~~~Search Engine Optimization~~~
While most of us were enjoying the holidays with family and friends,
the folks at Yahoo were busy quietly instituting a new fee structure
for their Yahoo! Express site-listing program. Instead of a one-time
fee of $299 to get your site reviewed and *possibly* added to Yahoo's
directory, the new fee is $299 a YEAR.
Certainly, Yahoo has a right to charge whatever they feel like, as
that is capitalism at its best. In fact, in a recent article on InternetNews.com, Yahoo CEO Terry Semel is quoted as saying, "Focus is the new keyword
to our company. We're not going to change the face of Yahoo! but
there are things that we can do to increase our revenue and become a
partner of choice." (Wonder how much they had to pay for that
keyword! (g)) With this new focus, the annual fee shouldn't really be
a big surprise to anyone.
What does this mean for search engine optimization specialists and Web
site owners? Well, SEO forums all over the Internet are abuzz with
various theories. Over at Webmaster World, many posters are
predicting that this is the last straw and will surely be the end of
the Yahoo directory. Some are claiming that small businesses will not
be able to afford $299 a year and, therefore, the directory will
eventually be filled up with only companies that have deep pockets.
Others have long ago predicted something like this would happen and
are embracing it with open arms. On Monday, I called Yahoo's media
relations line to get their side of the story for this article, but
have yet to hear back from them.
Let's look at the logistics of this new setup to see how it may affect
you. When submitting a site to Yahoo, everything is basically the
same as it has always been. You still go to the category where you
want to be listed, and then you click on the "suggest a site" link at
the bottom of the page. Assuming that you're in a commercial
category, you'll then be presented with the Yahoo! Express box to
click to continue with your submission. If you submit lots of sites
to Yahoo, it's possible that you may not have even noticed the new
link there that says, "US$299.00 non-refundable, recurring annual
fee." (In the past, I believe it simply said, US$299.00
non-refundable, one-time fee.) The "recurring annual fee" phrase is
actually a hyperlink to their new service agreement, part of which
states:
"You expressly agree to pay to Yahoo! such fee whether or not your
site is accepted or denied inclusion in the Directory. If your web
site is accepted for inclusion in the Directory as part of Yahoo!
Express on or after December 28, 2001, then your web site's continued
inclusion in the Directory will be subject to additional review each
year and you agree that your credit card will be charged the Recurring
Annual Fee."
This tells us that the recurring annual fee will only apply to sites
added on or after Dec. 28, 2001. So if your site was submitted or
already in Yahoo's directory before that date, you will *not* have to
pay the recurring fee. I'm assuming that Yahoo won't suddenly start
deleting sites from their directory in order to force people to submit
using their new fee structure, since that would be extremely
unethical.
What is troubling to me (and apparently to many posters at the Search Engine Forums) is that your credit card will be automatically charged each year for
your listing. (Assuming that Yahoo actually adds your site and
decides to keep it in the directory each year.) I don't know about
you, but I am opposed to anything that automatically charges my credit
card. I don't envy Yahoo next year when thousands of people call
their credit card companies to complain about the strange charge on
their bill from Yahoo, because they had no clue (or forgot) this would
happen. In Yahoo's defense, they did add the line, "I understand that
if my site is added, every year thereafter my credit card will be
charged the recurring annual fee" to the countless boxes you have to
check off (twice) while submitting. However, those who submit lots
of sites to Yahoo may have stopped reading those boxes a long time ago
and simply check them off mindlessly. It would be easy to miss this
new one under those circumstances. For me, this means I will have to
start using my clients' credit cards for submissions, since I don't
want these annual automatic charges on my card. A bit more of a pain,
but doable, I guess.
This annual program *could* be a good thing for site owners if it
meant they would have a chance to update or change their listing at
the time of annual renewal. As many of you are aware, updating Yahoo
listings at the moment is nearly impossible to do. However, it
doesn't appear that updating is part of the new process. I wanted to
ask them about this when I contacted them, but since they didn't get
back to me, I can only speculate. It's not clear whether or not
they'll even be notifying you by email when it's time to renew. It's
possible that you'll simply receive a charge on your credit card.
Plus, if your credit card is no longer any good, Yahoo states that
they will remove your site from their index. They mention that it's
up to you to keep your credit card info current, yet it's unclear how
to do that at this time. I imagine they'll be working out these kinks
in the upcoming months.
So is this new process a good or bad thing? Obviously, it's a more
expensive thing. Will it be the death of the Yahoo directory? I
doubt it. The Yahoo directory has not been the best place for
relevant searches for years, but that doesn't stop people from using
it anyway! The average person searching at Yahoo will not know nor
care about annual recurring fees for listings. The bottom line for
you as an SEO specialist or Webmaster is whether or not your Yahoo
listing brings you visitors and buyers. Some sites depend on their
Yahoo listing for their livelihood. Other sites get only a handful of
visitors from Yahoo. If you're not sure about whether or not your
site is a good Yahoo fit, you can sign up for your express review and
see how your first year goes. If you make back your $299, then it's
probably worth renewing. If you don't, then it's not! Hopefully,
Yahoo will make it easy to NOT renew your listing if that is your
choice, but this too is still yet to be seen.
(Thanks to Pandia for
the heads up on this matter!)
Jill
~~~Send Us Your Questions~~~
If you have questions about online copywriting or search engine optimization (or both!), just zip us an email to questions@rankwrite.com. We've had some folks ask if their question
was "too basic" to be printed - and you don't have to worry about
that! There are no "stupid" search engine optimization or copywriting
questions, so ask away!
