How to Use Quora for Business: The 7 Best Tips

Quora is a place where we can gain and share knowledge. From my marketing point of view, it is much more than an online platform for answering questions. There are about 300 million active Quora users. It’s the largest answer site out there. So you can reach a massive audience there.

We, as digital marketers, are constantly in need of generating traffic to our websites. Whether you use organic methods or paid advertising, what matters at the end of the day are your KPIs and, correct me if I am wrong, some of the most important ones for all of us are:

• a number of users on site
• those who signed up for a trial, or whatever your goal is
• and the conversion rate resulting from this.

Over the past few years, we’ve been fairly successful at generating quality traffic from Quora. It didn’t build up overnight. Finding the right questions to engage and crafting quality answers can be a time-consuming process, but it’s well worth it.

If you’ve ever wondered about Quora marketing, I am more than happy to share what’s learned and tested.

Here’s what you’re going to learn today:

• Why use Quora?
• How do I use Quora for business?
• How to discover relevant questions?
• Conclusion

In fact, I share my top 7 tips for Quora right inside this video:

My colleague Gloria (not pictured) and I have been answering Quora questions for more than two years now, and here are even more tips that I recommend implementing, whether you’re just starting with the platform or have already been around there for some time.

Why use Quora?

There are lots of reasons. Basically, it gives us great opportunities to promote our businesses.

I treat Quora as a mix of a user-generated content site, search engine, social media platform, and marketing and ads tool for companies.

You can create a profile, track topics, follow other Quora users, and make your own collections just like on other social media platforms. And what’s most important is that by adding interesting answers to relevant questions, you can reach a broad target audience. That’s right, use Quora wisely, then you will gain a wide reach.

How do I use Quora for business, then?

01 Create an intriguing bio!

This is just the first step but it’s crucial to your Quora success. When other users start coming across your answers, the first thing they are probably going to do is visit your profile page. You want to impress them, intrigue them, and give an impression of a thought leader who knows his ropes.

Choose a profile picture with your face clearly visible on it, bonus points for the big smile!

Add your job title and don’t forget to include a few words about yourself. You can tell about your job responsibilities, but also show your human face and include a few words about what your hobbies are, etc. Here’s what it looks like on my profile page:

Gloria, who taught me so much about Quora in the beginning, is another good example of a quality bio. She even has a video included there!

What adds even more credibility to your profile are the badges of a Top Quora Writer and Published Author. This is not entirely under your control, but if you earned those titles, a little brag about it wouldn’t hurt. Just have a look at the Credentials and Highlights section on the profile of Magda, our brand manager:

Once you have your profile ready, nothing holds you back from finding those questions you just can’t wait for valuable answers!

Don’t just shoot blindly and start answering any Quora questions you come across. While there are many of them that get hundreds of thousands or even millions of views, there are also those that don’t get that many views, let alone generating traffic to external sites.

More importantly, however, prepare a list of keywords that are relevant to what you want to market. Keywords that are related to your product or service and the benefits it provides to the users.

For example, we’re a media monitoring tool, so we want to engage and educate people about the benefits of media monitoring, but also about features such tools provide, such as sentiment analysis or finding influencers.

A tool like Answer the Public could be super helpful if you’re struggling with keyword ideas. Just type your keywords into the search bar on their site and you’ll discover different graphs presenting long-tail keywords related to your main keyword.

On top of that, I already mentioned benefits, and in our case, that would be discovering customer feedback, for instance. While it’s not a primary keyword that would come to your mind when thinking about a media monitoring tool, it’s certainly worth exploring such topics, and I recommend you think about keywords that apply to your product in a similar way – not directly but more related to what your product gives to the people.

Quora search is obviously your best bet when it comes to finding relevant discussions. You’ll be able to filter your keywords by:

• Type
• Topics
• Author
• And time

  

You might also take advantage of the fact that Quora ranks exceptionally well on Google. Just type your keywords into Google and add a formula site:quora.com, and a majority of results that come up will be different Quora questions containing a given keyword.

A few words of advice regarding the questions themselves. Each Quora question has a number of followers and views assigned to them. Ideally, you want those questions to have some engagement already, like in the example below:

This question has a number of followers that should get you a reasonable number of views once you get into the high position, and those more than 57 thousand views indicate that a question itself is getting significant Quora traffic your business could benefit from.

On the other hand, there are questions like the one below:

Very few followers and a low number of views won’t get you too far at this stage. There’s a huge difference between those two, mostly due to how long ago they were published. The former was posted 5 years ago while the latter only appeared on Quora last month. While the newer question can build up some traffic over time, these are those like example no. 1 that you want to target in the first place.

