Quora, like Google, takes into account a number of different ranking factors when deciding how to order the answers to a particular question. While Quora uses an upvote and downvote system, much like Reddit, rankings are more complex than that and take into account a number of different factors.
How Rankings Vary by User
According to Quora, the site’s algorithm ranks answers by “how helpful they are.” Obviously an algorithm can’t determine the subjective value of different answers, so Quora takes into account a number of different data points to decide the ranking of a particular answer. Moreover, those rankings are not static, and depend on the user who is viewing them. In the same way that Google takes into account your location and other interest factors into the order of their search results, Quora uses the data they have on each particular user to rank the visibility of different answers.
This applies not only to the rankings on each particular question’s page, but to the visibility each answer gets in the feeds of Quora users interested in that topic.
Given Quora’s tremendous success over the past five years, in terms of user growth, traffic and engagement on the platform, their answer ranking algorithm has appealed to a significant number of people. By adapting to the different interests and preferences of their users, Quora is able to keep users on their platform longer and grow their reputation as a trusted source for quality answers to people’s questions.
Quora’s goal is to keep users on the platform by providing the best fit for their questions. To prevent abuse and gaming of their system, Quora doesn’t publicize the specific algorithms they use to rank answers, but keeping in mind their goal of keeping users on the platform, they factor in the engagement that each answer gets for the question.
How to Increase Your Answer’s Rank on Quora
While Quora upvotes, author reputation, and the content of the answer as analyzed by Quora’s algorithm can all give you a good idea of how a particular answer will rank, the truth is there is no one perfect strategy to rank your answers highly because no ranking is the same for each user. Like search engine optimization, optimizing your answers for Quora depends on thinking from Quora’s perspective.
In terms of specific, actionable advice for you to take in your Quora marketing efforts, the following tips will put you at a good starting point:
- Write thorough and engaging answers to questions on the platform: This one is fairly obvious, but it’s the cornerstone around which all the other steps contribute. If you’re not providing quality content, you won’t engage users and won’t gain the valuable reputation as an “expert” in your topic on Quora.
Quora makes public that they factor in your previous answers and reputation in each topic in their ranking of answers, so make sure that each answer you write is of top quality. This will not only help you to rank on Quora’s algorithm, it will also build up your reputation and follower base among Quora’s organic users, allowing you to greatly amplify your message. - Optimize your content for Quora’s algorithm: While Quora’s algorithm is adaptive and intelligent enough to find the best answer for almost every user’s question, it still takes into account old school factors like word count, keyword density, and the inclusion of multimedia that helps to drive engagement. Most of the factors that will help here will also help you to improve the experience of the organic users reading your answer.
Where you can, include illustrative pictures, videos and other media. Keep this in mind particularly because much of the results your answer receives are dependent on engaging people scrolling through their Quora feed to look at your answer. Including relevant and interesting photographs will increase their engagement and in turn signal to Quora that your answer is of interest to viewers in that topic. It’s a powerful snowball effect that will allow you to quickly build up viewership for your answers and reputation in your field. - Quora’s voting system still matters: While Quora’s algorithm is effective at analyzing answers and ordering them, their voting system is still one of the most important ranking factors. You can have perfectly optimized content, months of reputable contributions in your field, and high engagement with your answer, and still lose out to another answer that receives a better ratio through Quora’s voting system.
Quora depends on the voting system as a signal of the community’s response to a particular answer, and it is one of the few immediately quantifiable factors in ranking your answer. Put simply, all else being equal, an answer with more upvotes and fewer downvotes will rank better than another. The voting system also factors in the voter’s reputations in that field, but it remains the easiest factor to influence once you’ve written a detailed, optimized answer for the question.
Boosting Your Quora Answers
Our services allow companies to buy Quora upvotes and easily increase their rankings in a specific question’s page or topic. Those Quora upvotes do more than just allow you to increase your rankings for that question, they also establish the account you’re answering from as an authority on the topic, and help get your answer to the critical mass of upvotes that allows it to appear in the feeds of more Quora users.
If you’ve followed the tips here, and written a high quality answer that addresses the question effectively, the initial boost provided by your Quora upvotes will allow your answer to benefit from a “snowball effect,” where its visibility increases as more users see and engage with your answer.
