Small Businesses Now Can Fight Back Against Inaccurate Online Reviews
It’s a step in the right direction.
Yelp, the site where consumers posts reviews of local businesses such as restaurants, is soon going to allow small business owners the option to respond to negative reviews. Next Thursday, April 16, 2009, Yelp reportedly will be emailing its “elite” reviewers to explain the new feature.
The New York Times Bits blog reports:
With the new public comment feature, business owners will only be able to correct or add factual information, not advertise or argue. Comments will not be read before they are published but users will be able to flag inappropriate comments and Yelp’s customer service team will review them.
In the letter to elite reviewers, Yelp said that the goal is for comments to be pleasant and useful, not disparaging of reviewers. “For example, if you wrote a glowing 5-star review some months ago about your favorite pub, in which you mention drinking Harp because they didn’t carry Guinness both you and other readers would probably be happy to see a new comment saying, ‘Just got our Guinness tap last week,’” the letter said.
Online consumer reviews have been great for consumers to make informed choices. But the situation has been lopsided. A business owner could do nothing if there was an inaccurate review — say, something just plain wrong, like complaining about a poorly cooked menu item at a restaurant that doesn’t even serve that item. There also have been reports of nasty reviews written by competitors solely for the purpose of making the business look bad.
That meant that on top of every other challenge in your business, you also had to worry about your business getting trashed online. Yelp’s move at least levels the playing field a little.
Yelp has set up a business owner’s website where you can claim a business listed on Yelp already, or list your business on Yelp. There’s also a business owner’s guide that explains how Yelp works from the business’s perspective. The new policy change by Yelp allowing businesses to correct inaccurate negative reviews, does not yet appear officially on the site as of this writing.
Anita,
This is a great initiative! I remember the “angst” I had when I search on our company name and found a negative remark on an online “consumer forum”. The comment was made by an anonymous “chicken” due to a thank that is was signed with a “faceless” name. I didn’t want to “feed the troll”, so I didn’t respond to the nonconstructive criticism at first. Later on, I wrote an reply (signed with my full name) and gave the users to contact me by email if they wanted to discuss the matter further.
I see that Yelp has locations in both the U.S.A and Canada, and has started in the U.K. It would be great if it spreads around Europe and other places in the world.
I love their slogan on the blog: “Reaching for the fifth star.” Funny address:
“Yelp is located in sunny San Francisco, CA. Our mailing address is:
706 Mission Street”
I am sorry for the typos…
Should be:
when I searched… due to the fact… gave the users the possibility
Interesting piece:
http://www.forbes.com/2009/03/31/myspace-yelp-facebook-technology-myspace.html
Anita,
Thank you mentioning Yelp. There has certainly been a lot of PR lately about this new site, so now I will really have to check it out.
Thgak you again!
The Franchise King
Joel Libava
This is a very good initiative made by Yelp. being trashed online is I’m afraid that most of business owners least expected.
[...] More information about how to respond to Yelp reviews here: Small Businesses Now Can Fight Back Against Inaccurate Online Reviews [...]
This is excellent news. I’ve always wondered when I see nasty reviews, how much of it is honest and how much of it is competition.
I never thought it was fair because if someone decides to start a smear campaign online, its actually quite easy to do seen as how there are no restrictions or abilities to correct.
This is good news and I hope that many who didn’t deserve the negativity and got it – get to correct it.
I agree that this is excellent news. Something that started out so innocent has really turned into something ugly. I’m glad they are giving businesses a chance to fight back.
I have had mixed feelings about Yelp, but one of the main things I’ve found in my own use of it — is I simply discount and do not trust the majorly lopsided reviews. I like to think that the smart consumer sees through the garbage posts that Yelp has allowed or not monitored well. But that’s the nature of it, right? They want to allow every consumer sentiment.
