Yahoo! Answers Celebrates One Year of Knowledge and Success as Poll Reveals Use and Influence of Q&A Sites

WebKnowHow
Wednesday, December 13, 2006; 04:34 AM

As Yahoo! Answers (http://answers.yahoo.com), the leading Q&A site on the web, turns one and celebrates a thriving community of users, knowledge and success, a recent survey commissioned by Yahoo! and conducted by Harris Interactive indicates that one in three online adults (33%) have used a Q&A site, and, of these, half (52%) say that information from a Q&A site has influenced a decision they have made. The survey also indicates that online adults have looked for advice and reviews online and would be even more inclined to do so if the information was free and provided answers to questions in minutes.

“We believe Internet users are looking to real people for their advice and knowledge more than ever before,” said Tomi Poutanen, director of product management for Yahoo! Social Search. “This survey indicates the adoption of new Q&A sites like Yahoo! Answers, as well as consumers’ desire for responses and knowledge from many people. Yahoo! Answers does exactly that – it connects people to the information they’re seeking with those who know it among the millions of people in the Yahoo! Answers community.”

Getting information online

The survey shows that online adults have searched for various types of information on the Internet, including current and breaking news (96%), reviews of consumer electronics (83%), advice on travel or trip planning (82%), restaurant or hotel reviews and recommendations (75%), and do-it-yourself home improvement tips (74%).

These topics reflect the popularity of corresponding Yahoo! Answers categories News and Events, Consumer Electronics and Home and Garden, and could include some of the most recently-searched topics on Yahoo! Answers such as “Wii,” “Britney Spears,” “Alternative Fuel,” “Oprah,” “Christmas,” “ps3,” “Michael Richards,” “Black Friday” and “iPod.”

Asking the masses

Regardless of the type of information they are looking for – including consumer electronics reviews (77%) or do-it-yourself home improvement (55%) – the majority of online adults would prefer to get many responses from a group of individuals rather than an individual response from a close friend or family member. Yahoo! Answers taps into the knowledge of individuals to benefit the greater group by providing online users many answers to their questions, increasing the likelihood that people will find what they are looking for.

Information free, fast and from many

Online adults also indicated that they would be more likely to turn to the Internet for answers to specific questions if the service was free (81%), they could get answers in minutes (79%), they needed an answer to something their friends or family aren’t familiar with (77%), or they could get individual answers from many people (43%).

Yahoo! Answers Turns One

Yahoo! Answers marks its one year milestone by honoring 25 users at a special awards ceremony during the Yahoo! Answers Birthday party, tonight at Yahoo! headquarters. Award winners will receive “Community Leadership,” “Category Excellence,” or “Special Achievement” awards, as some of the best and brightest of the 16.6 million Yahoo! Answers users (comScore, November 2006) who act as role models in the Answers community by consistently sharing thoughtful, high-quality knowledge and life experience with others.

“I’m excited to be a part of Yahoo! Answers, and both honored and humbled to be recognized for achievements on the site,” said Yahoo! Answers user and award winner Gordon Glazner, Faculty of Medicine from the University of Manitoba. “Yahoo Answers connects people from all over the world, and allows sharing of the largest pool of information in existence – the knowledge in our minds. People can receive multiple answers to information they can’t readily find on the web, customized just for them. This takes us a step closer to the dream of universally accessible and personalized education.”

Yahoo! Answers and Knowledge Search now have 60 million users and 160 million answers and are available in 20 countries and in nine languages worldwide.

Methodology for Survey

Harris Interactive^® fielded the study on behalf of Yahoo! Inc. between November 27 and 29, 2006 among 2,303 U.S. adults 18 years of age or older. Figures for region, age within gender, education, household income and race/ethnicity were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. The data were also weighted to be representative of the online population of U.S. adults on the basis of Internet usage (hours per week) and connection type.

With a pure probability sample of 2,303 adults one could say with a ninety-five percent probability that the overall results have a sampling error of +/- 3 percentage points. The sampling error for the sub-samples of those who have ever used an online question-and-answer site (n= 775) would be plus or minus 5 percentage points. However that does not take other sources of error into account. This online survey is not based on a probability sample and therefore no theoretical sampling error can be calculated.

About Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is a leading global Internet brand and one of the most trafficked Internet destinations worldwide. Yahoo! seeks to provide online products and services essential to users' lives, and offers a full range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connect with Internet users around the world. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.