A Simple(ish) Q&A Improvement

[Marcus_Miller]

Hey Roger,

In the posting etiquette it states that users should 'find out if someone has already posted your question before adding it' but we all know that is never really going to happen.

So, we tend to see the same questions asked again and again when there are already top class answers in the Q&A.

So, could you not implement some kind of suggested answer system? So, user posts a question, you analyse it, list potential answers that may provide the answer based on the content of the question itself. If nothing matches, the user can then go on to post the question but in many cases, they would get a top notch answer instantly.

I have seen this on other sites and it would certainly cut down on the amount of duplicated questions and the suggested answers could all be hand picked to some extent (good answers, lots of thumbs up etc).

So, the Q&A would have less duplication and users would get directed to the best possible answers for a given question in a shorter time frame. Good for those that do the answering, good for the people who have questions - everyone is happy.

Just a thought,  my tuppence, 5 cents, etc.

Marcus

[RikkiD22]

Its a great idea. It would also essentially build up a knowledge base within the Q&A for people to get instant answers from too.

[StoresDirect]

I agree, I think this would be a great feature.

[EGOL]

I really like this idea.

I know of a few questions that I have answered with very detailed information and references - and even received staff endorsement.  Then when the same question is asked again and again and I am not motivated to keep rewriting the entire epistle... and have difficulty finding it with the search.

I think that search could be improved by placing a badge beside answers that have SEOmoz staff endorsements or a green check beside answers that have been rated "good answer" by the author.

Really... just being honest... I think that the search used for Q&A is not very good.  If we want to locate to a great answer by Alan Bleiweiss or RyanKent the search ignores the author... so searching for a great answer about "panda recovery bleiweiss" will not return all of the great answers that Alan has given.

Try it...  if you search using author name and topic it will return nothing.  Try  "egol content" or "egol pdf"...  you will find nothing and I have written about them many times.  So, I go up to the google tool bar and query "site:seomoz.org egol pdf" to locate content on SEOmoz.

This forum is populated with searchers.  We need a better search to unleash the deep value of the content that is being written.

Suggestion...  Just use Google search.  We all know that it works superbly. 

[jennita]

Hi Marcus! This is a really great idea. We've actually passed this thread onto our Q&A product manager so we can get it in the queue. It will take a bit of work but it would be really beneficial to the community. Thanks for the idea!

[jennita]

I hear ya! I'll make sure our product manager takes a look at this as well. Thanks for the input!

[Marcus_Miller]

My pleasure.

I think it will really benefit the whole Q&A experience. The good guys like EGOL, Ryan and Alan that are answering all the time can focus on creating really strong answers for unique questions and the users looking for answers get visibility of the existing strong answers straight away.

EGOL's point above was valid as well. The search for the Q&A itself is a bit weak and it could do with looking at other factors along with some weighting for good answers. The metrics to apply this weighting like the staff endorsements, good answer and thumbs are all there to make this possible, just needs a bit of back end wizadry.

Cheers
Marcus