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{{short description|Directory service and online review forum}} | |||
{{Infobox_Company | |||
{{About|the Internet company}} | |||
| company_name = Yelp, Inc. | |||
{{Good article}} | |||
| company_logo = ] | |||
{{Use mdy dates|date=May 2013}} | |||
| company_type = ] | |||
{{Use American English|date=August 2024}} | |||
| company_slogan = Real People. Real Reviews. | |||
{{Infobox website | |||
| foundation = October 2004 | |||
| traded_as = {{ubl|{{NYSE|YELP}}|] component}} | |||
| location = ] | |||
<!--| ISIN = US9858171054--> | |||
| key_people = Jeremy Stoppelman, Co-founder/], Russel Simmons, Co-founder/], and Geoff Donaker ] | |||
| |
| name = Yelp Inc. | ||
| |
| logo = Yelp Logo.svg | ||
| logo_size = | |||
| num_employees = 150+<ref name="BizJournal1">{{cite web|url=http://www.sanfrancisco.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2008/06/30/story1.html|title=Restaurants Learn to Yelp|publisher=San Francisco Business Times|date=2008-06-27|accessdate=2008-07-01}}</ref> | |||
| screenshot = Yelp Screenshot.jpg | |||
| homepage = | |||
| caption = Yelp.com homepage | |||
| collapsible = yes | |||
| collapsetext = Screenshot | |||
| company_type = ] | |||
| foundation = {{Start date and age|2004|10}} | |||
| owner = ] (6.3%) | |||
| founder = {{Unbulleted list|]|]}} | |||
| location = ] | |||
| location_city = {{nowrap|]}} | |||
| location_country = U.S. | |||
| key_people = {{Plain list| | |||
* ] (]) | |||
* Jed Nachman (]) | |||
* David Schwarzbach (]) | |||
}} | |||
| industry = ], business ratings and reviews, online food delivery, local homeowner services | |||
| products = ] | |||
| revenue = {{Increase}} {{US$|1.34 billion|link=yes}} (2023) | |||
| operating_income = {{Increase}} US$79 million (2023) | |||
| net_income = {{Increase}} US$99 million (2023) | |||
| assets = {{Decrease}} US$1.01 billion (2023) | |||
| equity = {{Increase}} US$750 million (2023) | |||
| num_employees = 4,872 (2023) | |||
| homepage = {{URL|https://yelp.com/}} | |||
| native_clients = ], ], ] | |||
| footnotes = References:<ref name=10K>{{cite web | url=https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1345016/000134501624000009/yelp-20231231.htm | title=Yelp, Inc. 2023 Form 10-K Annual Report | publisher=] |date=February 27, 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1345016/000134501622000034/a2022def14aproxystatement.htm#ideb506c1819f44679a73cc42b0cb3031_181 | title=Yelp, Inc. SCHEDULE 14A INFORMATION | publisher=] | date=April 22, 2022 | access-date=June 25, 2022 | archive-date=June 25, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220625080646/https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1345016/000134501622000034/a2022def14aproxystatement.htm#ideb506c1819f44679a73cc42b0cb3031_181 | url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
}} | }} | ||
'''Yelp Inc.''' is an American company that develops the Yelp.com website and the Yelp ], which publishes ] reviews about businesses. It also operates Yelp Guest Manager, a ] service. It is headquartered in ]. | |||
'''Yelp, Inc.''' is a ] company that operates a ], ], and ] web site of the same name. Over 31 million<ref>{{cite web|url=http://officialblog.yelp.com/2010/04/announcing-steps-to-avoid-confusion-increase-transparency.html|title=We're Increasing Transparency and Eliminating 'Favorite Review'|publisher=Yelp, Inc. Official Blog|date=2010-04-05|accessdate=2010-04-19}}</ref> people access Yelp's website each month, putting it in the top 150 of U.S. Internet web sites.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.quantcast.com/yelp.com|title=yelp.com (rank 88) - Web Site Audience Profiles from Quantcast|publisher=Quantcast|date=2008-07|accessdate=2008-08-19}}</ref> | |||
Yelp was founded in 2004 by former ] employees ] and ]. It has since become one of the leading sources of user-generated reviews and ratings for businesses. | |||
== History == | |||
Yelp grew in usage and raised several rounds of funding in the following years. By 2010, it had $30 million in revenue, and the website had published about 4.5 million crowd-sourced reviews. From 2009 to 2012, Yelp expanded throughout Europe and Asia. In 2009, it entered unsuccessful negotiations to be acquired by ]. Yelp became a ] via an ] in March 2012 and became profitable for the first time two years later.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/1861/119312512093131/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp, Form 424B4, Filing Date Mar 2, 2012 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140050/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/1861/119312512093131/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2445/114420414045812/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Jul 30, 2014 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140159/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2445/114420414045812/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
Yelp was founded by Jeremy Stoppelman and Russel Simmons, both of whom were early ] employees at ].<ref name="USAToday1">{{cite web|url=http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2007-06-12-yelp_N.htm|title='Yelpers' review local businesses|publisher=USA Today|date=2007-06-12|accessdate=2008-08-19}}</ref> After an aborted start as an email recommendation service,<ref name="Fortune1" /> Yelp launched its namesake web site into the ] market in October 2004.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/10/13/viral_yelp/|title=Yelp! A viral recommendation system you can't resist?|last=Orlowski|first=Andrew|publisher=http://www.theregister.co.uk/The Register|date=2004-10-13|accessdate=2008-08-19}}</ref> The company received $6 million in early funding from ] firms ], led by another former Paypal-er ], and ]. Additional investments were made in the amounts of $3 million by ] in 2006<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2006/10/02/daily35.html?from_rss=1|title=City guide Yelp raises $10M in second round|publisher=San Francisco Business Times|date=2006-10-05|accessdate=2008-08-19}}</ref> by ] ($3 million) and a private Investor from Laguna Beach ($5 million) in 2008.<ref name="CNET1">{{cite web|url=http://www.news.com/8301-13577_3-9880723-36.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5|title=Yelp yanks another $15 million|publisher=CNET News.com|date=2008-02-27|accessdate=2008-08-19}}</ref> Yelp expanded from its San Francisco roots to open an east coast office in ]<ref name="McCarthy">{{cite web|url=http://blog.wired.com/business/2008/02/a-mighty-yelp-r.html|title=A Mighty Yelp! Review Site Gets $15M|last=McCarthy|first=Megan |publisher=CondéNet, Inc|accessdate=2008-10-01}}</ref> in the first half of 2008 and by introducing a Canadian-focused version of the site in 2008.<ref name="Jensen">{{cite web|url=http://citymarketer.com/category/yelp/|title=Yelp bringing local reviews to your iPhone and the World|last=Jensen|first=Michael|date=2008-06-05|accessdate=2008-10-01}}</ref> As of 2008 Yelp's ] count overtook its predecessor and early rival, ].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/dining/05yelp.html?_r=2&8dpc&oref=slogin&oref=slogin|title=Eat and Tell|last=McNeil|first=Donald G.|publisher=New York Times|date=2008-11-04|accessdate=2008-11-06}}</ref><ref name="BizJournal1" /> Revenues were approximately $30 million for 2009, with $50 million in 2010.<ref name=tcs>{{cite news|publisher=Techcrunch|date=2009-12-17|title=Google In Discussions To Acquire Yelp For A Half Billion Dollars Or More|author=Michael Arrington|url=http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/12/17/google-acquire-buy-yelp/}}</ref> | |||
As of December 31, 2023, approximately 287 million reviews have been contributed to Yelp. In 2023, the company had over 36 million desktop unique visitors and over 60 million mobile web unique visitors. Yelp estimates that over 55% of its audience has an annual household income of more than $100,000.<ref>{{citation |author=Yelp, Inc. |title=Yelp, Inc., 2023 Form 10-K Annual Report |date=February 27, 2024 |pages=1,43,50 |url=https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001345016/eea8ade7-1139-4df8-ad3a-398d3f7c41d2.pdf |publisher=U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission}}</ref> | |||
On December 17, 2009, ] reported that Yelp was in "advanced" negotiations for ] to buy the company for more than $500 million.<ref name=tcs/><ref>{{cite news|publisher=TechFlash|author=Todd Bishop|url=http://www.techflash.com/seattle/2009/12/yelp_will_microsoft_make_a_bid.html|title=Google and Yelp working on deal: Will Microsoft put up a fight?|date=2009-12-18}}</ref> By December 21, the same source was reporting that Yelp's CEO had rejected the Google offer.<ref>{{Cite news|publisher=CNET|date=2009-12-21|title=Yelp bails on Google deal?|author=Caroline McCarthy|url=http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10419547-2.html}}</ref> | |||
The company has been accused of using unfair practices to raise revenue from the businesses that are reviewed on its site{{snd}} e.g., by presenting more negative review information for companies that do not purchase its advertising services or by prominently featuring advertisements of the competitors of such non-paying companies or conversely by excluding negative reviews from companies' overall rating on the basis that the reviews "are not currently recommended".<ref name="Yelp Support Center">{{cite web |title=Yelp Rating System |url=https://www.yelp-support.com/article/Why-would-a-review-not-be-recommended?l=en_US |website=Yelp |access-date=14 February 2020 |archive-date=September 7, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140907113451/https://www.yelp-support.com/article/Why-would-a-review-not-be-recommended?l=en_US |url-status=live }}</ref> There have also been complaints of aggressive and misleading tactics by some of its advertising sales representatives. The company's review system's reliability has also been affected by the submission of fake reviews by external users, such as false positive reviews submitted by a company to promote its own business or false negative reviews submitted about competing businesses{{snd}}a practice sometimes known as "]"{{snd}}which the company has tried to combat in various ways. | |||
== Products and services == | |||
=== Local search === | |||
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.<ref name="TechCrunch1">{{cite news|publisher=TechCrunch|author=Nick Gonzalez|url=http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/04/28/yelp-lets-businesses-fight-back/|title=Yelp Lets Businesses Fight Back|date=2008-04-28}}</ref> | |||
==Company history (2004–present)== | |||
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 ] show reviewed businesses to further aid in business discovery. | |||
===Origins (2004–2009)=== | |||
] | |||
