. Yahoo! is trying to walk an impossible tight rope, tweaking the user experience while at the same time squeezing as much money as possible out of the search page.

To do something amazing in search, both organizations have to start at the foundation, the user, and rebuild from the ground up. What I would like to see is an approach taken by Intel and Apple in the past, leapfrog development. Let one team working on tweaking the existing product, and lock another team away somewhere to reinvent the future. Throw the rule book away and start over. Take your brightest rebels, remove them from the distractions of mind numbing bureaucracy and panicked financial analyst reports and let them do what they long to do, beat Google. Let them do something amazing.

Let People Be Amazing, then Keep Your Hands Off

But please, if someone at Microsoft or Yahoo! is listening, don’t make the same mistake GM did with Saturn. The launch of Saturn in 1983 redefined how a North American car company could be. Many of the legacy issues that plagued GM (confrontational union relationships, overly complacent dealer networks, quality control issues) were left behind with Saturn, creating an exceptional degree of loyalty and pride of ownership. In fact, Saturn became so successful that GM just couldn’t keep their hands off it, gradually bringing it more and more into the GM corporate fold and, in the process, squeezing much of the life out of the brand.

Amazing things wither and die in an atmosphere of corporate bureaucracy, visionless management and political infighting. Search is too important and too vibrant to leave it to this fate. Let 2009 be the year to do something remarkable.

Originally published in Mediapost’s Search Insider January 8, 2009

Wedding Night Advice for Microsoft and Yahoo

Gord Hotchkiss — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 18:41:35 +0000

Now that there seems to be some sort of union in Yahoo’s future, blessed or otherwise, I felt the urge to pass along some advice to whoever the happy couple might be. For, in all this talk about the impending nuptials , the clear objective is to survive and compete in the business of attracting the attention of prospects online.

I offer this advice on behalf of users, because frankly, I think that’s the only perspective you should be interested in. I’ll explain why.

Why Search is Essential

First of all, there’s a lot of talk about how a Microsoft – Yahoo deal would give you the biggest chunk of the online ad network space, and this is true. But I hasten to add: don’t forget search. Google has stumbled in rolling out another significant revenue channel that holds up against their search business, yet they’ve still dominated. That’s because the importance of search has been understated up to this point. Here’s why search matters.

Search is the thin edge of a wedge that is marking a fundamental change in advertising. And it’s fundamental because it’s initiated by the prospect. The importance of that sometimes gets missed by marketers, who start looking at search as just another weapon in their arsenal.

Search is important because of expressed intent. That puts it in a whole different league than all other advertising, online or off. Behavioral targeting is effective, but it’s still intrusive and interruptive. We ask for search results. That’s a different level of engagement, a different balance of control and a different mindset on the part of the prospect. It’s the first place that balance shifted from the marketer to the customer, but it won’t be the last. Search is forging the way, but customers will demand that level of control and relevance to intent in more commercial communication from corporations. So, for all the talk about ad serving networks, it’s vital that the new duo gets search right. All the truly effective revenue channels will lead from search and the new principle of prospect initiation, including the vast untapped mobile and local markets. You can’t afford to screw it up.

Users come first, Advertisers will follow

Secondly, all you should be focused on is one thing, and that’s meeting the expressed need of the user. Don’t talk to me about balanced ecosystems or serving the needs of both users and advertisers. While as an advertiser I appreciate the consideration, as a user I call it hogwash.

Search cannot serve two masters. One has to prevail. And it should always, always, always be the user. Users are the prospective customers, and without them, the equation doesn’t work. Get users and the advertisers will follow. And those advertisers will play by the rules laid out by the users because they have no choice. Google gets it (probably due to the philosophical bent of Google and an inherent suspicion of advertising) and you’ll have to get it too to compete. So those ads better be highly relevant and in the user’s interest if they appear. If they’re not, don’t show them.

If you pay attention to nothing else, please pay attention to this one point. It’s vital to your success.

Church and State: Antiquated Concept?