02 You have your list of keywords, found the perfect questions – let’s answer!

I know this sounds like a marketing cliche but it’s true – your most important goal here is to add value to the community. I assume you don’t want to lose your Quora account, right?

It’s kind of like Reddit – if you just go on Quora and start spamming with links here and there without providing people with quality and thoughtful answers, sooner rather than later Quora moderation team will come after you and it won’t take them too long to send you warnings, temporary editing bans, and a permanent ban, after all.

I should’ve mentioned that earlier, but I certainly recommended including the information about who you work for, both in your general bio and credentials displayed next to your answers on different topics.

If you’re on Quora for business, be authentic! Don’t act like you have the best product ever that has absolutely no flaws and is just perfect for everyone who’s looking for a product like yours. This feels like you’re trying to shove your product down your potential customers’ throats and nobody likes to feel this way.

To put that into perspective, when I am answering Quora questions about media monitoring, I don’t just rave about how awesome our tool is. Rather than that, I tell people what are the benefits of using such software, and not necessarily ours. I try to guide them and explain what they can do with the data collected by such tools.

Another good practice that adds authenticity is to mention some of your competitors. You don’t want to promote them, obviously, but adding links to sites other than just yours makes you less likely to be flagged as a spammer. I usually add that different people might require different specifics from tools and the fact that I consider one solution the best doesn’t mean it’s going to work like a charm for the person asking the question.

Also, if you’re aware of things that could be considered a flaw by some people, don’t be afraid to mention that. For example, our historical archive is limited and unfortunately, we won’t be able to track back in time as far as many people would like us to. I mention this every once in a while in my answers, just to add that authenticity bit that makes people more likely to click on my link even though I just mentioned something that could be perceived as a disadvantage of our tool.

03 A few words about editing

Now, that’s what I like a lot when it comes to creating content for Quora. It gives you quite a few possibilities to customize your answers. Other than obvious elements like bold, italics, or bullet points, you can add pictures and videos, quotations, lines of codes, or even embed tweets, just like I did in the example below:

You want your answers to stand out and using some of the elements I mentioned above will certainly help you with that. The three I use most frequently are bold, images, and videos.

However, don’t overload your answers with any of these. Using too many bold decreases the readability of your answers, and too many images or videos makes a person scroll and scroll through your answers while losing focus of what’s the point of your answer.

My recommendations would be to:

• use bold for titles of different paragraphs or maximum twice per paragraph
• maximum 3-4 images per answer
• no more than 2-3 videos per answer

Now, while I don’t know for sure how the Quora algorithm works, based on the experience of Gloria and myself, I can tell that enhancing your answers with visual content helps them rank higher.

We’ve both written over hundred answers over the last two years, some of them with both images and videos, some of them without, and I must say that answer having those additional media rank better.

Keep in mind that some Quora questions are highly competitive and have hundreds of answers to them already. There will be instances when even though you’ve written the best answer ever, added the pics and videos of the best quality, you still won’t make it to the very top of all the answers to a given question. Worry not, though, as you still will be able to generate traffic to your site.

04 Take your Quora marketing game a step further

I already mentioned that your time is best spent on answering a question that has a follower count higher than 10 and already a few thousand views. Sure, you can always answer the newest ones but you never know if they ever build enough traffic to pay you back.

Another tip would be to use Quora topics. The platform consists of thousands of them and each topic has its own page:

As you can see, there are different sections of each topic, such as Read, Answer, Links, Topic FAQ, and Most Viewed Writers. The last one is where you want to go to find questions that generate the biggest number of views on a given topic. This tab tells you exactly how many answers a user has on a particular topic.

Let’s say you click on the hyperlinked View 18 Answers that the Top 1 author in this topic wrote. You’ll be taken to his profile page and will only see those 18 questions that generated over 28 thousand views for this author in the last 30 days. This clearly indicates that he answered questions that have the potential to generate a substantial number of views for you as well.

You might as well click on Topic FAQ. This is a section of a topic page that anyone can edit.

As long as your answers are relevant to a given topic, you’re more than welcome to add them there. However, if you stuff too many of your answers in there, sooner or later Quora moderation team will remove them from this place.

The same applies to adding topics to questions – if they are irrelevant, they will be removed immediately. Here’s an example of what it looks like:

There are already 8 different topics added to this Quora question and you can still edit them by clicking on the pen icon. Not only can you add the new ones, but also remove some of them that are already there and you think they shouldn’t. In theory, the more topics there are there, the more views you should be generating, however, that’s not always the truth.

Also, if you try to game the system, you’re a lot more likely to get on moderators’ radar and nobody wants that, whether you’re a marketer trying to promote your business or simply an engaged member of a community trying to become a thought leader in some areas.