Two former ] employees, ] and ], founded Yelp at a ], MRL Ventures, in 2004.<ref name=Australia/><ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> Stoppelman and Simmons conceived the initial idea for Yelp as an email-based referral network, after Stoppelman caught the flu<ref name=doctor>{{cite news |title=Search for Doctor Leads to Yelp | work=] | url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324595904578117512589717352 | first=Angus |last=Loten |date=November 14, 2012 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150115105623/http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324595904578117512589717352 |archive-date=January 15, 2015 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> and had a difficult time finding an online recommendation for a local doctor.<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/><ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2007-06-12-yelp_N.htm | title='Yelpers' review local businesses | first=Jefferson | last=Graham | work=] | date=June 12, 2007 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090622044014/http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2007-06-12-yelp_N.htm | archive-date=June 22, 2009 | df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref name=BigBreak>{{cite AV media | url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpDR3iii8HM |publisher=] | title=My Big Break: Yelp's 'Aha' moment | date=October 21, 2009 | via=] | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130725104641/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpDR3iii8HM | archive-date=July 25, 2013 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> ], the co-founders' former colleague as founding ] of PayPal and founder of MRL Ventures, provided $1 million in ].<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.bvp.com/memos/yelp | title=Yelp | work=Bessemer Venture Partners | date=October 3, 2005 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173713/https://www.bvp.com/memos/yelp | url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=AmbitiousPlan>{{cite news | title=Yelp's Ambitious Plan to Take Over the Local Ad Market |url=https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/07/23/100134489/index.htm | first=Jeffrey M. | last=O'Brien | work=] | date=July 10, 2007 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140817232337/http://archive.fortune.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/07/23/100134489/index.htm | archive-date=August 17, 2014 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> MRL co-founder David Galbraith, who instigated the local services project based on user reviews, came up with the name "Yelp".<ref>{{cite news | title=What do Yelp and Twitter have in common? | url=https://om.co/gigaom/what-do-yelp-and-twitter-have-in-common/ | first=Om | last=Malik | author-link=Om Malik}}</ref> Stoppelman explained that they decided on "Yelp" for the company's name because "it was short, memorable, easy to spell, and was familiar with 'the help' and ']{{'-}}".<ref>{{cite AV media | title=Inside Yelp: How The Company Got Its Name | url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lnw3hqsGsMM |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211219/Lnw3hqsGsMM |archive-date=2021-12-19 |url-status=live| publisher=Yelp | date=February 22, 2013 | via=]}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news | url=https://go.forrester.com/blogs/b2b-social-review-sites-to-consider/ | title=B2B Social Review Sites Are Becoming Mainstream: Here's What to Consider | first=Ian | last=Bruce | work=] | date=August 26, 2019 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173711/https://go.forrester.com/blogs/b2b-social-review-sites-to-consider/ | url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
Information can be accessed by web or mobile browsers. | |||
According to '']'', Yelp's initial email-based system was "convoluted".<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> The idea was rejected by investors and did not attract users beyond the cofounders' friends and family.<ref name="Chafkin"/> Usage data showed that users were not answering requests for referrals, but were using the "Real Reviews" feature, which allowed them to write reviews unsolicited.<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> According to '']'', "the site's popularity soared" after it was re-designed in late 2005 with the distinctive Burst ].<ref name="SFGate1">{{cite news |url=https://www.sfgate.com/living/article/CASTING-THE-NET-Yelp-is-on-the-way-2494549.php | work=] | title=Casting the Net: Yelp is on the way | first=Heather | last=Maddan | date=June 18, 2006 |url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100226134234/http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2006%2F06%2F18%2FLVGO9JDMDV1.DTL&type=printable | archive-date=February 26, 2010 | df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Yelp Brand Identity |url=https://read.cv/beingernst/bvEcvOLDYwh9YZE3n0iw |access-date=2023-07-17 |website=read.cv |archive-date=July 17, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230717221138/https://read.cv/beingernst/bvEcvOLDYwh9YZE3n0iw |url-status=live }}</ref> Yelp raised $5 million in funding in 2005 from ] and $10 million in November 2006 from ].<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> The number of reviewers on the site grew from 12,000 in 2005, to 100,000 in 2006.<ref name="Chafkin">{{cite news | url=https://www.inc.com/magazine/20100201/youve-been-yelped.html | title=You've Been Yelped | first=Max | last=Chafkin | work=] | date=February 1, 2010 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173711/https://www.inc.com/magazine/20100201/youve-been-yelped.html | url-status=live }}</ref> By the summer of 2006, the site had one million monthly visitors.<ref name="Chafkin"/> It raised $15 million in funding from ] in February 2008.<ref name="CNET1">{{cite news | url=https://www.cnet.com/news/yelp-yanks-another-15-million/ | first=Caroline | last=McCarthy | title=Yelp yanks another $15 million | website=] | date=February 27, 2008 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 9, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210509062104/https://www.cnet.com/news/yelp-yanks-another-15-million/ | url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="McCarthy">{{cite magazine | url=https://www.wired.com/2008/02/a-mighty-yelp-r/ | title=A Mighty Yelp! Review Site Gets $15M | last=McCarthy | first=Megan | magazine=] | date=February 2, 2008 | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080924173609/http://blog.wired.com/business/2008/02/a-mighty-yelp-r.html | archive-date=September 24, 2008 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> In 2010, ] invested $100 million; $75 million was spent on purchasing equity from employees and investors, while $25 million was invested in sales staff and expansion.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2010-01-27/yelp-gets-up-to-100-million-from-elevation-partners | title=Yelp Gets Up to $100 Million From Elevation Partners | first1=Douglas | last1=MacMilan | last2=Burrows| first2=Peter | work=] | date=January 27, 2010 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130107075807/http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jan2010/tc20100127_525405.htm | archive-date=January 7, 2013 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> Yelp grew from 6 million monthly visitors in 2007 to 16.5 million in 2008 and from 12 to 24 cities during the same time period. By 2009, the site had 4.5 million reviews.<ref name=Jumps/> By 2010, Yelp's revenues were estimated to be $30 million and it employed 300 people.<ref name="Chafkin"/> | |||
=== Community === | |||
Yelp combines local reviews and ]ing functionality to create a local ].<ref>{{cite news|title=Two Wrongs Make a Right|publisher=PC Magazine|date=2005-12-26|url=http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,1905864,00.asp}}</ref><ref name="WPost1">{{cite news|url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/03/AR2007070301345_pf.html|publisher=Washington Post|title=For Latest Reviews, Chefs Look Online|author=Seth Sutel|publisher=Associated Press|date=2007-07-03}}</ref> Adding ] functionality to user reviews creates a de-facto ], 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.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://bokardo.com/archives/social-design-patterns-for-reputation-systems-two/|title=Social Design Patterns for Reputation Systems:An Interview with Yahoo's Bryce Glass (Part II)|author=Joshua Porter|date=2008-06-25}}</ref> Strong peer feedback mechanisms and the featured placement of popular reviews on the site and in local newsletters help motivate contributors.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/why-yelp-works/|publisher=New York Times|author=Saul Hansell|date=2008-05-12|title=Why Yelp Works}}</ref> 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. | |||
===Private company (2009–2012)=== | |||
The company strengthens the online community through off-line events at ]s, bars, restaurants, and cultural venues in various cities for its most prolific and loyal contributors, named "Elite" members on the site.<ref name="Fortune1">{{cite web|url=http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/07/23/100134489/index.htm|title=Business paradigm shifts and free tequila shots|publisher=Fortune,CNN Money.com|first=Jeffrey M.|last=O'Brien|date=2007-07-10|accessdate=2008-08-20}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://news.cnet.com/Social-networks-geared-for-offline-success/2100-1038_3-6192780.html?hhTest=1|title= Social networks geared for offline success?|last=McCarthy|first=Caroline|publisher=CNet News|date=2007-06-22|accessdate=2008-08-19}}</ref> 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.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/05/27/understanding-community-leadership-an-interview-with-a-member-of-yelps-elite/|title= Understanding Community Leadership: An Interview with a Member of Yelp’s "Elite"|date=2008-05-28|accessdate=2008-08-20}}</ref> To gain Elite status, it is often helpful to be nominated by other Elite users but recognition is bestowed when one writes useful, funny or cool reviews so members can vote on those reviews.<ref>{{cite web|url=ttp://www.yelp.com/elite | |||