The final piece of advice is not to be so set on holding on the divide between Church and State on the search results page. This is one hold over from the offline world that may be due for rethinking

The concept of the Church/State divide came from the fact that advertisers will always push their advantage. That’s one reason why you can’t have a balanced ecosystem. Advertisers have always had a much louder voice that gets heard more often. So in traditional channels, the only answer was to divide up the page (or other real estate). Advertisers had free reign over some sections, but they had to keep their hands off others. Consequently, we’ve learned to largely ignore the real estate given over to advertisers. The success of this Church/State division has been questionable in the past, but it’s a relic of journalistic thinking that somehow became entrenched in the world of search.

But if you pay scrupulous attention to my first two pieces of advice, you don’t have to worry about Church/State. The fact is that in search we have expressed our desire for relevant information, and if that information is commercial in nature, and it matches our intent, than we’re open to it. At Enquiro, we’ve looked at interactions with search advertising in minute detail, and while people will self report an aversion to advertising in general, in the midst of a task, relevance trumps all. If an ad is the closest match, it will succeed.

This opens the door to mash up editorial functionality with commercial messaging in a richer way. As search becomes better at determining intent and delivering richer results, the opportunity exists to seamlessly integrate commercial messaging with other information in a user-centric way. But user trust is paramount. Let the user set the rules of what’s acceptable.

So, whatever happens, this is the advice I would give. There’ll be a lot on your mind in trying to navigate the new union, so I’ve kept it simple. You can thank me later.

Originally published in Mediapost’s Search Insider, February 7, 2008

How Can Yahoo Search Assist Be Leveraged as an SEO Tool

Jody Nimetz — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 23:03:20 +0000

Roberto in Florida wanted to know how Yahoo Search Assist can be leveraged as part of a search marketing strategy. Well first off, for those of you who don't know what Yahoo Search Assist is, here is a quick review of Yahoo Search Assist. In essence, Yahoo Search Assist is a real time query suggestion tool that helps users refine search queries so that they can find what they are looking for in "one search".

When Yahoo began their person-powered search engine back in 1994, it was mainly two people's guide to their favorite links on the Web. When Yahoo launched the new Yahoo! Search on October 1st they included a new feature designed to help users find what they were looking for in one search. This new feature as you may have guessed is Search Assist.

With the new Yahoo Search, Yahoo became the last of the four major search engines to offer blended search. Yahoo Search Assist expands on a person's query to suggest additional relevant searches and concepts for the searches they perform. So how can Yahoo Search Assist be leveraged as an SEO tool? Well first things first, Search Assist is not meant to be an SEO tool, it is meant to improve the search user experience. Having said that, there are a few ways that you can leverage the tool as part of your search marketing strategy toolkit.

How You Can Use Yahoo Search Assist as an SEO Tool

As a Keyword Analysis Tool – Well in terms of search strategy, Yahoo Search Assist can provide a little insight into phrases that are related to specific user queries. For example let's say that you perform a search for "las vegas wedding" in Yahoo. (I'm using this example because I recently got married in Las Vegas…) With Search Assist on you get additional options such as "las vegas weddings, las vegas hotel weddings, las vegas wedding chapels, las vegas wedding packages" etc. You can scroll the list to find additional phrases. In addition you can use the "explore concepts" feature to find additional keywords for your campaign.
Long-Tail Optimization Tool – Using Search Assist can help you optimize for long-tail key phrases that you may have otherwise overlooked. Search assist may provide you with alternatives to popular "head" phrases that you may have no hope for ranking for. Why not focus on the long-tail and improve conversions with long-tail optimization. (Conversion rates tend to be better with long-tail optimization, you simply don't receive as much traffic.)
Understanding the User - Search Assist can help you understand your search user as you can learn more about how and what users are searching for. While it's unlikely that Search Assist factors in seasonality, you can get a better understanding of phrases that users may be using to find information. After all search and thus SEO should be all about the user. As Yahoo stated when they launched Search Assist, "One thing we've learned since launching our own algorithmic search engine back in 2004 is that at the end of the day, people really don't want to search; they want to get things done." It's all about giving the user what they want.

