SHERMAN OAKS, Calif. - (Business Wire) Blending the best of algorithmic and human powered search,
Scour.com launched today as a meta social search engine which encourages voting and commentary on search engine query results called from Google, Yahoo! and MSN. Scour fosters community- building and enables discovery through user feedback, friends and groups while giving users control of the search parameters needed for accurate results based on their preferences.
“Scour gives people a different way to search by infusing the best search results available on the web, with a way to benefit from the previous work and feedback of millions of searchers,” said Daniel Yomtobian, president and CEO of Scour. “The concept is not new, but we believe we can bring the elements together better than some of the other engines have to date.”
Scour differentiates itself from other social search, ratings and community sites in that it:
- lets users vote and comment on search results
- provides superior privacy control
- gives weight to preferred engines
- lets people redeem search points for VISA gift cards.
Scour pulls search results from the top three search engines. From there it thrives on feedback to make the results ever more relevant. After enough votes on results, a search result can rise or fall in ranking which will make listings across all the engines more relevant on Scour.
Scour Rewards—How It Works
People can earn up to 4 points per search through a combination of actions:
- Search – 1 point
- Vote – 2 points
- Comment – 3 points
- Friend Referral – 25% of each friend’s points
In one scenario, an average of 4.5 searches per day translates into $25 a year. Then adding in referrals with an average of three searches per day for each user, 25 friends who sign up and use Scour could earn the user an additional $100+ a year.
Yomtobian adds, “We’re not trying to provide users with an alternative income, the Scour points program is a way for Scour to reward the user for helping build the community to refine search results beyond what the algorithms say.”
For a quick demo of the new site, check out the Scour How to video (http://youtube.com/watch?v=kWBI7F_bMQk).
ABCSearch, an Internext Media Corp. company and the world’s largest privately-held PPC search network, acquired AfterVote.com earlier this year.
AfterVote was previously named “Search Engine of the Month” by ReadWriteWeb, was included in the “Top 100 List of Alternative Search Engines” by AltSearchEngines and named to PC Magazine’s PCMag.com’s list of “Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites.”
ABOUT SCOUR.COM
Scour.com is a social search engine that bridges the gap between algorithmic and human powered search. Scour rewards people for searching, voting, commenting and referring friends. Launched in 2008, Scour was previously Aftervote.com, which was acquired by ABCSearch, an Internext Media Corp.company, in 2008. To learn more about Scour, visit www.scour.com.
PAN Communications
Ann Shannon, 978-474-1900
scour@pancomm.com
