Q&A

Some Q &A sites have a clear, on-your-face niche; when you get there, the feel and the pulse of the niche almost gets under your skin.But some other Q &A sites slowly lose the grip on their niche(if they had one, that is) as time goes by. When I stumbled across Merchantcircle.com Answers, it had a business Q &A feel (even the name goes with that, eh?) to it. Now, as I stare at the home page, it seems to be all over the place. (more…)

Starting, running and managing a business is not easy but it isn’t difficult either. To succeed, all it takes for a business owner is to know what to do and do it when it’s the right time. But how would a small business owner know all the answers? What should entrepreneurs do when some of these questions about managing a business haunt them all the time? Where should they go looking for answers? Previously, we reviewed focus.com as one of those places a business owner could venture out and ask questions. I stumbled on an even better one – Business.com Answers. (more…)

There are plenty of Q &A sites – some really good and some that have the potential to be good – and most of them are heavily text-based. However, What To Wear (will be referred to as WTW henceforth) is a Q & A site that has a really unique way to dispense answers to your questions on fashion – a hugely popular and profitable niche. Although selling fashion online can be tricky since the buyer involvement for buying decisions is high, WTW’s unique twist as a fashion-only Q &A site is noteworthy (blogworthy!) (more…)

In the field of Internet Marketing, a “niche market” is a specific, targeted, narrowed down part of a vibrant and popular market. For instance, Computers is a huge market but when you deal with just laptops or notebooks that are based on Apple’s Mac OS, it classifies as a niche.

Askoholic deals just with the Q & A sites, and that’s a well-defined niche too. We’ve had posts based on some niche Q &A sites such as those on Information Technology, Real Estate or even Dating. But then, who says niches always have to be topic based? The AnswerBank is a niche Q &A site in the sense that it caters to users from the United Kingdom. (more…)

Rather than give you loyal readers another topic-specific list of some of the worst displays of question answering on the internet, we’re going to switch up the formula and now give you a rundown of this week’s 5 most embarrassing displays of question asking.

What intellectual horrors will we uncover in our expeditions each week? Only time will tell! But fear not, for we shall guide your hand through the terrifying fields of stupidity and you will make it out of the forest of idiocy unscathed (hopefully).

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With years of experience in Internet consulting and after having developed, seen, experienced and tampered with hundreds of websites or blogs of all kinds, the only thing that could make me fall off my chair could be something strikingly beautiful (while still being effective and functional) or something that is outright disgusting in the day and age of Wordpress themes laced with JQueries, Javascripts, etc. (more…)

What do you get when you merge the budding popularity of “Social Search” with the unquenchable thirst for information on real estate?

The answer: Trulia Voices ( Trulia itself is a full-fledged Real estate portal which I don’t intend to talk about!)

Next only to Q &A sites that focus on Business, IT related or technology related (especially with respect to matters relating to Personal Computers), Trulia could be catering to an audience that is craving to know more and have their questions answered from those in the know. (more…)

Some Q & A sites are making money – in one way or the other depending on the traffic they amass. While the big ones like Answers.com and Yahoo! Answers, don’t sweat it much, the others certainly do and are all in the business of making money through facilitating “Social Search” – a fancy, web 2.0ish way of calling Q & A sites. Is there a Q &A site that makes YOU money? Yes, of course. Webanswers.com has a way to fill your wallet with dollars. (more…)

Some Q & A sites are outright exceptional, while some have a long way to go. However, there are some that just stand out and inch towards the area marked as “I don’t know”. Questionhub.com has a domain name that could have given any other Q &A site a run for the money – it’s bang on, it hangs by the theme and it looks good at first look. Somehow, I have mixed feelings. It’s a Q &A aggregator site and it does a good job at that. However, should it have been just that? (more…)

With so many Q & A sites out there now it can be a minefield working out where to ask your question in the first place. Note to self: Maybe develop new Q & A site answering where to get the best answer for your question, comparethequestionmarket.com maybe?

Until I finalise my new website Martin Bryant from The Next Web has come up with an overview of which sites are best for what. (more…)