So here are three ways that Yahoo Search Assist can be leveraged as a tool for your search marketing efforts. I hope that answers your question Roberto. Keep them coming.

On Your Search Menu Tonight

Gord Hotchkiss — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 18:18:03 +0000

This week Yahoo unveiled a new feature. It doesn’t really change the search game that much in terms of competitive functionality. If anything, it’s another case of Yahoo catching up with the competition. But it may have dramatic implications from a user’s point of view. To illustrate that point further I’d like to share a couple of stories with you.

May We Suggest…

The feature is called Search Assist. You type your query in and Yahoo provides a list under the query box with a number of possible ways you could complete the query. This follows in the footsteps of Google’s search suggestions in their toolbar. Currently, Google doesn’t offer this functionality within the standard Google query box, at least in North America. Ask also offers this feature. Because Yahoo is late to the game, they had the opportunity to up the functionality a little bit. For example, the suggestions that come from Yahoo can include the word you’re typing anywhere in the suggested query phrase. Google uses straight stemming, so the word you’re typing is always at the beginning of the suggested phrases. Yahoo also seems to be pulling from a larger inventory of suggested phrases. The few test queries I did brought back substantially more suggestions than did Google.

It’s not so much the functionality of this feature that intrigues me. Its how it could impact the way we search. I personally have found that I come to rely on this feature in the Google toolbar more and more. Rather than structuring a complete query in my mind, I type the first few letters of the root word in and see what Google offers me. It leads me to select query phrases that I probably never would have thought of myself. Sometime ago I wrote that contrary to popular belief, we’ve actually become quite adept at paring our queries down to the essential words. It’s not that we don’t know how to launch an advanced query; it’s that most times, we don’t need to. This becomes even truer with search suggestions. All we have to do is think of one word, and the search engine will serve us a menu of potential queries. It reduces the effort required from the searcher, but let me tell you a story about how this might impact a company’s reputation online.

I Wouldn’t Recommend That Choice

Some time ago I got a voicemail from an equity firm. The woman who left a message was brash, a little abrasive and left a rather cryptic message, insisting that I had to phone her right back. Now, being in the search game, getting calls from venture capitalists and investment bankers is nothing really new. But I’d never quite heard this tone from one of these prospecting calls before. So, I did as I usually do in these cases and decided to do a little more research on the search engines to determine whether I was actually going to return this call or not. I did my quick 30 second reputation check.

Normally, I would just type in the name of the firm and see what came up in the top 10 results. Usually, if there’s strong negative content out there it’s worth paying attention to and it tends to collect enough search equity to break the top 10. This time, I didn’t even have to get as far as the results page. The minute I started typing the company name into my Google toolbar, the suggestions Google was providing me told the entire story: "company" scam, "company" fraud and "company" lawsuits. Of the top eight suggestions, over half of them were negative in nature. Not great odds for success. Needless to say, I never returned a call.

If these search suggestions are going to significantly alter our search patterns, we should be aware of what’s coming up in those suggestions for our branded terms. Type your company name into Yahoo or Google’s toolbar and see what variations are being served to you. Some of them may not be that appetizing.

Would You Prefer Szechuan?

My belief is that users are increasingly going to use this to structure their queries. It moves search one step closer to be coming a true discovery engine. One of the overwhelming characteristics of search user behavior is that we’re basically lazy. We want to expand a minimal amount of effort but in return, we expect a significant degree of relevancy. Search suggestions allow us to enter a minimum of keystrokes and the search engine obliges us with a full menu of options. This brings me to my other story. Earlier this year we did some eye tracking research on how Chinese citizens interact with the search engines Baidu and Google China. After we released the preliminary results of the study, I had a chance to talk to a Google engineer who worked on their search engine. In China, Google does provide real-time search suggestions right from the query box. They found that it’s significantly more work to type a query in Mandarin than it is in most Western languages. Using a keyboard for input in China is, at best, a compromise. So Google found that because of the amount of work required to enter a query, the average query length was quite short in China, giving a substantially reduced degree of relevancy. In fact, many Chinese users would type in the bare minimum required and then would scroll to the bottom of the page, where Google showed other suggested queries. Then, the user would just click on one of these links. Hardly the efficient searching behavior the Google was shooting for. After introducing real-time search suggestions for the query box, Google found the average length of query increased dramatically and supposedly, so did the level of user satisfaction.

