A recent study of Internet traffic patterns revealed that 43.5% of all search engine referrals are coming from Yahoo.com. That means that Yahoo! can still be a powerful force in your promotion strategy. What if I could show you three ways to harness the power of Yahoo! without spending a dime?

Yahoo! is notoriously slow in adding new submissions to their directory, it can take as much as six months to a year to see your site listed in the Yahoo! search directory. And just because you submit your link to Yahoo!, there is no guarantee that your site will even appear in their directory.

As a result, dozens of companies have sprung up promising that for a fee, they will get you listed on Yahoo! What kind of access do they have, that you and I don't have... likely, they don't have any more the ability than you or I. What they can do however, is use their experience submitting sites to Yahoo! to enhance your likelihood of getting listed on Yahoo!

At one time, Yahoo! itself was offering premium services to those with the cash. For a fee, they were willing to consider your submission within three days guaranteed, rather than the average 6 months. But, even after putting down your hard earned cash, they were only promising to consider your site for inclusion. They were not promising to include your site at all. It appears at this time, Yahoo! has discontinued this premium service.

To make it even tougher for the little guy, the rumor was circulating just last year that Yahoo! was only going to include top level domains in their directory from this point onward. If you were to pick the complete listing of What's New for any one day, you would discover that this isn't exactly accurate. Yahoo! seems to be giving preference to top level domains, but they are not restricting submissions to the top level domain. For example, take a look at Sunday, March 5, 2000:
http://dir.yahoo.com/new_additions/20000305/all.html

Run your mouse over each link in the list and look at the bottom of your browser to see the link address. On this date, the vast majority of new additions are top level sites, but a half dozen of the new listings can be found on Geocities and Angelfire, just to name a couple.

To get a grasp of what the editors of Yahoo! are looking for, find the sites served by the Free Webhosting services such as Geocities and Angelfire, and check them out for yourself. What you will discover is that these webmasters understood the motto: "Content is King!"

The following two tips will guide you towards harnessing the true power of Yahoo!, and they both take a lot less work. While your site's content will still play a roll in your marketing effectiveness when using these techniques, you will discover that the requirements of placement are not as stringent.

The first step you need to take is to visit Yahoo.com and search for the keywords that most accurately describe your site. This will give you a listing of categories and sites within the Yahoo! database. What you are doing is looking for the sites that most closely resemble your own site.

The best place to start is a category that lists a number of results for your query, and analyze the category itself. If the category seems to match your own site, then this is where you will begin your work. Use a generic text editor to come up with a description of your site and its content, and a sincere thank you at the end; then save your description, but keep it open and minimized.

Now visit each site listed in the Yahoo! category that you are in. Take a few minutes to look around the site. You are looking for specific information, so be thorough. You need to discover the name of the site, if they have a links page on the site, the name of the webmaster if possible, and an email address for the webmaster. Once you have completed these tasks, then open up an email addressed to the webmaster.

In that email, you want the Subject to say: "From the [name of website] website." Then if at all possible, you want to open the message with "Dear [name of webmaster]." Then write an introductory paragraph the mentions the links page [if there is one], and a brief comment about their website. The purpose here is not to flatter them, but to let them know that you have taken the time to view their site. Also, try very hard to address the email towards the webmasters site and site visitors as opposed to yourself. For each website you visit, and each email you create, the first paragraph of that email needs to be written on the spot... no canned presentation can serve you well at this point.

The general concept of the first paragraph is:

"Hi. I was looking for sites with good information on them when I came across your site. It seems that my site may serve your site visitors as well. Would you kind enough to take a few minutes and browse my site to see if it meets your approval for addition to your links page?" Remember also, that you are asking someone to do something that they may consider a hassle, so make darn sure you are courteous about it. If you try to tell them to do it, chances are, your email will go to the Trash Can without a second thought.

After the first paragraph is written, then copy and paste your site description from your text editor to the email being constructed. Be sure that you sign off the email with a considerate finish.

The key to this being effective is that the sites you have chosen to approach are those similar to your own. The webmaster of that site is already interested in your subject matter, therefore, he will be more likely to consider your link.

One of my online friends used this technique to propel his traffic from 30 hits a day to 500 hits a day, literally overnight. As a result, his newsletter doubled it's circulation in less than one month.

I spent an afternoon using this technique myself. All in all, I contacted 40 webmasters, and received 12 links. One of those links was a fellow who did not want to spend time maintaining his site any longer, so he just posted a direct link to my site on his main page. I have doubled my own traffic in less than two weeks.

Finally, have you ever noticed that when you search for something on Yahoo!, that if Yahoo! does not find a relevant link, or at the end of the links it did find, that Yahoo! will open up a window showing you Web Matches? Have you ever wondered where you can submit your link to be included in the rollover of a Yahoo! search? What if I told you that the Yahoo! Web Search is powered by the Inktomi Search Engine? And, what if I told you that getting listed on the Inktomi Search Engine is super easy, and you can see your link in as little as three days?!? That would be a powerful tip in itself, wouldn't it?

Well, here is the third and final tip I will offer you for "Seizing the Power of Yahoo!." Canada.com is powered by the Inktomi Search Engine. So, go to Canada.com to submit your URL, and you can conceivably see your link added to Yahoo! in as little as three days!