First Google manipulates their algorithms that we must all rely on ADWORDS / PPC for traffic in their engine and now Yahoo with Site Match. In stepping back and surveying the situation, it seems to me the Yahoo changes are little more than manifest destiny.
To survive in ANY marketplace, one of two things must be done well: Create trends or play catch-up and follow them. The former is preferred but, often, the latter will suffice. I suspect Yahoo's answer to Google will be countered with something and so on and so on, ad nauseam.
These two Goliath's will continue to battle it out and the rest of us will have to wait and see what happens next.
Interestingly, Yahoo and Google are not competing with one another for OUR business; presently, it seems they have our advertising dollars at almost ANY cost. They are merely climbing all over one another to get to the lion's share of the profits.
The Apocalyptic View: Inevitably, small businesses will lack the capital to stay in the game and only a few major players will remain standing. Hmmm. Historically speaking, this prediction is not far fetched. You need only look as far as the topic of this discussion to see how this principal applies.
So tonight, while cradling my "Bill Gates Action Figure" close to my breast, I will drift off to sleep chanting "Go Capitalism! But please take me with you..."

It is really great that Yahoo! took the time to lay out their argumentation. It is clear, but not compelling for my clients.

I used to submit to Inktomi through Positiontech for another company. One of my clients with a redesigned site asked me yesterday about the cost of getting updated in Yahoo! quicker, so I took a look.

The $49/$29 fee would have been acceptable for him, but this idea of $0.30 per click just destroys the economics. He has a relocation company in a country, and there aren't many competitors. I had to advise him to keep his head down and just wait it out.

For most of my clients it's the same. Basically, they just want a one-time site-refresh in the index. Some sites have not been re-indexed for many weeks. I suspect that this is a very common problem.

Obviously Yahoo's program is targeted at a different type of site, but it's too bad there isn't another program for these types of sites. Money left on the table, in my opinion.

__________________
DavidS

International Relocation Technology

"I have read about this free spidering by Yahoo in the posts but I have yet to see it. Is there a place to submit your url to these sites."

I don't believe you need to "do" anything to get the Yahoo Slurp! to visit your site. Just wait, same as Google.

__________________
BVI in Minnesota, SEO

A lot of people posting in this thread need to go back and get their facts right before making comment and helping spreading myths.

CBP

Being less charitable now. The arguementation from many, including Yahoo!, is "If Site Match does not meet your needs, just wait for slurp". However, the evidence contradicts this.

Running searches in my industry, I see pages that were changed a long time ago. I can even view the cached pages of a site that I know was taken down around November.

I am not sure what conclusions to draw from this.

__________________
DavidS

International Relocation Technology

It seems clear to me that the game at present is to scare you into paying Yahoo for a listing. I was dropped overnight to ranking mostly in the 30s in a very small market. Many of the sites that are ranked ahead of me are old abandoned sites that break all of the SEO rules. None is as well designed or provides as much information as my site.

This is the period when Yahoo scares the money out of you. Just wait. They will change their tactics soon, or they will cease to be a player, in which case we can all cheer their demise.

__________________
Jett Hitt
Yellowstone Outfitters
Horse Pack Trips
Fly Fishing

Paying for inclusion vis SiteMatch will not affect your ranking.

CBP

I agree with cbp. Some people need to get their facts straight. Maybe some should go back and read the post by YahooSearch. Take it right from the horses mouth.

Also, if your want to submit your site for free YahooSearch has posted:

So, go submit and give Yahoo a few weeks to show us what they can do. I for one find it a refreshing change from Google, Florida and Brandy.

Karen
http://www.vintagedge.com

__________________
Original Vintage designed t-shirts at http://www.vintagedge.com

Fine, I'm still heavily confused. Are results ranked by preference for SiteMatch or not? Are SiteMatch sites = sponsored sites and clearly marked, or do they simply bubble up in the ranks of "generic search results"?

To 1. - Search quality is defined by the user, not yahoo or the owner of a web-site. So as long as yahoo manipulates the ranking of entries by how much money people pay or how much they can earn from the click through (which is, on the bottom line of the site owner, the same), the quality sucks. Because as someone seeking information, I'm not looking for the one that can make the largest profit (= can stomach the largest advertising costs) from providing it to me. The quality of the information I'm seeking is different from that.
To 2. - That looks like a reasonable service I'd be willing to pay an annual fee for . May be even a fee per URL submitted, but why would I pay per click through? In what way are the clicks correlated with the service?
In clear speak, because I'm not able to automate my site index page(s), I need to pay yahoo on a per click basis? Come on!

