Once of my clients has been after me to optimize their pages to do better in Yahoo Search.  I told them to spend more money on PPC, because, as far as I can tell - ranking well in Yahoo seems to have much more of a relationship to how much you spend on Yahoo.   I have not been able to figure out the algo for Yahoo (Maybe now that Andre Broder is working for them - they’ll improve it - because it makes not sense half time now - with Spam sites ranking on top for many popular keywords - you have to wonder…)

Ranking well in Google Organic has less or nothing to do with how much you spend on AdWords and MSN Search does not seem to reward you with better organic listings if you spend more on MSN AdCenter PPC.

Anyway….my client argued with me that PPC spend has absolutely nothing to do with ranking Organically in Yahoo Search.   I was not going to argue with them - why bother - I was just going to focus on Yahoo for the next report and leave it at that.

Meanwhile, an article just came out that confirms some of my ideas about Yahoo’s ranking algo.  Yes, getting a good directory listing is important to Yahoo…. and a higher listing in the Yahoo Directory implies that your site is more popular - and if your site is more popular it’s a ranking factor for Organic Search.   

I can see, in my mind, a four part Algo - 25% being Yahoo Directory Popularity, 25% being Organic Seo Optimization, 25% Backlinks to the site and the other 25% being how much the site spends for PPC.   I’ll have to test that idea and see if it fits.

Here’s part of what the article says:

Each search engine has its own method for finding and ranking the non-biddable searches. Google, for example, uses an algorithm that rates a page’s content as well as the number of other pages linked to that site, while Yahoo! counts more on editors to decide where the sites best belong.

"Or, companies can try to slip into a searcher’s field of vision the old-fashioned way, through what the industry calls an organic search. That means putting content on a Web page that somehow convinces automated search engine "bots" to rate a site as being useful and include it near the top of the non-sponsored links, which often number in the tens of thousands".

Perhaps because of all the hurdles, organic searches only claimed about 11 percent of marketing dollars last year, according to the search engine marketing association. "That’s really difficult for someone who isn’t very experienced to tackle successfully," said Mr. Jarboe.

Antique collector Tim Sweet had one of those satisfying moments in December when he decided to feature a type of ceramic known as yellowware on his whatsinyourattic.com site.

Mr. Sweet, who is senior sales consultant for Nauticom Internet Services in Sewickley, posted several paragraphs, trying not to use the term "yellowware" more than 4 percent of the time so it wouldn’t be classified as spam but also to include enough content to lure the search bots.

Within three weeks, his listing showed up at the top of MSN.com’s "yellowware" search — at no cost.

And he has managed to sell some yellowware, too.

……

My takeaway for this is to get my clients pages to have about 4% of the keyword density for whatever keywords are important for the main pages - but the other part is that you need to pay more to get a higher listing in Yahoo Dir by going after the Sponsered listings and making sure the editors write your description to include the  most important site keywords near the beginning of the title (which Yahoo Editiors control).

And then, if my idea is correct, Yahoo factors in how much you SPEND on PPC and perhaps, any other advertising you do with them -as a part of the ranking factors (but i’m sure they’ll never admit it).

I’d love some feedback on this subject - please post some comments and I will discuss them on this blog and give you a link back to your site if you come up with something I can use.