Yelp introduced a site for the United Kingdom in January 2009<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/pda/2009/jan/07/startups-digitalmedia|first=Jemima|last=Kiss|title=Reviews site Yelp is coming to the UK – and bringing the parties|newspaper=The Guardian|date=January 7, 2009|access-date=January 6, 2013|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130930232342/http://www.theguardian.com/media/pda/2009/jan/07/startups-digitalmedia|archive-date=September 30, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> and one for Canada that August.<ref name=Jumps>{{cite news | title=Yelp Jumps the Pond | first=Claire Cain | last=Miller |url=https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/08/yelp-jumps-the-pond/ | work=] |date=January 8, 2009 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140715004957/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/08/yelp-jumps-the-pond/ | archive-date=July 15, 2014 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> The first non-English Yelp site was introduced in France in 2010; users had the option to read and write content in French or English.<ref>{{cite news |title=Bon Appétit! Yelp Goes to France | url=https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/bon-appetit-yelp-goes-to-france/ | first=Claire Cain | last=Miller | work=] | date=May 5, 2010 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130117041924/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/bon-appetit-yelp-goes-to-france/ | archive-date=January 17, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> From 2010 to 2011, Yelp launched several more sites, in Austria, Germany, Spain, and the Netherlands. International website traffic doubled during the same time period.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://techcrunch.com/2011/05/11/yelp-spain/ | title=Yelp Moves To Spain As International Traffic Doubles | last=Schonfeld | first=Erick |work=] | date=May 21, 2011 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130225111412/http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/11/yelp-spain/ | archive-date=February 25, 2013 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> An Australian website went live in November 2011.<ref name=Australia>{{cite news |url=https://www.inc.com/news/articles/201111/yelp-goes-live-in-australia-as-it-prepares-for-ipo.html |title=Yelp Goes Live in Australia as It Prepares for IPO |first=Courtney |last=Rubin |work=] |date=November 30, 2011 |access-date=May 8, 2021 |archive-date=April 18, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210418190107/https://www.inc.com/news/articles/201111/yelp-goes-live-in-australia-as-it-prepares-for-ipo.html |url-status=live }}</ref> It was supported through a partnership with ], which provided one million initial business listings,<ref name=yelpaus>{{cite news |title=Review site Yelp goes live in Australia |url=https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/review-site-yelp-goes-live-in-australia/news-story/71de38e2cc2466841af701e438d88a42 |last=Griffith |first=Chris | work=] | date=November 30, 2011 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111206094618/http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/review-site-yelp-goes-live-in-australia/story-e6frgakx-1226209758508 |archive-date=December 6, 2011 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> and was initially glitchy.<ref>{{cite web|title=Yelp lands in Aus with some help from Telstra|website=The Register|first=Natalie|last=Apostolou|date=November 30, 2011|access-date=January 6, 2013|url=https://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/30/yelp_launches_downunder/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121231083024/http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/30/yelp_launches_downunder/|archive-date=December 31, 2012|df=mdy-all}}</ref> By the end of 2012, Yelp was publishing reviews for establishments in 20 countries, including Turkey<ref name="CNet">{{cite web | url=http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57558878-93/yelp-takes-its-reviews-to-turey/ | title=Yelp takes its reviews to Turkey | website=CNET | date=December 12, 2012 | access-date=November 13, 2013 | author=Musli, Steve | archive-date=July 14, 2014 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714140043/http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57558878-93/yelp-takes-its-reviews-to-turey/ | url-status=unfit }}</ref> and Denmark.<ref name="NYSE">{{cite web | url=http://www.nysemagazine.com/statics/NYSE_Fall_2012.pdf | title=Word On the Street | magazine=NYSE magazine | date=Fall 2012 | access-date=September 15, 2013 | author=McNichol, Tom | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130921054354/http://www.nysemagazine.com/statics/NYSE_Fall_2012.pdf | archive-date=September 21, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> Yelp's first site in Asia was introduced in September 2012 in Singapore,<ref name=doctor/> which was followed by Japan in 2014.<ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp goes live in Japan, its second country launch in Asia|publisher=The Next Web|url=https://thenextweb.com/asia/2014/04/09/yelp-goes-live-in-japan-its-second-country-launch-in-asia/|date=April 9, 2014|access-date=September 8, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150629001655/http://thenextweb.com/asia/2014/04/09/yelp-goes-live-in-japan-its-second-country-launch-in-asia/|archive-date=June 29, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
/|title=Yelp Elite Squad|accessdate=2009-10-06}}</ref> | |||
In December 2009, ] entered into negotiations with Yelp to acquire the company,<ref>{{cite news| title=Google Bids for Yelp's Online Local Ad Communities |first=Douglas |last=MacMillan | work=] | date=December 18, 2009 | url-access=subscription | url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2009-12-18/google-bids-for-yelps-online-local-ad-communities |url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110831153424/http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/dec2009/tc20091218_024906.htm| archive-date=August 31, 2011 |df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Google Said to Be Near a Yelp Deal |first=Claire|last=Miller | work=]|date=December 18, 2009 | url-access=limited |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/19/technology/companies/19yelp.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130521204733/http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/19/technology/companies/19yelp.html?_r=1&ref=technology |archive-date=May 21, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> but the two parties failed to reach an agreement.<ref name="NYT 2009">{{cite news | url=http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/21/yelp-turns-down-google-for-now/ | title=Yelp Turns Down Google, for Now | last=Miller | first=Claire Cain | work=] | date=December 21, 2009 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130407050606/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/21/yelp-turns-down-google-for-now/ | archive-date=April 7, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=December 21, 2009 |title=Yelp bails on Google deal? |last=McCarthy |first=Caroline | url=https://www.cnet.com/news/yelp-bails-on-google-deal/ | website=] | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131001211728/http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10419547-2.html |archive-date=October 1, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> According to '']'', Google offered about $500 million, but the deal fell through after ] offered $1 billion.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-02/stoppelman-standing-up-to-investors-leads-to-yelp-ipo.html | title=Yelp's Stoppelman Leads IPO by Snubbing Google, Yahoo Offers | last=Kucera | first=Danielle | work=] | date=March 2, 2012 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130921230845/http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-02/stoppelman-standing-up-to-investors-leads-to-yelp-ipo.html | archive-date=September 21, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> ] reported that Google refused to match Yahoo's offer. Both offers were later abandoned following a disagreement between Yelp's management and board of directors about the offers.<ref>{{cite news | title=The Ugliest Girl at the Dance: How Yahoo Destroyed Yelp's Google Acquisition |url=https://techcrunch.com/2010/10/01/the-ugliest-girl-at-the-dance-how-yahoo-destroyed-yelps-google-acquisition/ |first=Michael| last=Arrington| author-link=Michael Arrington|work=] |date=October 1, 2010 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130101005446/http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/01/the-ugliest-girl-at-the-dance-how-yahoo-destroyed-yelps-google-acquisition/ |archive-date=January 1, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> In June 2015, Yelp published a study alleging Google was altering search results to benefit its own online services.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.vox.com/2015/6/29/11563936/yelp-teams-with-legal-star-tim-wu-to-trounce-google-in-new-study | title=Google Manipulates Search Results, According to Study From Yelp and Legal Star Tim Wu | first=Mark | last=Bergen | work=] | date=June 29, 2015 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150702000257/http://recode.net/2015/06/29/yelp-teams-with-legal-star-tim-wu-to-trounce-google-in-new-study/ | archive-date=July 2, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB11064341213388534269604581077241146083956 | |||
The site also has a ] for online socialization and to discuss local businesses and events.<ref name="SFGate1">{{cite news|url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/06/18/LVGO9JDMDV1.DTL&type=printable|publisher=San Francisco Chronicle|title=Casting the Net:Yelp is on the way|author=Heather Maddan|date=2006-06-18}}</ref> | |||
| last=Fairless | first=Tom | title=Study Suggests Google Harms Consumers by Skewing Search Results | website=] | date=June 29, 2015 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150702035829/http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB11064341213388534269604581077241146083956 | archive-date=July 2, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> | |||
Yelp began a service called Yelp Deals in April 2011,<ref>{{cite news | url=https://techcrunch.com/2011/06/29/yelp-deals-mobile-groupon/ |title=Yelp Brings Local Deals to Mobile and Gives Groupon Now a Run for its Money | first=Erick |last=Schonfeld |work=] |date=June 29, 2011 | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130404085356/http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/29/yelp-deals-mobile-groupon/ |archive-date=April 4, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> but by August it cut back on Deals due to increased competition and market saturation.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-29/yelp-scales-back-deal-service-as-competition-rises-for-internet-coupons.html |first=Douglas |last=MacMillan | work=] |date=August 30, 2011 | url-access=subscription |title=Yelp Follows Facebook in Scaling Back Daily-Deal Service |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131104182920/http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-29/yelp-scales-back-deal-service-as-competition-rises-for-internet-coupons.html |archive-date=November 4, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> That September, the ] investigated Yelp's allegations that Google was using Yelp web content without authorization and that Google's ]s favored ] over similar services provided by Yelp.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://venturebeat.com/2011/09/21/yelp-joins-antitrust-lawsuit-against-google/ |title=Yelp cooperating with FTC on antitrust lawsuit against Google | first=Tom |last=Cheredar |work=] |date=September 21, 2011 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130208093359/http://venturebeat.com/2011/09/21/yelp-joins-antitrust-lawsuit-against-google/ |archive-date=February 8, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-antitrust-hearing-today/33777/ | title=Yelp Hopes to Serve Grilled Google: Antitrust Hearing Today | first=David | last=Angotti | work=] | date=September 21, 2011 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111228144915/http://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-antitrust-hearing-today/33777/ |archive-date=December 28, 2011 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> In order to avoid an FTC anti-trust lawsuit, in January 2014, Google agreed to allow services like Yelp the ability to opt out of having their data scraped and used on Google's websites.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.pcworld.com/article/2023719/googles-ftc-antitrust-deal-top-takeaways-and-challenges.html |title=Google's FTC antitrust deal: Top takeaways and challenges | work=] | date=January 4, 2013 |first=Ian |last=Paul |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714235122/http://www.pcworld.com/article/2023719/googles-ftc-antitrust-deal-top-takeaways-and-challenges.html |archive-date=July 14, 2014 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