Search query suggestions are just one additional way we’ll see our search behavior change significantly over the next year or two. Little changes, like a list of suggested queries or the inclusion of more types of content in our results pages will have some profound impacts. And when search is the ubiquitous online activity it is, it doesn’t take a very big rock to create some significant and far reaching ripples.

Originally published in Mediapost’s Search Insider, October 4, 2007

What Does Yahoo Search Assist Mean for Me?

Jody Nimetz — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 23:12:51 +0000

Earlier today, Yahoo announced the launch of their new Yahoo! Search to help make search more effortless for users and consumers. The official press release from Yahoo (YHOO) states that "the new Yahoo! Search was designed to better understand user intent and get consumers to the results they are looking for in one search."

According to research conducted by Harris Interactive specifically for Yahoo, consumers are suffering from "Web Search Fatigue" and that while 99 percent of online adult users use a search engine to find information on the Internet, only 15 percent of them actually find what they are looking for on their first search. To help combat this issue, Yahoo has released Search Assist to provide real time query suggestions as well as related topics and concepts. If you are logged into your Yahoo account, using Yahoo Search Assist, a search for Enquiro would return the following:

If you were not logged into your Yahoo account and did a search for "enquiro" you would receive the following:

Notice the "Explore Concept" option? It brings up phrases such as "eye tracking", "search marketing", b2b" all phrases that accurately reflect what Enquiro is about. Very cool. The Yahoo Search Assist and new Yahoo results page could be Yahoo's answer to Google's Universal Search as Yahoo has stated that their new results will include items such as images and video. The new Yahoo Search is designed to provide a richer experience for the search user. The update integrates audio, video, photos, shortcuts, consumer reviews, and local information directly into the search results, with special emphasis on Yahoo properties such as their travel portal travel.yahoo.com. Perform a search for "Las Vegas" or "New York" to see this in effect.

So what does Yahoo Search Assist Mean for You?

Well first and foremost it should mean a better search experience. This is providing that the results returned are relevant to your search query… and why shoudn't they be? Yahoo has done enough usability research to know that relevancy is what users are seeking. When they perform a search looking for information, they want the results that show up to be the most relevant in terms of providing a solution to their query. But what about user intent? How do they know that a user searching for "Las Vegas" was looking for the NBC television program vs. a user looking to spend a fun weekend in the City of Sin? Well according to Yahoo, with Search Assist available, users saw a 61 percent increase in task completion meaning they completed a successful search.

For website owners and search engine marketers, the New Yahoo Search means that user generated content will become more important in the genetic makeup of your site's content. You will need to incoporate the user of user generated content such as product reviews, site reviews or the like. The integration of user-generated content in Yahoo's results is a fairly innovative and impressive update that includes restaurant and hotel shortcuts. Again very cool.

Web 2.0 is taking place before our eyes. Yahoo was the last of the big 4 search engines to get on board with an actual change to their search offering. The release of this is interesting as it was only after mere days that Microsoft announced updates to their Live Search product. Both Google and ASK announced changed to their seacrh offering in May and June respectively. Just when you think you have a handle on Search, the engines throw us a slight curveball. I love it, because for me as a user of search I am getting a better user experience. While there is always room for improvement, this is a great step into Web 2.0 and Search 2.0

How Important is the Yahoo Directory?