Yes, what if I can't afford the program. YahooSearch, you did not answer the question. what happens if my set daily/monthly limit is exceeded. How does it influence my position in the search results? Can you give me a detailed example, what will happen?
By the way, I don't care if 99% free crawled sites are on page 10 - 10,000! As a user I'm fed the advertisers (= bad quality) and as a site owner, I'm off the radar screen for 99.99% of all users.
What is the difference in the search results, if I'm crawled by the free crawler, as opposed to the SiteMatch crawler. Are you telling me, that I end up on page 277 of the search results, because my keywords don't match my content and there are little incoming links (= poor search engine relevance). And Yahoo misses out on the chance to earn a buck, if someone clicks on my entry? I thought you are in business and conventional wisdom has it, in business you try to earn money. So you'd need to prove to me that this is the truth now and every day that goes by, before I'm convinced. How arre you going to do this?

Sorry YahooSearch, I have more questions than answers. Sorry for the rant, but I'm sure I'm not alone with my confusion.

Kind regards
K<o>

__________________
Technical Support for non-technical users of OpenOffice.org,
Conficio, Blogging about Plan-B for OpenOffice.org

It has been made clear numerous times that their will be no ranking preference given.

They are not doing that. At least they have said they are not - we have no reason to disbelieve them.

There is no such thing as a daily limit.

It dosen't.

The vast majority of sites will not need to use SiteMatch.

CBP

Hi CBP,
this I will only believe if it is proven to me. See there is a clear conflict of interest. If Yahoo ranks your SiteMatch after the otherwise better ranked, but free crawled listings, they loose out on the chance to earn the click through. Sooner or later there will be a change in policy.

The only thing that would convince me otherwise, is an independent outside auditor that would have access to the Yahoo ranking algorithm and verify it by independent research, every day!

One other logic defying piece. Why would I set a large limit for click-through, if after it expired, I show up in the very same spot of the results as before? Or does the click-through have an influence on the frequency or depth of the crawling of my pages? Is that what Yahoo means with "more clarity" or "more control"?

You find me in disbelieve
K<o>

__________________
Technical Support for non-technical users of OpenOffice.org,
Conficio, Blogging about Plan-B for OpenOffice.org

Dear CBP,
help me to understand what are the budgeting options, that yahoo provides? What are the caps, that keep the CPC costs at a comfortable level?

Thanks!
K<o>

__________________
Technical Support for non-technical users of OpenOffice.org,
Conficio, Blogging about Plan-B for OpenOffice.org

From Tim in Yahoo Forum at WMW:
CBP

In response to Greg Gates and other Site Match customers who are having problems with URLs that were submitted.

Due to the overwhelming response to the new Site Match program, we must temporarily extend the quality review period for some URLs. We appreciate your patience and assure you that we are working quickly to resume our 4 business day turnaround time. We are also working with our resellers to address the delays some customers have had receiving customer support in a timely fashion.

If it has been more than 4 business days since you submitted your URLs to Site Match and your URLs have not yet appeared, please contact your reseller for more information. You can also check your account status by logging into the Site Match Account Center.

Contact information for Site Match resellers is listed below:

INeedHits.com
Phone: US (including Hawaii) & Canada: 866 873 5834
ov.query@ineedhits.com

InfoSpider
Phone: 408-635-2289
support@infospider.com

Network Solutions
Phone: 800 779 1710
customerservice@networksolutions.com

MarketLeap
Phone: +1 888 201 9982 (7am to 5pm PST)
support@marketleap.com

Position Tech
Phone: 630 262 6255
support@positiontech.com

Trellian:
support@trellian.com

scticket asked:
"Is there a place to submit your url to these sites."

YahooSearch said they will be providing a free crawl from any url summissions at:http://submit.search.yahoo.com

I will continue to submit to http://www.dmoz.org/
any new site.

I probably will not use Yahoo! SiteSearch but I will also be looking closely at my position that is currently on Yahoo.

__________________
GSO
http://www.GlobalSpecialOperations.com/
-------------------------------------

It sounds like it comes down to believing or not in what Yahoo is saying. I think it is fair to be skeptical that my current FREE listing and ranking is NOT going to be effected by this program.
I paid to be list in Inktomi because they would not index my site without my payment. I strongly suspect Yahoo is headed in that direction. If I am wrong I will be delighted!
Why in the world would some HAVE TO PAY for inclusion and CPC, whlie others will list and rank FREE? The idea that Yahoo's Site Match was designed solely for the benefit of dynamic content sites and their searchers sounds ridiculous, does it not? IMO, only an extremely naive person could buy such an explanation.
I admit I am confused, skeptical and even, perhaps (sigh), bordering on paranoid. Those who continue to quote Yahoo's statement as though it is gospel is scary to me! Am I missing the boat completely here? Sheesh.