A number of competitors emulating these Yelp concepts have failed or were acquired.<ref name="TechCrunch1">{{cite news|title=Angry Businesses Organize Anti-Yelp Websites. This Is A Sure Sign Of Their Success.|publisher=TechCrunch|author=Calley Nye|url=http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/02/angry-businesses-organize-anti-yelp-websites-this-is-a-sure-sign-of-their-success/|date=2008-07-02}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|publisher=TechCrunch|author=Michael Arrington|url=http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/10/23/judys-book-to-shut-down-yelp-is-the-last-of-the-local-review-sites-still-standing/|date=2007-10-23|title=Judy's Book To Shut Down. Yelp Is The Last of The Local Review Sites Still Standing}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|publisher=VentureBeat|title=Citysearch snaps up Insider Pages in local search race|author=Matt Marshall|date=2008-02-27|url=http://venturebeat.com/tag/coinsider-pages/}}</ref> | |||
=== |
===Public entity (2012–present)=== | ||
] | |||
The Yelp sites have listings for businesses throughout the United States and Canada and accept reviews of any business or service.<ref name="USAToday1" /> Listings vary widely in nature with the site including listings for storefronts such as restaurants and shops; service businesses such as doctors, hotels, and cultural venues; and non-business locations such as schools, museums, parks, and churches.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/13/yelp_sales_pitch/|title=Yelp Sales Pitch|date=2008-08-13|publisher=The Register|accessdate=2008-08-20}}</ref> | |||
] building in San Francisco, Yelp's former headquarters]] | |||
Having filed for an ] (IPO) with the ] in November 2011,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://pdf.secdatabase.com/1033/0001193125-11-315562.pdf |title=Yelp! Inc, Form S-1, Filing Date Nov 17, 2011 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140730/http://pdf.secdatabase.com/1033/0001193125-11-315562.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Yelp Files for I.P.O.|first=Evelyn |last=Rusli |url=https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/yelp-files-for-i-p-o/ |date=November 17, 2011 | work=] | url-access=limited | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130111163357/http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/yelp-files-for-i-p-o/ |archive-date=January 11, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Yelp Files to Raise $100 Million in Initial Public Offering |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2011-11-17/yelp-files-to-raise-100m-in-ipo | work=] |first=Douglas |last=MacMillan |date=November 17, 2011 | url-access=subscription |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130105185229/http://www.businessweek.com/technology/yelp-files-to-raise-100-million-in-initial-public-offering-11172011.html |archive-date=January 5, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> Yelp's stock began public trading on the ] on March 2, 2012.<ref>{{cite press release | url=https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/yelp-prices-initial-public-offering-141125413.html | title=Yelp Prices Initial Public Offering | publisher=] | date=March 1, 2012 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173710/https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/yelp-prices-initial-public-offering-141125413.html | url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.marketwatch.com/story/yelp-prices-ipo-at-15share-above-expected-range-2012-03-01 | title=Yelp prices IPO at $15/share, above expected range | first=Dan | last=Gallagher | work=] | date=March 1, 2012 | url-access=limited | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173711/https://www.marketwatch.com/story/yelp-prices-ipo-at-15share-above-expected-range-2012-03-01 | url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://pdf.secdatabase.com/1861/0001193125-12-093131.pdf |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 424B4, Filing Date Mar 2, 2012 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140823/http://pdf.secdatabase.com/1861/0001193125-12-093131.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Yelp Prices Its Offering at $15 a Share |url=https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/03/01/yelp-prices-its-offering-at-15-a-share/ |first=Evelyn |last=Rusli |date=March 1, 2012 | work=] | url-access=subscription |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121226062225/http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/03/01/yelp-prices-its-offering-at-15-a-share/ |archive-date=December 26, 2012|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://money.cnn.com/2012/03/02/technology/yelp_ipo/ | title=Yelp shares soar more than 60% in IPO | first=Julianne | last=Pepitone |date=March 2, 2012 |work=] | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120505204823/http://money.cnn.com/2012/03/02/technology/yelp_ipo/ |archive-date=May 5, 2012 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> In 2012, Yelp acquired its largest European rival, ], for $50 million.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2279/119312512432436/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Oct 24, 2012 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140506/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2279/119312512432436/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=doctor/> The following year, CEO ] reduced his salary to $1.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/1291/119312513046243/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Feb 8, 2013 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140942/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/1291/119312513046243/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|first=Jennifer|last=Grove|url=http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57568512-93/yelp-ceo-takes-$1-salary/|title=Yelp CEO takes $1 Salary|date=February 8, 2013|access-date=February 14, 2013|website=CNET|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130921054423/http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57568512-93/yelp-ceo-takes-$1-salary/|archive-date=September 21, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Yelp acquired start-up online reservation company SeatMe for $12.7 million in cash and stock in 2013.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Jul-2013-8-K">{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/856/119312513300723/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Jul 24, 2013 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140711/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/856/119312513300723/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine | url=https://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2422049,00.asp | title=Yelp Buys Online Reservation Service SeatMe | last=Milot | first=Stephanie | magazine=] | date=July 19, 2013 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130925120242/http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2422049,00.asp | archive-date=September 25, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite news | title=Yelp to acquire restaurant reservation service SeatMe to take on OpenTable |url=https://www.theverge.com/2013/7/18/4536038/yelp-purchasing-seatme-restaurant-reservation | last=Kastrenakes| first=Jacob |work=] |publisher=] |date= July 18, 2013 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170202040600/http://www.theverge.com/2013/7/18/4536038/yelp-purchasing-seatme-restaurant-reservation | archive-date=February 2, 2017 | df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | title=Yelp To Acquire Online Reservation Service SeatMe For Up To $12.7M |url=https://techcrunch.com/2013/07/18/yelp-acquires-online-reservation-service-seatme/ | last=Kumparak | first=Greg | work=] | date=July 13, 2013 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170202041047/https://techcrunch.com/2013/07/18/yelp-acquires-online-reservation-service-seatme/ |archive-date=February 2, 2017 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> Yelp's second quarter 2013 revenue of $55 million "exceeded expectations", but the company was not yet profitable.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Aug-2013-10-Q">{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2050/120677413002644/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 10-Q, Quarterly Report, Filing Date Aug 2, 2013 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140910/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2050/120677413002644/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="CNN September 2013">{{cite web | url=http://fortune.com/2013/09/19/yelps-jeremy-stoppelman-will-do-it-his-way/ | title=Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman ignored advice from Peter Thiel and Elon Musk and succeeded anyway | publisher=CNN | date=September 19, 2013 | access-date=September 25, 2013 | last=Roberts | first=Daniel | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140819082024/http://fortune.com/2013/09/19/yelps-jeremy-stoppelman-will-do-it-his-way/ | archive-date=August 19, 2014 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> | |||
In 2012/13, Yelp moved into its new corporate headquarters, occupying about 150,000 square feet on 12 floors of ] (the former PacBell building) in San Francisco.<ref>{{cite news|first=Sharon|last=Simonson|url=http://news.theregistrysf.com/yelp-occupies-140-new-montgomery/|title=Yelp Occupies 140 New Montgomery|newspaper=The Registry SF|date=August 19, 2013|access-date=February 8, 2015|archive-date=January 22, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150122082142/http://news.theregistrysf.com/yelp-occupies-140-new-montgomery/|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
San Francisco, the home city, remains the most active as of 2008, with significant adoption in 18 metro areas including Boston, Chicago, New York, Washington, D.C., San Diego, and Los Angeles.<ref name="BizJournal1" /> San Francisco usage has earned the site over 4000 reviewed restaurant listings, some with hundreds of reviews each.<ref name="BizJournal1" /> The site boasts of having over 2.3 million reviews overall as of February 2008.<ref name="CNET1" /> Reviews trend 85% positive as estimated by the CEO<ref name="WPost1" /> and are thought to come primarily from the 26-35yo ].<ref name="SFGate1" /> | |||