05 Mix things up a little

Don’t just answer questions related to the area of your expertise or try to promote your business every time you feel like engaging on Quora a bit. I bet you have some hobbies that you want to talk about and discuss different points of view. Share some personal stories! That’s how I took up writing about football. I am no pundit that tv channels would invite to their studios, but I have a fair bit of knowledge and opinions that I want to share.

This can significantly boost your Quora views and increase the exposure of your profile. On top of that, answering them increases your authenticity as a Quora user who’s not just there for marketing, but also contributing to a variety of topics he or she cares about.

One of my questions about the best right backs in the world already generated 15 thousand views and was upvoted 83 times. This is my second best answer, as far as the number of views are concerned. Not too shabby, huh?

The same thing applies to Gloria. She’s a community manager for IgersKrakow and, trust me, I don’t know anyone more knowledgeable than her when it comes to Instagram, and she shares her knowledge by answering tens of Instagram-related questions. The most successful got her 285 thousand views (!) and 67 upvotes, so my numbers pale in comparison to hers.

06 Consider Quora Ads

If you’re looking to take your Quora marketing game to the next level, consider using Quora ads. Quora advertising offers a variety of targeting options, including targeting specific questions and topics, as well as demographics such as age, gender, and location.

This can be a powerful tool for reaching your target audience and driving traffic to your website. However, just like with answering questions, it’s important to make sure your ads are adding value to the community and not just spamming. Keep in mind Quora’s guidelines and best practices when creating your ad campaigns to avoid being flagged or banned. To advertise on Quora, you’ll need a Quora Business account.

07 Quora for market research

Quora can prove to be a valuable platform for those seeking to enhance their marketing strategy through market research, establishing thought leadership and providing helpful answers to industry-related queries.

The site’s vast user base and diverse range of topics allow marketers to access insights and opinions from a broad pool of potential customers, enabling them to better understand their target audience and refine their brand messaging.

Additionally, the act of regularly sharing informed and well-crafted answers can establish oneself as a trusted authority in their industry, paving the way for increased visibility and brand recognition. By leveraging Quora in this manner, marketers can not only boost their marketing efforts but also drive genuine engagement and build lasting relationships with potential customers.

So how about posting some Quora answers about your interests?

How to discover relevant questions?

That’s probably one of the most critical questions. As I mentioned above, you can use Quora’s internal search engine to discover the right topics. It will require manually searching. But it is not the only way.

To be up to date, you can use the social listening tool and monitor Quora. All you have to do is to set up the project and monitor relevant keywords. Then the tool will show you all mentions containing those keywords. Voila! You can join the topic by posting your answer.

How to use Quora? Let’s wrap things up

I might not have mentioned this before, but the key to reaping the rewards from your activity on Quora is to be consistent. Find the time to answer at least a question a day, maybe even more. While at it, be authentic and share your knowledge to the best of your ability.

When you try to promote your business, don’t be too pushy and try to over-promise. On top of that, keep in mind that it’s worth mentioning both the pros and cons of what you offer. This will make you more trustworthy to the readers and indicate that you’re not there just to brag about your product.

To successfully use Quora for business, mix your professional knowledge with your hobbies, and you should be on your way to glory. 

As I mentioned initially, you won’t succeed overnight, but a snowball effect will start working in your favor the more you contribute to the platform.

FAQ

Are Quora ads worth it?

Yes, Quora ads are worth it. With over 300 million monthly users, Quora offers a unique advertising platform that allows businesses to reach an educated audience with their products and services. Quora users are more likely to have authorized a business purchase, hold a college degree, and have a higher annual household income than the average user.

Additionally, 63% of Quora users conduct research before major online purchases, making it an ideal first-stage-of-the-funnel platform. Quora’s advertising services may not offer the same level of data and dynamic content as Facebook and Google, but it has been shown to provide a significant return on investment for businesses.

While Facebook and Google Ads should remain the foundation of an online advertising strategy, supplementing with Quora Ads can help boost sales and brand authority.

Is Quora good for B2B marketing?

Yes, Quora can be an effective platform for B2B marketing. Quora users tend to be highly educated and often conduct research before making purchasing decisions, making it an ideal platform for B2B companies to establish themselves as thought leaders in their industry and provide helpful answers to potential customers.

What is Quora mostly used for?

Quora is primarily used as a platform where people can ask and answer specific questions related to a wide range of topics. It is a community-driven knowledge-sharing platform where users can seek out information on various subjects, share their expertise, and engage in discussions with other users.

Is Quora social media?

Yes, Quora can be considered a form of social media. While it is primarily a question-and-answer platform, it allows users to interact with each other, follow other users, upvote and downvote answers, and engage in discussions through comments. These features are characteristic of social media platforms, making Quora a hybrid platform that combines elements of social media and knowledge-sharing websites.