This may irk some, but I just look the goofy, whining reviews, even the really negative ones as uneducated and unreasonable and decide for myself if I will give a place a try. I would like to see some research done to find out if businesses have actually lost business due to the reviews of Yelp. There have been some good articles recently that showcased how biz owners have fought back — one funny one where the owner used the review comments on t-shirts and turned the negative into fun by poking back at these reviews and reviewers.
I’m equally curious to hear from consumers or biz owners who have decided anything from Yelp. Did it move you one way or another?? My guess is that most business owners are a bit more savvy and don’t make decisions based on the mob….
[...] kind of scary happened last week. Yelp announced that they’ll soon let businesses respond to the critiques and the not-so-glowing reviews made against them on the site. I know, this should be good news, [...]
That is great to hear! I would rather buy from a site that has comments from the owners as well. They should have a chance to defend themselves.
[...] kind of scary happened last week. Yelp announced that they’ll soon let businesses respond to the critiques and the not-so-glowing reviews made against them on the site. I know, this should be good news, [...]
Yes this is great. A venue for business owners to “fight back”. But do you think this is healthy for your business? Or for you as the business owner?
People have really figured out how to manipulate this situation to their advantage and ruin its intended purpose. I’m glad to see that things will soon be changing. Abuse of this has hurt us all and we cannot always rely on the reviews of others as a result of the bad behavior of a few. Its about time someone took notice of whats been going on and hopefully, this will spread.
I’m happy thay we’ll have a chance to respond to negative comments. As long as business owners respond in a professional manner. It won’t reflect well on a business if they get defensive and respond in that manner. It will be interesting to see how this evolves.
Same here Don, I’m excited on how this will turn out. It’s a good thing that our fear of getting trashed online is at least lighten up a bit.
[...] Small Business Trends
[...] Small Business Trends
[...] Yelp’s announcement a few weeks ago, saying they will soon let businesses respond to the reviews they receive from the site’s users, Lisa Barone of Outspoken Media, wrote a great article on when and how businesses should respond to [...]
[...] so long ago, Yelp received quite a bit of attention when they began allowing business owners to respond to reviews left on the site. It was something SMB owners and others had been salivating for. And for good [...]
[...] things I chatted with Luther about was the feature released in April that allows business owners to publically respond to reviews left about them on the site. He noted that most business owners realize that coming in and being [...]
[...] Small Businesses Now Can Fight Back Against Inaccurate Online Reviews | Small Business Trends smallbiztrends.com/2009/04/small-businesses-fight-inaccurate-online-reviews.html – view page – cached It’s a step in the right direction. Yelp, the site where consumers posts reviews of local businesses such as restaurants, is soon going to allow small — From the page [...]
There should be a measure so the general public can determine the difference between “Hate” feedback and “Real deserved negative feedback” for businesses. Because as it is, you have sift through so many posts to get the real story on a business and its services. I’d like to see more.
[...] Small Business Trends recently did an article on the planned change on the yelp site allowing businesses to fight back on their negative reviews. Meaning, the customer could have had a bad day and over dramatized the situation, the customer may not have mentioned all the thing’s the business did to try and rectify the situation, etc. There are always two sides to every story, and now it loo’s as though small businesses are going to get their chance to tell their side of the story. Online consumer reviews have been great for consumers to make informed choices. But the situation has been lopsided. A business owner could do nothing if there was an inaccurate review — say, something just plain wrong, like complaining about a poorly cooked menu item at a restaurant that doesn’t even serve that item. There also have been reports of nasty reviews written by competitors solely for the purpose of making the business look bad. [...]
[...] time to sniff out Yelp and learn about all the ways it can help your business. From allowing you to fight back against inaccurate reviews, manage positive ones, and now even track consumer patterns, they’re providing a whole lot of [...]
Yelp is murder for small businesses. Unless you pay to advertise with them, they take your reviews off. FOr NO reason. It’s unfair and we need to start utilizing other venues like Manta.com and Foursquare.com
Please help!