Yahoo Japan Will Give Points When You Search

Yahoo Japan will run a Yahoo Point Campaign in March. During a month of March, all registered users (Yahoo ID is required) will gain Yahoo points every time they search. Members can use Yahoo points to pay for several services including Yahoo Music, Yahoo Shopping and Yahoo Travel.

Detail: http://search.yahoo.co.jp/campaign/2011a/ (in Japanese)

It’s an interesting campaign, but why you should pay (give away points) for the use of search? Are they hoping to keep current Yahoo search users from going to other search engines? I wonder if they started to see any changes in the search user trend since the organic search was switched to be powered by Google…

Motoko Hunt

Motoko Hunt manages the SEO for all of Adobe's properties in Japan and the APAC region. Prior to joining Adobe, Motoko established AJPR in 1998; she has been providing search marketing consulting services targeting Japan and Asia to companies around the world. Her services have made a big impact on the search marketing campaigns of some of the world's most popular multi-national brands. A number of her articles have been published on industry websites and printed media including MultiLingual Computing and the International Journal of Localisation. She also writes about the Japanese online market on her blog at AJPR and contributes to several online magazines in Japan and Asia. She served as a member of the board of directors of SEMPO in 2010-2012, and is a chairperson of the SEMPO Asia-Pacific Committee.

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