Search Engine Optimization

Yahoo has released new WordPress plugin designed to ease the job of bloggers.

As you go on typing your blog, Yahoo will automatically offer rollover links from its search platform. For example, if I was to enter Montreal, Yahoo would offer me a link, which will pop up as a small window every time anyone hovers over that word. Once clicked, another window will open within the blog itself, which shows yahoo search results for that term and gives readers the option to click on it.

Links may take all kinds of forms and currenly Yahoo! WordPress plug-in offers:

• Search
• Maps
• Local
• Pictures/Flikr.
• Shopping

Yahoo WordPress plugin offers full control to the blogers as to what links to keep and which to let go, making it a potential time saver.

Yahoo WordPress Plugin – strategic Yahoo! intitiative.

Apart from making the job easier for blogers, in my opinion, at the core of this project lies the expansion of Yahoo! search market. Whenever anyone hovers over such a link, Yahoo! automatically offers results, which of course when clicked lead to Yahoo! search. If a substantial number of bloggers will use such an extension, Yahoo! will inevitably get a good share of readers to its search platforms. If a targeted word, say Sony HDR-FX7(a camera) gets Yahoo! linked, WordPress Plugin will lead its readers onto Yahoo! search, where a vast number of online shops are competing in PPC. The user has a potential of clicking on sponsored results, making revenues for Yahoo.

Props to Yahoo! on a brilliant idea.

Apart from PPC advantage to Yahoo!, WordPress plugin will play a role of luring more people to use its search engine, since the ads are quite friendly and may get their share of users to switch to Yahoo!

Yahoo! plugin from blogging perspective.

Though the primary selling point is the job made easy, I would not agree with it entirely. Personally I prefer to be completely in control, and link out to sites I’ve seen first hand. Yahoo! WordPress plugin does give a degree of control over the links, however you may never know where exactly users will land.

From the interactive perspective it’s wonderful, and has web 2.0 written all over it.

Maps. Really nifty feature is the Yahoo! maps. Whenever you enter the name of a city/country/town or any other geographical location, Yahoo! shortcuts pick it up and give you the ability to embed Yahoo! maps within the article, which are of course interactive. Some more value to the reader.

Flikr is integrated with the plugin, so whenever Yahoo! finds a suitable word, Flickr photos will be offered with ability to choose resolution. A picture can speak a thousand words, and pic search is made convinient.

The aspect of distraction. It does distract users from reading. Whenever mouse pointer reaches such a link, a little popup window may:

Interest the reader and be the exit point from your blog.
Traffic is gold and loosing it without a good reason is never good. Lets say a Reddit story got promoted, a new flow of traffic came in. Yahoo! WordPress plugin has the potential of getting that traffic away from you, before people finish the article, or even explore the blog/website. Potential subscribers are lost.

Convenience. Personally, I sometimes get annoyed reading articles with similar platforms installed and it does disrupt the natural flow by stealing attention from the article itself. Usually it is done by ad agencies specializing in that type of advertising and sites with substantial traffic levels use it as a revenue source.

I would personally restrict my use of Yahoo! WordPress plugin to maps and Flikr, entering rest of the links manually. Though a wonderful idea by Yahoo! team, it has the potential of taking away hard earned traffic. Of course, one might argue – as long as you got the content and the SEO in place that should not be of a worry, however maximizing your audience and maximizing the revenues is on the priority list of many blogers and Yahoo! is a perfect example of that strategy in practice.

Just my 2 cents. Some blogs are already using it and so far Yahoo! WordPress didn’t link me out anywhere, so I’m probably just too paranoid =).

Watch video presentation of Yahoo! WordPress plugin.