evilgreenmonkey

Almost one year on since Yahoo Answers launched in December 2005, we’re taking a look back at how it has grown and where the future lies for the Q&A website model.For those of you yet to hear of, or experience Yahoo Answers, it is essentially a platform enabling registered users to pose questions to others within an online community. Each response can be rated, and a single answer can be chosen as the best. A merit system deducts points from a user for asking a question and rewards them for answering others.

Despite Google, Yahoo and MSN all launching similar communities quite recently, this model is anything but new. My first experience with Q&A sites was back in 2000, when stumbling upon a website called AskMe.com. I became somewhat addicted to the website for the first month or so, getting an adrenalin rush whenever I was rewarded for answering (some rather geeky) questions. Luckily, other things in my life became bigger priorities and I managed to wean myself away from the community. A few years later, I revisited the website to gain insight from its impressive array of experts; only to find that it had closed its doors in 2002 (rumoured to be a result of low ad revenues failing to cover costs).
So if the Q&A model failed six years ago, why would it work today?
This is an interesting question which can be answered 2 different ways. For the search engines, their Holy Grail is to offer a perfect set of answers for every search query, every time. Many say that bad natural search results increase clicks on paid search and is therefore to the engine’s advantage; although it’s proven that internet users are more then willing to change search providers if they’re unable to find what they’re looking for first time. In contrast, giving the search user a selection of quality answers (including paid search), one of which offering the user exactly what they need, heavily increases user retention.

Where does the Q&A platform fit into this? Search Engines mostly rely on their core algorithm to filter, analyse and rank each indexed web pages for natural search results. Although small teams of human editors work to manually filter out some pages such as spam, the mathematical algorithm is relied upon for the most part. Even with additional algorithms such as PageRank aiming to add a democratic style of human interactive voting to search ranking (through analysing links), this is still a mathematical equation which can be manipulated, no matter how relevant or irrelevant a page is to the user’s query.

A database of answered questions, like what Yahoo now holds, is a very valuable commodity. Not only are questions asked by verified users, but a democratic collective also choose the best answers. Integrating this into mainstream search, if a user queries [what is a royal flush?] or [viagra side effects], the engine can show results from its “Best Answer” archive and most likely offer a more credible and useful set of results then the usual affiliate and “Made For AdSense” sites which appear for such queries. As the platform exists entirely on Yahoo’s network, every aspect of the Q&A process can be (and is) moderated and controlled by their staff.

The other reason why a Q&A model may work in today’s online society, is the mixture of highly relevant contextual advertising and a more open “social networking” community. Few advertising networks could offer real content targeting in 2000, mainly working on a basis of website or individual site section topics. The ability of companies such as Google to read a page and pinpoint the best paid advertising based on each individual page’s content is of tremendous benefit. Where as before there would be Ford advertising their new saloon on a Q&A page about fixing the exhaust on a Jaguar XK8, now community sites are able to serve relevant adverts for Jaguar Garages and Jaguar DIY Mechanic Books. As a result, the commercial opportunities through much higher Click Through Rates and greater overall ad revenue, now makes the business model much more viable.

One website looking to challenge Yahoo’s share of Q&A enthusiasts is AnswerBag, founded in 2003 by Joel Downs, who sold the company earlier this year to InfoSearch Media. Just last month, Answerbag was sold a second time to Demand Media (owners of rival Q&A website eHow) for 3 million dollars. The website itself reminds me of a young YouTube, free from rich media adverts cluttering the page or Calls To Action for “Premium” services. The actual advertising on the site takes some time to find, hidden under a “Related Ad Categories” menu on the side bar and powered by the Ask.com advertising network. Coupled with equally popular site eHow, AnswerBag is no longer a minnow - and I’m sure it has already caught the eye of big fish such as News International and the former owner of MySpace. Its current threat to Yahoo is still minimal however, with less than 2% of Yahoo’s unique visitors according to data obtained from comScore World Metrix:

Percentage Of Data Sample Visiting Q&A Site

Source: comScore World Metrix

With MySpace, YouTube and Flickr making social networking and interaction more common place between the average internet user recently, the ability to ask questions or become an authority source is much more appealing and open to everyone. Back in 2000, I was still using Usenet Newsgroups, discussion forum software such as vBulletin had only just being released and the people using AskMe.com tended to be either technically minded or in the 30-60 age range. Although Google has alienated a lot of the younger demographics through its Pay Per Answer Q&A model, a brief exploration of Yahoo Answers seems to show a majority age bracket of under 30’s. Not only is this demographic very profitable to advertisers (electronics, car insurance, loans, first time mortgages etc), it’s also one which feeds on trends and virally marketed fads. Yahoo Answers is desperately trying to not only increase their user base, but also to attract more long-term users who post fewer questions but usually of a higher quality. A recent television commercial by Yahoo features a middle-age woman, compared to the teen focussed advertising used to market its email services. Until recently, almost every train on the London Underground featured a Yahoo Answers advert for around 5-6 months (along with many station platforms).

The global advertising budget for the 6 months which we’ve been monitoring would have been immense, although did help to increase visitor numbers in September to almost four times that of April. Whether such substantial growth is possible for the next 6 months is debatable, although the data collected since Answers launch would have been worth the expenditure alone. Along with the advantages to Yahoo’s search results as discussed above, the service offers yet another method of tracking trends, narrowing demographics to the advantage of their advertisers and adding to the existing portfolio of Yahoo owned content. I personally think that Q&A sites will not only see a lot of growth over the next year, but also experience a number of mergers and acquisitions much like the search landscape today. Where as Google is looking to become the worlds largest offline and online advertising network, Yahoo still holds firm to its principles on company owned information through its in-house news agency and content publishers. With this in mind, Yahoo Answers will become a very valuable part of the company’s family of products and maybe part of the future for search.
Further Information On Yahoo Answers:
Look Out Wikipedia, Here Comes Yahoo Answers!
Wikipedia Article on Yahoo! Answers