Yandex Webmaster skill

Yandex Webmaster

Workflow

1. Setup & Verification

Verification methods:

• HTML file upload
• Meta tag: <meta name="yandex-verification" content="XXXX" />
• DNS TXT record
• WHOIS email verification

Post-verification:

• Submit sitemap: Settings → Sitemap files → Add
• Set main mirror: Settings → Site indexing → Main mirror (www vs non-www)
• Configure regional targeting: Settings → Regional targeting → Select regions

2. Yandex vs Google — Ranking Differences

3. Commercial Ranking Factors

Yandex explicitly values these for commercial queries:

4. Regional Targeting

Yandex assigns pages to specific regions. Critical for local businesses.

Set region in Yandex Webmaster: Settings → Regional targeting → Assign region per site section.

For multi-region businesses:

• Create separate regional landing pages (/moscow/, /spb/, /novosibirsk/)
• Each page should have region-specific content (not just city name swapped)
• Register in Yandex Business Directory for each location
• Add structured local data (address, phone per region)

5. Turbo Pages

Turbo pages are Yandex's AMP equivalent — ultra-fast mobile pages served from Yandex cache.

RSS feed implementation:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss xmlns:yandex="http://news.yandex.ru" xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/"
     xmlns:turbo="http://turbo.yandex.ru" version="2.0">
  <channel>
    <title>Site Name</title>
    <link>https://example.com</link>
    <turbo:analytics type="Yandex" id="XXXXXXXX"/>

    <item turbo="true">
      <title>Article Title</title>
      <link>https://example.com/article</link>
      <turbo:content>
        <![CDATA[
          <header>
            <h1>Article Title</h1>
            <figure>
              <img src="https://example.com/image.jpg"/>
            </figure>
          </header>
          <p>Article content goes here. Use standard HTML.</p>
          <h2>Subheading</h2>
          <p>More content with <a href="https://example.com">links</a>.</p>
        ]]>
      </turbo:content>
    </item>
  </channel>
</rss>

Submit: Turbo pages → Sources → Add RSS feed URL.

Turbo page benefits:

• 15x faster load time on mobile
• Higher position in mobile search results
• Yandex serves from their CDN (zero server load)
• Supports ads, analytics, forms, e-commerce widgets

6. ICS Quality Rating

ICS (Index of Citation for Sites) is Yandex's visible site quality score (0-10,000+).

Factors that improve ICS:

• Regular content updates
• User engagement metrics (low bounce, high dwell time)
• Backlink quality (Yandex values editorial links from relevant sites)
• Site age and history
• Presence in Yandex Business Directory
• Social signals (shares, mentions)

Check ICS: Yandex Webmaster → Site quality → ICS rating.

7. Yandex-Specific Meta Tags

<!-- Verification -->
<meta name="yandex-verification" content="XXXX" />

<!-- Control indexing -->
<meta name="robots" content="index, follow" />
<meta name="yandex" content="noyaca" />  <!-- Don't replace description with Yandex Catalog -->

<!-- Original source (for syndicated content) -->
<meta property="article:source" content="https://original-source.com/article" />

8. Yandex Webmaster API

import requests

headers = {"Authorization": f"OAuth {YANDEX_OAUTH_TOKEN}"}
host_id = "https:example.com:443"

# Get search queries
r = requests.get(
    f"https://api.webmaster.yandex.net/v4/user/{USER_ID}/hosts/{host_id}/search-queries/popular",
    headers=headers,
    params={"date_from": "2025-01-01", "date_to": "2025-01-31"}
)
for query in r.json().get("queries", []):
    print(query["query_text"], query["indicators"]["TOTAL_SHOWS"], query["indicators"]["TOTAL_CLICKS"])

Monthly Audit Checklist

• Check indexing status — pages indexed vs submitted
• Review ICS rating trend
• Analyze top queries and position changes
• Check Turbo page errors (if using)
• Verify regional targeting is correct
• Review crawl errors and excluded pages
• Compare Yandex vs Google performance for key queries
• Update sitemap if site structure changed