The company was profitable for the first time in the second quarter of 2014,<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Aug-2013-10-Q"/> as a result of increasing ad spending by business owners and possibly from changes in Google's local search algorithm.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.webpronews.com/yelp-becomes-profitable-for-first-time-since-going-public-2014-07|publisher=WebProNews|title=Yelp Becomes Profitable For First Time Since Going Public|first=Chris|last=Crum|date=July 30, 2014|access-date=September 1, 2014|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140817182034/http://www.webpronews.com/yelp-becomes-profitable-for-first-time-since-going-public-2014-07|archive-date=August 17, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> The algorithm dubbed ] made authoritative local directory sites like Yelp and ] more visible.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://searchengineland.com/googles-pigeon-update-solves-yelp-problem-boosts-local-directories-197949|publisher=searchengineland.com|title=Google's Pigeon Update Solves Yelp Problem, Boosts Local Directories|date=July 25, 2014|access-date=May 18, 2016|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160603232519/http://searchengineland.com/googles-pigeon-update-solves-yelp-problem-boosts-local-directories-197949|archive-date=June 3, 2016|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Over the course of the year, Yelp websites were launched in Mexico, Japan, and Argentina.<ref>{{cite news|title=The Toxic, Abusive, Addictive, Supportive, Codependent Relationship Between Chefs and Yelpers|first=Rebecca|last=Marx|date=July 28, 2014|url=http://www.modernluxury.com/san-francisco/story/the-toxic-abusive-addictive-supportive-codependent-relationship-between-chefs-an|newspaper=San Francisco Magazine|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140917113709/http://www.modernluxury.com/san-francisco/story/the-toxic-abusive-addictive-supportive-codependent-relationship-between-chefs-an|archive-date=September 17, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Also in 2014, Yelp expanded in Europe through the acquisitions of German-based restaurant ] Restaurant-Kritik and French-based CityVox.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Feb-2015-10-K">{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2722/120677415000650/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 10-K, Annual Report, Filing Date Feb 27, 2015 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502211252/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2722/120677415000650/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp makes Europe its mission with back-to-back acquisitions|first=Benjamin|last=Snyder|date=October 28, 2014|url=http://fortune.com/2014/10/28/yelp-makes-europe-its-mission-with-back-to-back-acquisitions/|newspaper=Fortune Magazine|access-date=November 13, 2014|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141105104434/http://fortune.com/2014/10/28/yelp-makes-europe-its-mission-with-back-to-back-acquisitions/|archive-date=November 5, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp Says Oui, Adds French Online Review Site Cityvox|first=Michele|last=Chandler|date=October 28, 2014|url=http://news.investors.com/technology/102814-723801-yelp-acquires-french-review-site.htm|access-date=November 13, 2014|newspaper=Investors Business Daily|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150122081558/http://news.investors.com/technology/102814-723801-yelp-acquires-french-review-site.htm|archive-date=January 22, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
=== API === | |||
Yelp released a free ]- and ]-based application programming interface (]) in ].<ref name="TechCrunch1" /> The API provides access to business listing details, reviews, photos, and ratings and can be used to add business information to a website, widget, or mobile application.<ref name="apidoc"></ref> The API has been used to integrate business reviews into existing Google Maps applications such as on ] and . | |||
In early February 2015, Yelp announced it bought Eat24, an online food-ordering service, for $134 million.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Feb-2015-8-K">{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2510/120677415000438/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Feb 10, 2015 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502211001/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2510/120677415000438/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/10/yelp-buys-eat24-an-online-food-ordering-service-for-134-million/?_r=2|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=February 12, 2015|title=Yelp Buys Eat24, an Online Food-Ordering Service, for $134 Million|first=Mike|last=Isaac|date=February 10, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150428051250/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/10/yelp-buys-eat24-an-online-food-ordering-service-for-134-million/?_r=2|archive-date=April 28, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.ibtimes.com/yelp-inc-yelp-stock-leaps-7-after-review-website-buys-eat24-134m-rival-grubhub-inc-1811418|title=Yelp Inc (YELP) Stock Leaps 7% After Review Website Buys Eat24 For $134M, Rival GrubHub Inc (GRUB) Drops 2%|newspaper=International Business Times|access-date=June 17, 2015|first=Jessica|last=Menton|date=February 10, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150820052109/http://www.ibtimes.com/yelp-inc-yelp-stock-leaps-7-after-review-website-buys-eat24-134m-rival-grubhub-inc-1811418|archive-date=August 20, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Then in August 2017, Yelp sold Eat24 to ] for $287.5 million.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Aug-2017-8-K">{{cite web |url=http://pdf.secdatabase.com/1612/0001157523-17-002288.pdf |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Aug 3, 2017 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502211126/http://pdf.secdatabase.com/1612/0001157523-17-002288.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/3/16092270/yelp-sells-eat24-to-grubhub|title=Yelp is selling Eat24 to GrubHub for $287.5 million|last=Kastrenakes|first=Jacob|date=3 August 2017|work=]|access-date=3 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170803234032/https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/3/16092270/yelp-sells-eat24-to-grubhub|archive-date=August 3, 2017|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref> The acquisition resulted in a partnership to integrate Grubhub delivery into the Yelp profiles of restaurants.<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-selling-eat24-grubhub-287-million-2017-8?op=1|title=Yelp's stock is skyrocketing on the news that it's selling Eat24 for $287.5 million to Grubhub|last=Oreskovic|first=Alexei|date=3 August 2017|work=]|access-date=3 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170804174355/http://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-selling-eat24-grubhub-287-million-2017-8?op=1|archive-date=August 4, 2017|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
=== Facebook Beacon integration === | |||
In December 2007 Yelp implemented ]. Changes to the site ] were made to accommodate this feature, which experienced some negative press at the time.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pcworld.com/article/140182/facebooks_beacon_more_intrusive_than_previously_thought.html|title=Facebook's Beacon More Intrusive Than Previously Thought|date=2007-11-30|first=Juan Carlos|last=Perez|publisher=PC World|accessdate=2008-08-20}}</ref> | |||
In late 2015, a "Public Services & Government" section was introduced to Yelp, and the ] began encouraging government agencies to create and monitor official government pages.<ref name="Washington Post 2015">{{cite news | title=The federal government wants you to review it on Yelp | newspaper=Washington Post | first=Lisa | last=Rein | date=August 18, 2015 | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/federal-eye/wp/2015/08/18/the-federal-government-wants-you-to-review-it-on-yelp/ | access-date=February 9, 2016 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160210003112/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/federal-eye/wp/2015/08/18/the-federal-government-wants-you-to-review-it-on-yelp/ | archive-date=February 10, 2016 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> For example, the ] created official TSA Yelp pages.<ref>{{cite web | last=Griggs | first=Brandon | title=Rude TSA agent? Review them on Yelp | website=CNN | date=August 20, 2015 | url=http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/20/travel/tsa-yelp-reviews-feat/index.html | access-date=August 20, 2015 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150821084948/http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/20/travel/tsa-yelp-reviews-feat/index.html | archive-date=August 21, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | last=Berman | first=Russell | title=Uncle Sam Wants You—to Write Reviews on Yelp | website=The Atlantic | date=August 19, 2015 | url=https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/08/can-yelp-make-government-agencies-work-better/401825/ | access-date=August 20, 2015 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150820230751/http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/08/can-yelp-make-government-agencies-work-better/401825/ | archive-date=August 20, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> Later that year Yelp began experimenting in San Francisco with consumer alerts that were added to pages about restaurants with poor hygiene scores in government inspections.<ref name="washingtonpost">{{cite news | title=How Yelp plans to clean up one of the restaurant industry's most dangerous flaws | newspaper=Washington Post | date=October 27, 2015 | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/27/how-yelp-plans-to-clean-up-one-of-the-restaurant-industrys-most-dangerous-flaws/ | access-date=October 27, 2015 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151028025809/http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/27/how-yelp-plans-to-clean-up-one-of-the-restaurant-industrys-most-dangerous-flaws/ | archive-date=October 28, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> Research conducted by the ] found that Yelp reviews with keywords associated with food poisoning correlates strongly with poor hygiene at the restaurant. Researchers at ] used data from Yelp to identify three previously unreported restaurant-related food poisoning outbreaks.<ref>{{cite web | last=Ostrov | first=Barbara Feder | title=Can Yelp help track food poisoning outbreaks? | website=CNN | date=October 26, 2015 | url=http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/26/health/yelp-food-poisoning/index.html | access-date=October 27, 2015 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151026204925/http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/26/health/yelp-food-poisoning/index.html | archive-date=October 26, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> | |||
=== Advertising program === | |||
Businesses may advertise with Yelp for preferred search result placement and extra listing features. For the advertising fee, the business may include an individualized message and photo slide show onto the web page for its listing as well as receive reports on listing traffic.<ref name="CBS5">{{cite web|url=http://cbs5.com/wrapper_consumer/seenon/Yelp.Internet.ratings.2.787400.html|title=Business Owners 'Yelp' About Internet Ratings Site|publisher=CBS 5|first=Jeanette|last=Pavini|date=2008-08-05|accessdate=2008-08-20}}</ref> Additionally, these advertisers, called "Sponsors" on the site, are allowed to highlight a specific review and communicate with reviewers.<ref name="BizJournal1" /><ref name="TechCrunch1" /> | |||
