Apr
How To Market On Yahoo Answers And Get Tons of Traffic, FREE!
Want to get tons of quality visitors from Yahoo Answers without spending a dime? If so, you’ve come to the right place.
Last month I mentioned the $97 Answer Sniper software, along with why I’m not buying it. (Be sure to read that post and the comments, some idiot stopped by and left like 5 dumb, yet amusing, comments.)
Anyway, since people are totally missing the point I was trying to make, I’m writing another post specifically about how you can market on Yahoo Answers legitimately and easily, without spending a dime. (BTW, the whole point is that you don’t need to buy $97 software to do this.)
(Step 0 - register for a free Yahoo Answers account and/or link your Yahoo email address to a Y! Answers account.)
Step 1: Pick a topic.
First, decide where you should market. You’ll want to pick the topics you know about, i.e. ones that relate to your site. If you were John Chow, you might pick the “Dining Out” category. (Categories and subcategories are listed in the menu on the left side of the page.)
Step 2: Get the RSS feeds.
Now that you have chosen a good category or subcategory, scroll down below the category listings and look for the “Save to My Web” box. At the bottom right of that box, you’ll see a green RSS icon.
Click that RSS link and subscribe to the feed using a free feed reader such as Google Reader. This will allow you to keep abreast of all the new questions in your chosen category, in one place.
You can also find RSS feeds for keywords. Just search for the term, scroll to the bottom of the results, and click the RSS button down there.
(Be sure to repeat this step for each topic you want to monitor.)
Step 3: Read the feed.
In just two steps you have set-up a free monitoring system for Yahoo Answers. Now you just need to open your feed reader each day and look for questions that suit you.
When you see a good question that you can answer, simply click the title and the page will open in your browser window.
Step 4: Answer the question.
This is simple - Click the blue “Answer this Question” button.
The trick is to be first and provide a great answer. Being first is usually pretty hard, as there are so many people logged-in at all hours. (Not even Answer Sniper software can change that.)
So be sure to provide a quality answer each time. That way, even if you’re not first, you’re still the best.
Step 5: Promote.
Here’s the trick… throwing in some self-promotion without spamming.
If you are answering something in a category you know about, your answer probably relates to a page on your site. If it does, list that page URL in the “Source” box below your answer. Then people who liked your answer will probably click through to learn more.
Step 6: Check your stats.
After you have posted some answers, wait a few days and then check your stats to see if you’re getting any visitors. I use Google Analytics and it shows that Yahoo Answers traffic comes in frequently and stays a while. Woo-hoo!
There you have it, a simple guide to getting free traffic from Yahoo Answers. And you didn’t have to spend a dime.
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Click here to buy me a beer, because damn, I need to get drunk to forget how much internet marketing sucks!
In my experience, it’s hard to make links stick on the site. They’re really cracking down.
I’m surprised they would delete links. If you are providing quality answers with links to your source material, it would be in Yahoo’s benefit to leave the links there.
Of course, if you leave short, spammy answers and unrelated links, then the entire answer should be deleted.
Yes, that’s not fair. I tottaly agree with Sucker.
I’ve used this method of “advertising” on Yahoo Answers for a few months now and can personally vouch for how effective it is.
A big problem to look out for is when other people in your same niche start doing the same sort of marketing. A lot of times they’ll vote your answer down just to try and hurt your chances of getting hits. Childlike, I know, but it happens.
People really need to pay attention to Step 5 above, as well. Just posting “Good question! http://www.site.com” is stupid and pointless, yet I see people do it all the time. At least ANSWER the question being asked!
Very good and helpful post , with a great step to step guild on how to gain traffic for free from Yahoo Answers, i will have to give this a shot.
Thanks
I also done some advertising and it really works on there, Thanks for your wonderful post
Great info…off to look and play
Doug
If the question is post worthy, consider creating a post about the subject and then answering the question with the link in the source. No one can complain that it is not a good source (because you custom built it for the answer).
Obviously it only applies if your blog is closely related to the subject of the answer.
Wouldn’t make sense to post about how to program your iPhone on a real estate blog.
Good info to me that i can drive more traffics,thanks.
@Goob
Yeah, I forgot about that, definitely a problem. The good news is that those people probably don’t make it very high in Y! Answers so their votes won’t matter much.
