Google Ranking VS Yahoo
 

How does it work that you can rank # 1 or within the first three or so in a number of google listings for certain keywords or phrases and not even be on the radar on Yahoo or other search engines for exactly the same listing or visa versa - why is it so different ....

No rational explaination but my Yahoo ranking far exceeds Google's engine. Not sure how competitive search queries vary that much. I will accept the traffic either way. :)

They are different businesses, different algorithms, and have different goals with their search.

It takes strengths in different factors to rank well on both. It is fully possible to rank on both, just not very common for the average website.