On November 2, 2016, concurrent with its earnings report for Q3 2016, Yelp announced it would drastically scale back its operations outside North America and halt international expansion. This resulted in the termination of essentially all international employees across Yelp's 30+ international markets from the sales, marketing, public relations, business outreach, and government relations departments. Overseas employees now primarily consist of engineering and product management staff. These layoffs affected only 175 individuals or 4% of its total workforce.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://skift.com/2016/11/02/yelp-gives-up-on-international-growth-layoffs-probable/ | title=Yelp Gives Up on International Growth, Layoffs Probable | first=Andrew | last=Sheivachman | work=] | date=November 2, 2016 | url-access=limited | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 9, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210509062046/https://skift.com/2016/11/02/yelp-gives-up-on-international-growth-layoffs-probable/ | url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Nov-2016-8-K">{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2164/115752316007172/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Nov 2, 2016 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502211257/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2164/115752316007172/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/yelp-to-halt-global-expansion-trim-workforce-by-4-1478095190|title=Yelp to Halt Global Expansion, Trim Workforce by 4%|last=Hufford|first=Austen|date=2016-11-02|newspaper=Wall Street Journal|issn=0099-9660|access-date=2016-11-21|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161120190811/http://www.wsj.com/articles/yelp-to-halt-global-expansion-trim-workforce-by-4-1478095190|archive-date=November 20, 2016|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
==Reception== | |||
===Over reviews=== | |||
Yelp has been criticized over the fairness of negative reviews on the site. Among other sources, the anonymous nature of the Internet allows competitors to disparage one another by creating illegitimate negative reviews on their respective profile pages. Yelp states that it will not censor user comments, although it does remove favorable and unfavorable reviews that are considered "suspicious".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://cbs5.com/wrapper_consumer/seenon/Yelp.Internet.ratings.2.787400.html|title=Business Owners 'Yelp' About Internet Ratings Site|first=Jeanette|last=Pavini|date=2008-08-05|accessdate=2008-08-26}}</ref> Some small businesses have said that Yelp salespeople offered "to hide negative customer reviews of their businesses" in exchange for advertising sponsorship contracts, a practice Yelp denies.<ref>Kathleen Richards, , East Bay Express, February 18, 2009, Accessed October 21, 2009</ref> In February, 2010, two law firms filed a ] accusing Yelp of "extortion" on behalf of a ] in ] that made similar claims.<ref>{{cite news|publisher=Wired Magazine|url=http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/02/yelp-sued-for-alleged-extortion/|title=Yelp Accused of Extortion|author=Kim Zetter|date=2010-02-24}}</ref> Partially in response to these allegations and in a move to increase transparency, Yelp now shows which reviews get filtered by its spam algorithm. <ref>{{cite web|url=http://officialblog.yelp.com/2010/04/announcing-steps-to-avoid-confusion-increase-transparency.html|title=We're Increasing Transparency and Eliminating 'Favorite Review'|publisher=Yelp, Inc. Official Blog|date=2010-04-05|accessdate=2010-04-19}}</ref> | |||
In March 2017, Yelp acquired the restaurant reservation app Nowait for $40 million.<ref name="Sawers 2017">{{cite web | last=Sawers | first=Paul | title=Yelp acquires restaurant waiting list tech startup Nowait in a $40 million all-cash deal | website=VentureBeat | date=March 1, 2017 | url=https://venturebeat.com/business/yelp-acquires-restaurant-waiting-list-tech-startup-nowait-in-a-40-million-all-cash-deal/ | access-date=November 22, 2022 | archive-date=November 23, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221123190509/https://venturebeat.com/business/yelp-acquires-restaurant-waiting-list-tech-startup-nowait-in-a-40-million-all-cash-deal/ | url-status=live }}</ref> In April 2017, Yelp acquired ] marketing company Turnstyle Analytics for $20 million.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2859/120677417001120/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Apr 7, 2017 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502140907/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2859/120677417001120/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/04/yelp-acquires-wi-fi-marketing-company-turnstyle-analytics-for-20-million/ |title=Yelp acquires Wi-Fi marketing company Turnstyle Analytics for $20 million |last=Perez |first=Sarah| website=]| date=April 4, 2017 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170404173637/https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/04/yelp-acquires-wi-fi-marketing-company-turnstyle-analytics-for-20-million/ |archive-date=April 4, 2017 |df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{Cite press release | url=https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170404005620/en/Yelp-Acquires-Wi-Fi-Marketing-Company-Turnstyle-Analytics | title=Yelp Acquires Wi-Fi Marketing Company Turnstyle Analytics | publisher=] | date=April 4, 2017 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 10, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210510144701/https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170404005620/en/Yelp-Acquires-Wi-Fi-Marketing-Company-Turnstyle-Analytics | url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
===Confrontation=== | |||
There have been several lawsuits filed by business owners against reviewers. On November 3, 2009, a Yelp user was confronted by the owner of a bookstore in ] at his home. The user had posted a review criticizing the store and received a string of angry messages towards him, which he revealed through ]. The user called the police, who arrested the bookstore owner, and obtained a restraining order.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local-beat/San-Francisco-Bookstore-Has-an-Uneahlty-Yelp-Confrontation-68914367.html|title=San Francisco Bookstore Accused of Violent Yelp Confrontation|first=Sajid|last=Farooq|date=2009-11-04|accessdate=2009-11-04}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/scavenger/detail?entry_id=51052|publisher=San Francisco Chornicle|title=Nasty altercation between Yelp critic, bookstore owner|date=2009-11-05|author=Aileen Yoo}}</ref> | |||
In early 2020, Yelp listed space at 55 Hawthorne Street, San Francisco, for 235 employees as available for sublease.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/Mass-layoffs-at-Yelp-Eventbrite-show-15190391.php |title=Mass layoffs at Yelp, Eventbrite show coronavirus' damage to SF tech |access-date=April 10, 2020 |archive-date=December 27, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201227235151/https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/Mass-layoffs-at-Yelp-Eventbrite-show-15190391.php |url-status=live }}</ref> Business closures and stay-at-home orders during the ] caused a massive decline in searches on Yelp (down 64–83% from March to April, depending on category) and company revenues. On April 9, the company announced it would lay off 1,000 employees, furlough about 1,100 with benefits, reduce hours for others, cut executive pay by 20–30%, and stop paying the CEO for the rest of 2020.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://blog.yelp.com/2020/04/planning-for-yelps-future | title=Planning for Yelp's Future | first=Jeremy | last=Stoppelman | author-link=Jeremy Stoppelman | work=Yelp | date=April 9, 2020 | access-date=April 10, 2020 | archive-date=April 9, 2020 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200409142837/https://blog.yelp.com/2020/04/planning-for-yelps-future | url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
In September 2021, Yelp announced that it was relocating its corporate headquarters to a smaller space at 350 Mission Street to be subleased from ].<ref name="DiFeliciantonio">{{cite news |last1=DiFeliciantonio |first1=Chase |title=Yelp to relocate S.F. headquarters, aims for office return early next year |url=https://www.sfchronicle.com/tech/article/Yelp-to-relocate-S-F-headquarters-aims-for-16444733.php |access-date=10 April 2022 |work=San Francisco Chronicle |date=September 9, 2021 |archive-date=February 10, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220210232314/https://www.sfchronicle.com/tech/article/Yelp-to-relocate-S-F-headquarters-aims-for-16444733.php |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
On June 1, 2023, Yelp decided to close its offices in ] and ]. According to an announcement made by the company, less than 6 percent of the available workstations in these offices were being utilized. This move comes after Yelp had already shut down its New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. offices.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2022-06-23 |title=Yelp closes three US offices, says remote work is its future |url=https://apnews.com/article/cf96950567ca07e407f7afc2cf42052b |access-date=2022-06-24 |website=] |author=Dee-Ann Dyrbin |archive-date=June 24, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220624170230/https://apnews.com/article/cf96950567ca07e407f7afc2cf42052b |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
As of mid-2023, Yelp maintains a single remaining office in the United States in San Francisco. Additionally, the company will continue its operations in Toronto, Canada, and London, United Kingdom. The closure and downsizing of these offices are expected to result in approximately $27 million in annual cost savings for Yelp during the 2023–24 fiscal year.<ref>{{cite news |last=Peck |first=Emily |url=https://www.axios.com/2023/06/01/remote-work-trends-2023-yelp |title=Yelp is down to one office in the U.S., as it leans into remote work |work=] |date=2023-06-01 |accessdate=2023-06-02 |archive-date=June 2, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230602213610/https://www.axios.com/2023/06/01/remote-work-trends-2023-yelp |url-status=live }}</ref> As of February 2024, its website listed reviews for establishments in 32 countries.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.yelp.com/locations |title=Browse 219 cities on Yelp, all around the world! |access-date=February 28, 2024}}</ref> | |||
==Features== | |||
{{Infobox website | |||
| name = Yelp.com | |||
| collapsible = yes | |||
| collapsetext = Screenshot | |||
| screenshot = File:Yelp Mobile Home.png | |||
| caption = The homepage of Yelp's ] app. | |||
| url = {{URL|https://www.yelp.com/}} | |||
| commercial = Yes | |||
| type = Local online reviews | |||
| registration = Optional | |||
| language = 15 languages<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.sfgate.com/restaurants/article/The-toxic-abusive-addictive-supportive-6156547.php |title=The Toxic, Abusive, Addictive, Supportive, Codependent Relationship Between Chefs and Yelpers |first=Rebecca |last=Marx | work=] |date=July 28, 2014 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140917113709/http://www.modernluxury.com/san-francisco/story/the-toxic-abusive-addictive-supportive-codependent-relationship-between-chefs-an#sthash.aQ8m9WkA.dpuf |archive-date=September 17, 2014 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