@Minn
Yes, if you don’t have a perfect page already, that’s the best way to do it. It’s especially good because a lot of questions get repeated, so you ‘get more bang for your buck’ as you are prepared to answer that question multiple times
I’ll give it a try. It will be interesting as I will be replying questions in english and try to forward people to content in spanish…
Are votes from people with more points actually weighted more on Yahoo Answers? I didn’t know that. Good info to have (for what I don’t know yet, but I’m sure it’ll come in handy).
Say, I’ve got a 35% best answer rate and a couple hundred points on one of my YA profiles. Anyone want to buy them off me - I’ll give you a good rate
Its obvious to point out that this type of advertising will only be effective if your website is related to the question you are answering.
@Melanie
I’m not sure if your points necessarily make your votes worth more, but when it comes to someone using the childish behavior mentioned above, voting things down or reporting them when no one else does will diminish that account’s power. (i.e. it’s obvious that the person is just voting down an answer from a competitor, not because the answer should be voted down.)
But as for points, I don’t think Level 1 answerers are allowed to vote at all. And the childish people probably don’t get past that level anyway
What topic do you generally use to promote Internet Marketing Sucks?
I have a blog-about-blogging and really can’t find any relevant questions whatsoever.
By the way, I loved the bit about John Chow. So true.
“What topic do you generally use to promote Internet Marketing Sucks?”
John Chow himself falls under that category
I don’t promote this site on there, although there is a “Computers & Internet -> Internet” category that gets some random internet and social networking questions, and even a few “can you really make money online?” questions.
Sucker says: “but when it comes to someone using the childish behavior mentioned above, voting things down or reporting them when no one else does will diminish that account’s power.”
Most of the questions I look at don’t get enough traffic to determine whether someone voted an answer down because the answer was bad or because the person is a jerk. I.e., there are at most one or two votes on the page, so you can’t really look at trends.
Great advice…I’ll definitely have to give that a try. Now I just need to get some witty answers to some less than intelligent questions.
It can really increase your traffic, but I thought it takes more time than social bookmarking like stumbleupon, digg, etc
LOL
I love this blog. Can’t wait to go to work tomorrow and read it.
I too have used this method with some success. Like others have said the more time and effort you put into answering the question the better response you are going to get.
But it’s a highly effective method and you should defiantly include it as a traffic generation method.
Cheers,
Tristan
Hey
I got voted best answer. It was how to deal with cat crap. I guess I enjoy dealing with crap.LOL
Huh.
I hadn’t thought about using Yahoo Answers this way, but it’s pretty smart. Thanks a lot for the tip (especially in regards to aggregation, that’s the step I would have missed had I started this without thinking). I’m going to try this out.
I had thought about using yahoo answers in a way similar to this. I was simply going to search for my keywords then hope I could answer with useful information. This RSS way is a lot easier and efficient.
Thanks for the guide!
Thanks for the writeup.
I am presently just beginning to subtly spam my site on yahoo answers. As an aside, the weight loss section appears to be rather populated with twits who are giving fantastically bad advice, and I am fighting the urge to flame people.
Query - there seems to not really be opeings to slide in my site as a link, is it spammy to put it in the ‘how I know’ box? [It is a somewhat correlated website]
That’s where you should put your link. If you don’t have a page that directly relates to the question, do this:
Source(s):
My years of experience as a bodybuilder and from running the website bodybuilding.com
Nice little advice to get some traffic and business for yourself.
Is it possible to just ask a website review question on your own site.
eg, how does my logo look? Or does the design fit the business model, stuff like that?
Just got a nice traffic from Yahoo Answer
@Business Seller
You could probably do that. Some people even post a picture and then say “do you think I’m hot?” … LOL
@Sucker
Live Search started a similar gig to Yahoo! Answers, called QnA beta.
I thought I would give it a try and put up a question.
I guess the most effective way would be to use Google Adwords, and as soon as my business picks up, I’m hoping to start a campaign there.
But I’ve heard it can get kinda expensive if you don’t set it up right.
thanks a lot for your tips.
i think the hard thing is find topic related to blog, especially when you writing some general topic
There’s tons of other Yahoo Answers type sites….