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Yelp is a little more legit looking than most online complain/review sites and seems to be more legit than most complaint sites but don’t overlook the fact that they are still a complaint portal in the form of reviews. I have seen some pretty nasty reviews on this site about businesses.
Yelp provides online local search capabilities for its visitors. A typical search includes what the user is seeking (e.g. a barber shop) and the location from which the search is to be performed, entered as a specific address, neighborhood, city/state combination, or zip code. Each business listing result contains a 5-point rating, reviews from other site visitors, and details such as the business address, hours, accessibility, and parking. Site visitors can aid in keeping the business listings up to date, with moderator approval, and business owners can directly update their own business’ listing information.

Listings and related content are organized by city and a multi-tier categorization system. Content and listings can also be discovered through categorized reviews or via Yelp member profiles and their review lists. Maps leveraging Google Maps show reviewed businesses to further aid in business discovery.

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Yelp combines local reviews and social networking functionality to create a local online community. Adding social web functionality to user reviews creates a de-facto reputation system, whereby site visitors can see which contributing users are the most popular, respected, and prolific, how long each has been a member, and which have interests similar to theirs. Strong peer feedback mechanisms and the featured placement of popular reviews on the site and in local newsletters help motivate contributors. Yelp also applies a “First to Review” reward system to create a competition among contributing members, further motivating the creation of reviews and adding to the site’s business coverage.

The company strengthens the online community through off-line events at nightclubs, bars, restaurants, and cultural venues in various cities for its most prolific and loyal contributors named “Elite” members on the site. These members must provide a photo and their real name, be at least 21 years of age, and in return receive a special badge on their personalized page for every year they author a specific number of reviews. The concept is meant to indicate that the user is a trusted author of business reviews. The site also has a forum for online socialization and to discuss local businesses and events. A number of competitors emulating these Yelp concepts have failed or were acquired. Source: Wikipedia
Now the problem with Yelp:

There have been numerous reports from business owners that Yelp has been removing or not allowing new positive reviews to appear on their Yelp listings. Businesses have also said that Yelp has purportedly solicited funds from them in order to help improve their star ratings. Not only does yelp seem to help their paying client remove negative listings or keep them from appearing, they also seem to allow more negative items on non-paying member profiles. There has been a lot of negative press about this issue and you will find details about this issue if you simply Google the term “Yelp Scam”.

If your business is on Yelp and has a few reviews, good or bad, your Yelp listing will most likely appear high within Google search results when people search your name. This can be good or bad, depending on how your rating is with Yelp. If you have 5 stars and all positive reviews it may help your business. If you have a few negative reviews and a lower rating it may deter people from doing business with you.

Yelp is a ticking time bomb! Today your rating may be great and you are happy that the Yelp page about you ranks so high on Google, you might even link to it from your website. How are you going to react when a competitor or ex-employee or someone posts a couple of negative reviews about your business and causes your Yelp listing to be a pool of negativity?

Reputation management experts believe that if you push Yelp.com back 3-4 pages on Google when people search for your name then you won’t have to worry as much if you get negative complaints. The fact is only a small fraction/percent of searchers go past the first page of Google and even less go past the second page of results. The 3rd page or deeper is considered a tolerable zone for complaints to be on search results about your company.

To push a Yelp complaint further down search results you must get positive or neutral items about your company above the Yelp.com results. To get items above a link the items must out rank the link. You will need to use various search engine optimization techniques in order to push back the negative links.

A reputation management company can help you remove Yelp reviews and complaints. If you find your Yelp listing has come back to haunt you or you find that Yelp is hurting your business, contact ReputationArmor.com at 1-888-358-ARMOR or visit them online: Remove Yelp Reviews

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 at 8:56 am and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.