Jody Nimetz — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 01:51:23 +0000

There has been speculation lately over the direction of the Yahoo Directory. What exaactly is the Yahoo! Directory you ask? The Yahoo! Directory is a human-created and maintained library of web sites organized into categories and subcategories. Previously we posted about the potential end of the Yahoo Directory, yet this is not likely to happen soon as Yahoo reaps a large amount of revenue from the annual directory submissions. So if the Yahoo Directory is not going away, just how important is the Yahoo Directory in 2007?

Fact: The Yahoo Directory is still one of the oldest and most important directories on the Web.
Fact: There is an annual fee associated per listing per category in the Yahoo Directory.
Fact: A link from the Yahoo Directory is simply just another link from another site.

While these are all important facts, how do you determine if being listed in the Yahoo Directory is important for your site and for your business? From an SEO point of view, being listed in the Yahoo Directory is not the thing that is going to push your site over the edge in terms of search engine rankings. In fact, submitting to the Yahoo Directory may not even be necessary. Check your referral stats? Does Yahoo drive a lot of referrals to your site? The question becomes is there any value in being listed in the Yahoo Directory? Let's look at some of the advantages.

Advantages of Being Listed in the Yahoo Directory

It may be beneficial to submit to the directory if Yahoo Slurp is having a difficult time crawling your site.
If you are launching s new site, being listed in the Yahoo Directory can be used to develop new site presence.
While they will probably deny it, being listed in the Yahoo Directory may have an impact on your organic listings in Yahoo. Even if it is a small impact, being listed in the Yahoo Directory may indirectly affect your organic listings in Yahoo!
Having a listing in the Yahoo Directory is a quality inbound link to your site. Depending on the category or page that you get listed in this could be a very effective addition to your external link inventory.

There is value in having a well optimized Yahoo Directory listing. For your "SEO-buck", $299 US per year is not that bad, but keep in mind that it is $299 US that you could be spending elsewhere. Whether a Yahoo Directory listing is of benefit depends on your site and on your site users. Does the average person who is looking for your product or service use the Yahoo Directory to find their information? If the answer is no, then you might not want to shell out the money to be listed in the directory.

Being listed in the Yahoo Directory is not important as it once was. There is however, still some benefit to being listed in the directory. The value of being listed in the Yahoo Directory may in fact be in the eye of the beholder as the value will differ with each and every site.

Considering submitting to the Yahoo Directory? Follow these steps.

How to Submit to the Yahoo Directory

As taken from Yahoo:

In order to add your web site to the Yahoo! Directory, you must first suggest it to Yahoo!'s team of editors, who visit and evaluate every site added to the Directory. To suggest your site for evaluation by an editor, please follow the process outlined below.
Step 1: Check to see if your site is already in the Yahoo! Directory.

Step 2: Find the appropriate category in the Yahoo! Directory.
We ask that you suggest your site from the most relevant Directory category page.

Non-English Sites:
Please refer to the list of Non-English Yahoo! Directories.)

Step 3: Suggest your site from the link on the Directory category page most relevant to your site.

The Yahoo! Directory is made up of categories. To do a Yahoo! search to find the best category for your site:

From the front page, search on a term relevant to your site.

From the web search results page, select the Directory tab under the search box. This will confine your search to sites listed in the Yahoo! Directory.

Under the search bar you will see a list of "RELATED DIRECTORY CATEGORIES" and relevant sites from the Directory will be listed under "TOP 20 DIRECTORY RESULTS". You can review the list of Directory categories related to your search term and you can see various categories listed under the description of each site listed in Directory Results.

When you click on a category, you will go to that page in the Directory. You will see a "Suggest a Site" link located to the right of the search box on the Directory page.

Note: If you try to click on "Suggest a Site" from a broad or top-level category, such as Education, Regional, or Entertainment, instead of browsing down to a more specific sub-category, you'll be told that your suggestion is too broad. So make sure you search for and find the most specific category that describes the subject matter of your site.

Additional Yahoo Directory Resources
Yahoo Directory Basics
More Thoughts on the Yahoo Directory
Yahoo Directory Submit
Yahoo Directory Home

Original Post on SEO-Space.