There are a lot of question and answer services on the Web, some in the forum design, but it seemed that the most prominent in this sphere is Yahoo! Answers. Imagine a city-centric New York version of Yahoo! Answers, it leads me to AdviceYard, a Q&A site that anyone can use and post question about anything in NYC (New York City).
AdviceYard is a well-designed Q&A site with most of the questions are organized by NYC. The site has a very strong community focus, as all the questions posted must be categorized under any of the communities given, may it be beauty, style & fashion, going green, heath care, or the others. Of course, there is a scenario whereby certain questions are not given an answer, but if you find a good answer to a question posted, a user can rate a point to that answer for the recognition purpose. To further encourage users to get involve in a community, the idea is a user can register any of the communities he/she interested during the sign-up process.
For questions given to a particular topic, for instance, bar or karaoke places, you can get a more specific and objective opinion since this site is NYC centric. If you’re worry of keeping up with the questions you posted, there is a live notification feed in your profile.
On the business side, AdviceYard’s business model is relatively simple. Unlike Yahoo Answers and other Q&A sites, AdviceYard offers a premium membership which provides the ability to post business listings for a one-time fee ($60 for 6 months or $100 for 1 year). These listings are indexed in up to three (3) related communities, on the user’s profile page, and on a dedicated business page. An example of the business listing can be found here.