| num_users = 142 million unique visitors per month | |||
| programming_language = Python, Java, and a custom framework | |||
| owner = Yelp, Inc. | |||
| launch_date = {{start date and age|2004}} | |||
| current_status = Online | |||
}} | |||
Yelp's website, Yelp.com, is a crowd-sourced local business review and social networking site.<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> The site has pages devoted to individual locations, such as restaurants or schools, where Yelp users can submit a review of their products or services<ref name="registerregister"/> using a one to five stars ].<ref name="Chafkin"/> Businesses can update contact information, hours, and other basic listing information or add special deals.<ref name="Chafkin"/><ref name=Jumps/> In addition to writing reviews, users can react to reviews, plan events, or discuss their personal lives.<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> | |||
78% of businesses listed on the site had a rating of three stars or better,<ref name=factsheet>{{cite web | title =An Introduction to Yelp Metrics | publisher=Yelp | url =https://www.yelp-press.com/company/fast-facts/default.aspx |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160825213451/https://www.yelp.com/factsheet| archive-date=August 25, 2016}}</ref> but some negative reviews were very personal or extreme.<ref name="Chafkin"/> Some of the reviews are written entertainingly or creatively.<ref name="SFGate1"/> As of 2014, users could give a "thumbs-up" to reviews they liked, which caused these reviews to be featured more prominently in the system.<ref name=criticaleye/> As of 2008, each day a "Review of the Day" was determined based on a vote by users.<ref name=eatandtell>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/dining/05yelp.html |title=Eat and Tell |last=McNeil |first=Donald G.| work=]|date=November 4, 2008 | url-access=limited |url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130521185428/http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/dining/05yelp.html?_r=2&8dpc&oref=slogin&oref=slogin|archive-date=May 21, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
72% of Yelp searches are done from a mobile device.<ref name=factsheet/> The Yelp ] ] was introduced in December 2008.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://medium.com/@maulikmmodi94/yelp-what-happened-62c325f13235 | title=Yelp — What happened!! | first=MAULIK | last=MODI | work=] | date=December 1, 2019 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173711/https://medium.com/@maulikmmodi94/yelp-what-happened-62c325f13235 | url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news | title=Citysearch vs. yelp on the iPhone: Can You Tell Them Apart?| url=https://techcrunch.com/2008/12/10/citysearch-vs-yelp-on-the-iphone-can-you-tell-them-apart/ | first=Erick | last=Schonfeld |work=] | date=December 10, 2008 | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130331113437/http://techcrunch.com/2008/12/10/citysearch-vs-yelp-on-the-iphone-can-you-tell-them-apart/ |archive-date=March 31, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> In August 2009, Yelp released an update to the iPhone app with a hidden ] augmented reality feature called Monocle, which allowed users looking through their iPhone camera to see Yelp data on businesses seen through the camera.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/08/yelp-ar/ | title=Yelp Sneaks Augmented Reality Into iPhone App | first=Brian | last=Chen | magazine=] | date=August 27, 2009 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130215024540/http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/08/yelp-ar/ |archive-date=February 15, 2013 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> Check-in features were added in 2010.<ref name=checkin>{{cite news | url=https://www.adweek.com/lostremote/yelp-adds-check-ins-on-mobile-app/ | title=Yelp adds check-ins on mobile app | first=Cory | last=Bergman | work=] | date=January 15, 2010}}</ref> | |||
Yelp users can make restaurant reservations in Yelp through Yelp Reservations, a feature initially added in June 2010; in 2021 the service was consolidated with others into "Yelp Guest Manager".<ref>{{cite news|date=June 3, 2010|title=Yelp and OpenTable Join Forces|first=Nick|last=Bilton|access-date=January 6, 2013|url=http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/yelp-and-opentable-join-forces/?dbk|newspaper=The New York Times|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120919025343/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/yelp-and-opentable-join-forces/?dbk|archive-date=September 19, 2012|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Littman |first1=Julie |title=Yelp adds searchable 'veteran-owned' tag for businesses |url=https://www.restaurantdive.com/news/yelp-adds-searchable-veteran-owned-tag/634881/ |website=Restaurant Dive |access-date=9 December 2022 |date=25 October 2022 |archive-date=December 9, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221209204927/https://www.restaurantdive.com/news/yelp-adds-searchable-veteran-owned-tag/634881/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Yelp's reservation features have been done through ], which was acquired by Yelp in 2013.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Jul-2013-8-K" /> Prior to that, Yelp had offered reservation services through ].<ref name="Bilton 2010">{{cite web | last=Bilton | first=Nick | title=Yelp and OpenTable Join Forces | website=Bits Blog | date=June 4, 2010 | url=http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/yelp-and-opentable-join-forces/ | access-date=September 4, 2016 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150906080022/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/yelp-and-opentable-join-forces/ | archive-date=September 6, 2015 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> In 2013, features to have food ordered and delivered were added to Yelp<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2013-jul-09-la-fi-mo-yelp-food-delivery-takeout-20130709-story.html | title=Yelp launches food delivery and pickup service | last=Hsu | first=Tiffany | work=] | date=July 9, 2013 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130907075637/http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jul/09/business/la-fi-mo-yelp-food-delivery-takeout-20130709 | archive-date=September 7, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> as well as the ability to view hygiene inspection scores<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/yelp-restaurant-grades-health-department_n_2495636 |date=January 17, 2013 | title=Yelp Adds Health Department Grades to Restaurant Listings | first=Katherine | last=Bindley | work=] | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130210110421/http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/17/yelp-restaurant-grades-health-department_n_2495636.html | archive-date=February 10, 2013 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> and make appointments at spas.<ref name=SideofBookings/> Yelp's content was integrated into ]'s ] "]" and the mapping and directions app of Apple's September 2012 release of the ] computer operating system.<ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Aug-2012-8-K">{{cite web |url=http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2286/114420412042321/filing-main.htm |title=Yelp! Inc, Form 8-K, Current Report, Filing Date Aug 1, 2012 |publisher=secdatabase.com |access-date=May 1, 2018 |archive-date=May 2, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180502141130/http://edgar.secdatabase.com/2286/114420412042321/filing-main.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=You may hate Apple Maps, but the Yelp integration is something to love|url=https://venturebeat.com/2012/09/19/yelp-ios-6/#EJZJWZDL1B2gBlOi.99|work=VentureBeat|date=September 19, 2012|access-date=January 10, 2013|first=Jennifer|last=Grove|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130112010136/http://venturebeat.com/2012/09/19/yelp-ios-6/#EJZJWZDL1B2gBlOi.99|archive-date=January 12, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
In March 2014, Yelp added features for ordering and scheduling manicures, flower deliveries, golf games, and legal consultations, among other things.<ref>{{cite news|title=You Can Now Order Flowers, Manicures And Legal Advice Through Yelp|date=March 24, 2015|first=Brian|last=Solomon|url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2015/03/24/yelp-pushes-into-flower-delivery-golf-spa-and-club-bookings/|newspaper=Forbes|access-date=April 10, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150406025646/http://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2015/03/24/yelp-pushes-into-flower-delivery-golf-spa-and-club-bookings/|archive-date=April 6, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> In October 2014, the company, working in collaboration with hotel search site Hipmunk, added features to book hotels through Yelp.<ref name=SideofBookings>{{cite news | title=On Yelp, Reviews With a Side of Bookings |first=Emily| last=Brennan | url=https://intransit.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/24/on-yelp-reviews-with-a-side-of-bookings/ | work=] |date=October 24, 2014 | url-access=limited |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150122081847/http://intransit.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/24/on-yelp-reviews-with-a-side-of-bookings/?_php=true&_type=blogs&partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1 |archive-date=January 22, 2015 |df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref name="Yelp!-Inc-Feb-2015-10-K"/> | |||
Yelp started a 7–10% cash-back program at some US restaurants in 2016 through a partnership with Empyr, which links credit card purchases to ].<ref>{{cite news | title=Get cash back when you dine with Yelp | url=https://www.cnet.com/how-to/how-to-get-cash-back-when-you-dine-with-yelp/ | first=Rick | last=Broida | work=] | date=March 3, 2017 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171230114643/https://www.cnet.com/how-to/how-to-get-cash-back-when-you-dine-with-yelp/ | archive-date=December 30, 2017 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2016/12/22/yelp-introduces-cash-back-program-consumers/95768842/ | title=Yelp introduces cash-back program for consumers | first=Jefferson | last=Graham | work=] | date=December 22, 2016 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171230061742/https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2016/12/22/yelp-introduces-cash-back-program-consumers/95768842/ | archive-date=December 30, 2017 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web | url=https://empyr.com/ | title=Empyr | publisher=Empyr | access-date=November 20, 2019 | archive-date=December 4, 2020 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201204050105/https://empyr.com/ | url-status=dead }}</ref> | |||
On February 14, 2017, Yelp launched Yelp Questions and Answers, a feature for users to ask venue-specific questions about businesses.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/14/yelp-q-and-a/|title=Yelp launches new feature for asking and answering questions about any business|work=TechCrunch|last=Ha|first=Anthony|date=14 February 2017|access-date=15 February 2017|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170215005144/https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/14/yelp-q-and-a/|archive-date=February 15, 2017|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
