Tracking Traffic from Yahoo Answers?

[kellymonaghan]

I just went to my web stats to see what sort of traffic I was getting from Yahoo Answers. I've reached the Second Level (about 600 pts) and have a 40% Best Answer average, so I figured I should be doing pretty well in the traffc department.

But if my stats (I have AWstats via my hosting co) are to believed, I'm getting zero traffic, which I find a bit hard to believe. Low traffic, perhaps. But ZERO?

I wonder if because it's a Yahoo site any traffic it generates is lumped under Search Engine traffic. (AWstats separates referrals from SEs and referrals from other sites.)

Does anyone know how I can find out if Yahoo Answers is actually producing traffic, because if it isn't I see no great utility in posting there.

Thanks.

[Oling]

I tried before it the traffic it generates is really sucks to say the least. I do not know if there is something you have to to make it better. Its probably how the questions are configured or its just plain keywords that do not convert. Some of the guys here use it as a gauge for their keywords and not really traffic. Traffic is just a bonus if you got a good flow for traffic.

[rafaelapolinario]

Yes, I was also wondering about the same thing, if yahoo answers generates traffic same way as that of other IM's strategies.

[johnsonkyle25]

I personally don’t like using yahoo answers, I believe forums are a better way to get information as well as traffic, sure Yahoo answers is good, but it’s not very trustworthy and so you can loose credibility.

[Easy Cash]

Be careful using yahoo Answers - you can get banned really easy. You may think you have done nothing wrong and you still get banned.

Don't put a huge amount of effort into something you can't control.

Spread your risk so to speak.

[scene4u]

Yahoo Answers generates referral traffic. If you set-up a Google Analytics account then it will tell you exactly how many people are finding your site via yahoo answers.

[MarioSotojr]

I have spent some time using yahoo answers. being banned Two times. First time I got banned was because I didn't realize if you link more than once every 5 or 6 posts they ban your account. When I finally got the hang of it. I Did setup a Google Analytics account, I'm finding that I'm getting very little traffic from yahoo answers. Maybe I need to give it more time. But it's starting to feel like work.. I found that using Forums are way more forgiving and you can target your audience beter.

[ahefner33]

Hey.

I ever so often go over to yahoo answers and answer question on subjects that has do exactly what the page link I put in the resource is about about. I have never been banned and I have never answered any questions without placing some type of link back to one of my sites. I will say that I haven't posted the same address for the resource on multiple questions but rather different pages on my site.

If you get chosen for a best answer and the question is something like "how to" bla bla bla then you can get a good bit of traffic cause it can rank pretty well with that title.

One other thing is that I have never put any links in the actual text of the answer.

[dranzer1990]

Why dont you use google analytics?
I sometimes post answers on yahoo answers as well and I am able to track visitors perfectly with google analytics.

[kellymonaghan]

Thanks for the tip about Google Analytics. Unfortunately, I won't have time to add the GA javascript to EVERY PAGE on ALL MY SITES until God decides to add 24 more hours to each day!

But I'm curious to know why AWstats (which seems to do a very good job in all other respects) would not show traffic from Yahoo Answers.

Anyone have any ideas?

[myralove]

If you can't add Google Analytics to every age, then add it to the pages that you send traffic to from Yahoo Answers. Easy solution.

BTW, if you have a wordpress site, there is a plugin that adds it to every one of your pages automatically.

Thanks,
Myra

[geyser]

I've been banned from yahoo answers before, but I can say that its worth your time to answer some questions over there, even though I can't really tell if there was traffic but for me its fun...

[kellymonaghan]

Originally Posted by myralove

If you can't add Google Analytics to every age, then add it to the pages that you send traffic to from Yahoo Answers. Easy solution.

Actually, I discovered that adding it was no big deal, thanks to DW templates.

Today, I clicked on one of my Answers links, so tomorrow I should see if it shows up in the results. I'll report back.

BTW, I'm wondering if Yahoo Answers traffic might show up in site stats under a different name. Anyone know?

[jtrag]

Yahoo Answers now uses "nofollow" for all external links posted on their site which cause search engines to not follow the links. Therefore, Yahoo Answers is pretty much useless for backlinks anymore. I would recommend StumbleUpon over Yahoo Answers at this point, even though it's not quite the same type of site. I've always seen better traffic from StumbleUpon/Digg and other social bookmarking sites than I've ever seen from Yahoo Answers. Especially now.

Hope this helps

[kellymonaghan]

An update on Google Analytics.

I am now seeing answers.yahoo showing up in the referring sites and, although it's early days yet, the indications are that Yahoo Answers brings in a significant amount of traffic, enough at least to justify participating. I'll know better after a few weeks.

For those who might be interested, I found some discussion of GA vs AWstats and some general info about the whole issue of how to track site visitors on Webmaster World. Here:

Google Analytics VS. Awstats

and here

How to track visitors

The consensus seems to be that GA has many advantages, but no method of tracking can produce perfect data.

Thanks, jtrag, for the info on backlinks and Yahoo Answers. That's good to know.

[Satdin]

Any more suggestions on answers.