Whether Site Match is good or bad depends upon how unquestioning or intelligent one thinks a user is. If you assume that all users are unquestioning (and unfortunately certain US government studies suggest a large percentage are) then Yahoo! becoming another HotBot, with the first 2/3rds of the screen covered in paid ads, and the prospect of Google's AdWords gradually moving from the right area of the screen to central prominence (which they undoubtedly will) will eventually end SEO techniques as we (or rather you because I am only an amateur SEO trying to learn from the professionals) know them.

That is not an unusual scenario because the Internet is a new advertising and commerce medium and all new mediums are marked by the same evolutionary phases.

I choose to believe that (despite government statistics) humans are not the mindless unquestioning morons that politicians (and search-engine sales divisions) would doubtless prefer them to be. I almost never use HotBot because I detest a whole bunch of paid ads for sites wth often poor content, cluttering up the screen. One needs to wade through a ton of crap to get to the good stuff! Yahoo!, which has always been my favorite, is now starting to look the same way. As a user, and despite everything I read about PageRank, HillTop and Google's other cost-reduction technologies (because that is what they ultimately are) I rarely use Google because frankly the rekevance of its results are unpredictable and often totally off-topic.

The only certainty is that it costs a fortune to run any search-engine based on present technologies and that means paid-positioning or pay-per-click are inevitable. In fact the emerging search-engine business model is 1 - capture an audience on the basis of free and unbiased content then 2 - once you believe the audience is captive charge advertisers to access your audience. The fundamental flaw is that the audience is not captive. Google and Yahoo! are not Microsoft - there is no economic or platform-dependant lock-in.

Just as Google broke AltaVista's supposed perpetual hold so the time is approaching for a new search-engine to break Google's hold. Not such a difficult task as it might seem. What is required is a totally different way to provide a search and indexing capability. Google is close to it through their combination of ODP listings and their PageRank algorithm but nowhere near close enough.

__________________
Chris Bowd
doing business in Japan

This is an email I just sent to Ineedhits inktomi submission service. I was unaware that there is no more inktomi submission service at all, just thought Site Match was something new not replacing everything else. Now what do I do. Many have recommended that we wait and see however my clients are losing traffic and money while we are waiting. Sometimes I really have to wonder why I am in the site design business and I sure am glad I am not in the SEO business except to help my own customers.

Anyway this is what I sent them, do you think I will get a reply and what does everyone think about the possibility of regional search engines becoming KING.

It looks like your company is pulling a "looksmart"

I thought what happened to them would deter any others from using the same tactics but I guess not.

For your information

your site match pricing policy is not within range of most small businesses

Big companies have budgets of hundreds and thousands of dollars and they can afford your highway robbery

however, smaller companies, which is my market and probably 80% of businesses (under 10 employees) out there are already paying through the nose for advertising in regional papers and don't have the budget to pay your exorbitant 15 cents per click rate.

An average customer getting 35 hits per day or about 1000 clicks per month would have to pay $150/month or $1800/year to stay in your system and for someone like howiesmarine.com - he is on the net to appeal to his regional and local buyers not global and so most clicks are people researching before they buy which means he won't get a sale to payback the click.

If people can't afford to pay $299US for listing in the Yahoo directory what makes you think they can afford $1800US.

Yahoo may feel that the only way to make money is to buy up everybody, but in the end they will lose their market share because most companies CAN"T AFFORD TO PAY TO BE IN THE PROGRAM!!!! ....therefore most sites will drop out of the program and BINGO, bad search engine results, which means people will stop using YAHOO to search.

Looks like it's time for regional directories to start getting into the fray as most companies want to appeal to local and regional markets anyway.

Maybe things will start to go in reverse....instead of big companies getting bigger, a bunch of smaller regional companies will come in and steal their business right out from under their noses...better service, better quality and cheaper pricing.

Regional directories will advertise in regional papers and print media and regional customers will look in those directories first when searching for products and information rather than the BIG 3 as the search results will be more relevant.

Yahoo had a chance to actually compete with Google. It looks they are going to screw it up with GREED again.

Too bad.

What I want to know is that just like Looksmart, will you be expecting my current clients who have already submitted to you for a year to start paying the per click cost and if they don't have money in their account (which they won't) will you be dropping their listing from the database just like Looksmart did????

Get this, after I logged into my ineedhits inktomi submission account and then logged out, now in my inbox I got an info email saying that "I should have heard by now that Inktomi is no longer accepting new orders....blah,blah"

can you believe it, nice of them to inform me ahead of time.

http://www.pgwebdesigns.com
affordable business websites

hello everyone

now that site match is here and paid inclusion into Inktomi and Altavista are gone. Is Ask Jeeves and Teoma a viable option. Or maybe Lycos. Has anyone had any success with these ones?

http://www.pgwebdesigns.com
affordable business websites