Strange result in natural results

[salmo]

I have noticed a very strange result in the number 1 spot on Yahoo. A client has an agreement with another "SEO" company that apparently guarantees 500 clicks per month from Yahoo. We have worked with his site for a couple of years now and it ranks well over all of the big 3, in fact it's number 1 on Yahoo for his main search term.

So far so good. What I have noticed though is that at the beginning of the month the Title and description displayed in the serps are not the same as on the site itself. Once the 500 clicks have been used up though the Title and Description changes to reflect the meta data on the home page of the site. It's not a sponsored result but is the number 1 listing in the natural results.

Could there be some kind of cloaking at work here or does Yahoo have some kind of arrangement with certain companies to show specific results in the natural listings for certain times of the month?

[salmo]

I'd really like to hear anybody's thoughts, anything at all will help. I have discovered that my clients phone company arranges the 500 clicks. I don't know if I'm allowed to mention the company's name (bellsouth), apparently they are partners with Yahoo.

[tedster]

This sounds, at first blush, like it may be related to Yahoo's Trusted Feed program:

[searchmarketing.yahoo.com...]

The business about the changed listing after 500 clicks seems odd, but the company could be changing their xml feed after the 500th click is registered, I suppose.

[Shurik]

Few months back Yahoo overrode my site’s title with my company’s name. The site is not and has never been listed in Yahoo directory or ODP. The curious thing is that recently they changed it again to match searched keyword but it didn’t last. They reverted back the very next day. I’m not sure what they were trying to do but they definitely have an ability to change page titles dynamically to manipulate click thru.

[salmo]

Thanks for answering.