In June 2020, Yelp launched a COVID-19 section that enables businesses to update their health and safety measures as well as their service offering changes.<ref>{{Cite web|last1=Akhil Kuduvalli|first1=Head of Consumer Product|last2=Tuesday|first2=June 16|date=2020-06-16|title=Helping Local Businesses Reopen During COVID-19 with New Products and Features|url=https://blog.yelp.com/2020/06/helping-local-businesses-reopen-during-covid-19-with-new-products-and-features|access-date=2021-02-03|website=Yelp|language=en-US|archive-date=February 7, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210207082001/https://blog.yelp.com/2020/06/helping-local-businesses-reopen-during-covid-19-with-new-products-and-features|url-status=live}}</ref> Starting January 2021, users can provide detailed feedback regarding what health and safety measures the business has implemented through editing in the COVID-19 section on Yelp business pages.<ref>{{Cite web|last1=Akhil Kuduvalli|first1=Head of Consumer Product|last2=Tuesday|first2=January 12|date=2021-01-12|title=Yelp Will Now Display User Feedback on Health and Safety Practices of Local Businesses|url=https://blog.yelp.com/2021/01/yelp-will-display-user-feedback-on-health-and-safety-practices|access-date=2021-02-03|website=Yelp|language=en-US|archive-date=January 29, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210129050052/https://blog.yelp.com/2021/01/yelp-will-display-user-feedback-on-health-and-safety-practices|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|date=2021-01-11|title=Yelp reviewers can now offer feedback on restaurants' COVID-19 health and safety practices|url=https://www.nrn.com/delivery-takeout-solutions/yelp-reviewers-can-now-offer-feedback-restaurants-covid-19-health-and|access-date=2021-02-03|website=Nation's Restaurant News|language=en|archive-date=January 25, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210125221609/https://www.nrn.com/delivery-takeout-solutions/yelp-reviewers-can-now-offer-feedback-restaurants-covid-19-health-and|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
In April 2023, Yelp introduced Yelp Guaranteed, which provides a refund of up to $2,500 if something goes wrong with a project. It also improved its search features with AI and added the option to add video to reviews.<ref name="u388">{{cite web |last=Malik |first=Aisha |date=April 25, 2023 |title=Yelp rolls out AI-powered search updates and the ability to add videos to reviews |url=https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/25/yelp-rolls-out-ai-powered-search-updates-and-the-ability-to-add-videos-to-reviews/ |access-date=July 23, 2024 |website=TechCrunch}}</ref> In April 2024, Yelp released Yelp Assistant, an AI chatbot that helps users find a professional for a project. It also introduced an API that allows developers to search Yelp data from other applications, and made other improvements.<ref name="s089">{{cite web |last=Lacy |first=Lisa |date=April 30, 2024 |title=Yelp Has a New AI Bot for Home Repairs, and It'll Quiz You on Your Needs |url=https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/yelp-has-a-new-ai-bot-for-home-repairs-and-itll-quiz-you-on-your-needs/ |access-date=July 23, 2024 |website=CNET}}</ref> | |||
===Features for businesses=== | |||
Yelp added the ability for business owners to respond to reviews in 2008.<ref name="Chafkin"/><ref name="nytloi">{{cite news|url=http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/why-yelp-works/|work=]|last=Hansell|first=Saul|date=May 12, 2008|title=Why Yelp Works|access-date=November 27, 2013|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131126090632/http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/why-yelp-works/|archive-date=November 26, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Businesses can respond privately by messaging the reviewer or publicly on their profile page. In some cases, Yelp users that had a bad experience have updated their reviews more favorably due to the business's efforts to resolve their complaints. In some other cases, disputes between reviewers and business owners have led to harassment and physical altercations.<ref name="Chafkin"/> The system has led to criticisms that business owners can bribe reviewers with free food or discounts to increase their rating. However, Yelp users say this rarely occurs.<ref name=eatandtell/> A business owner can "claim" a profile, which allows them to respond to reviews and see traffic reports.<ref name="Chafkin"/> Businesses can also offer discounts to Yelp users that visit often using a Yelp "check in" feature.<ref name=checkin/><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.informationweek.com/smb/ebusiness/yelp-intros-check-in-offers/228300452|archive-url=https://archive.today/20131127150604/http://www.informationweek.com/smb/ebusiness/yelp-intros-check-in-offers/228300452|url-status=dead|archive-date=November 27, 2013|title=Yelp Intros Check In Offers|last=Diana|first=Alison|date=November 23, 2010|newspaper=InformationWeek|access-date=January 6, 2013}}</ref> In 2014, Yelp released an app for business owners to respond to reviews and manage their profiles from a mobile device.<ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp Gives Business Owners Stronger Voice|first=Barbara|last=Hernandez|url=http://www.nbcbayarea.com/blogs/press-here/Yelp-Gives-Business-Owners-a-Voice-286279911.html|publisher=NBC Bay Area|access-date=December 19, 2014|date=December 18, 2014|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402093822/http://www.nbcbayarea.com/blogs/press-here/Yelp-Gives-Business-Owners-a-Voice-286279911.html|archive-date=April 2, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Business owners can also flag a review to be removed, if the review violates Yelp's content guidelines.<ref>{{cite web|title=How do I flag a review|url=http://www.yelp-support.com/article/How-do-I-flag-a-review?l=en_US|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150303053453/http://www.yelp-support.com/article/How-do-I-flag-a-review?l=en_US|archive-date=March 3, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
Yelp's revenues primarily come from selling ads and sponsored listings to small businesses.<ref name=BigBreak/><ref name="Chafkin"/> Advertisers can pay to have their listing appear at the top of search results or feature ads on the pages of their competitors.<ref name="Chafkin"/><ref name=Jumps/><ref name="nytloi"/> In 2016, advertising revenue grew at a rate of 30% year over year.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://s24.q4cdn.com/521204325/files/doc_financials/quarterly/2017/q2/Yelp-Investor-Presentation-2Q17.pdf | title=Yelp Investor Presentation Q2 2016 | publisher=Yelp | date=August 9, 2016 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173711/https://s24.q4cdn.com/521204325/files/doc_financials/quarterly/2017/q2/Yelp-Investor-Presentation-2Q17.pdf | url-status=live }}</ref> Yelp will only allow businesses with at least a three-star rating to sign up for advertising.<ref name="SFGate1"/> Originally a sponsored "favorite review" could place a positive review above negative ones,<ref name="Chafkin"/> but Yelp stopped offering this option in 2010 in an effort to deter the valid criticism that advertisers were able to obtain a more positive review appearance in exchange for pay.<ref name=FastTweak>{{cite news|newspaper=Fast Company|title=Yelp Tweaks Its System for Transparency—and Lawsuit-Dodging|first=Kit|last=Eaton|date=April 5, 2010|access-date=January 6, 2013|url=http://www.fastcompany.com/1608067/yelp-tweaks-its-system-transparency-and-lawsuit-dodging|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130304121935/http://www.fastcompany.com/1608067/yelp-tweaks-its-system-transparency-and-lawsuit-dodging|archive-date=March 4, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|title=Yelp makes two major changes in the way reviews are posted|date=April 6, 2010|first=Andrea|last=Chang|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2010-apr-06-la-fi-yelp7-2010apr07-story.html|access-date=January 6, 2013|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130427082915/http://articles.latimes.com/2010/apr/06/business/la-fi-yelp7-2010apr07|archive-date=April 27, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
On June 5, 2020, Yelp launched a tool to allow businesses on the platform to identify themselves as black-owned, allowing customers to search for black-owned companies they want to support.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Brown |first1=Dalvin |title=Yelp adds tool search for black-owned businesses |url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/06/06/yelp-adding-new-tool-search-black-owned-businesses/3162943001/ |work=] |date=June 6, 2020 |access-date=December 19, 2020 |archive-date=December 5, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201205024851/https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/06/06/yelp-adding-new-tool-search-black-owned-businesses/3162943001/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |title=Yelp is adding a new tool to easily search for black-owned businesses |url=https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/5/21281887/yelp-new-search-tool-black-owned-businesses-app-donation-matching |website=] |last=Lyles |first=Taylor |date=June 5, 2020 |access-date=June 8, 2020 |archive-date=June 6, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200606071625/https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/5/21281887/yelp-new-search-tool-black-owned-businesses-app-donation-matching |url-status=live }}</ref> There were more than 2.5 million searches for black-owned businesses on Yelp from May 25 to July 10.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/black-owned-business-support-up-7000-percent-yelp/ | title=Yelp searches for Black-owned businesses jumped 7,000% amid protests | first=CHEVAZ | last=CLARKE | work=] | date=July 22, 2020 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173710/https://www.cbsnews.com/news/black-owned-business-support-up-7000-percent-yelp/ | url-status=live }}</ref> Searches for black-owned businesses were up 2,400% in 2020.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://blog.yelp.com/2021/01/yelp-names-black-owned-businesses-to-watch-in-2021 | title=Yelp Names black-Owned Businesses to Watch in 2021 | first=Brenae | last=Leary | work=Yelp | date=January 29, 2021 | access-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-date=May 8, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508173709/https://blog.yelp.com/2021/01/yelp-names-black-owned-businesses-to-watch-in-2021 | url-status=live }}</ref> In August 2021 Yelp added a feature to let users filter businesses based on their COVID precautions.<ref name="Jones 2021">{{cite web | last=Jones | first=Zoe Christen | title=Yelp to allow users to filter businesses based on vaccination requirements | website=CBS News | date=August 5, 2021 | url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/yelp-restaurants-covid-vaccine-requirements/ | access-date=November 22, 2022 | archive-date=November 23, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221123190510/https://www.cbsnews.com/news/yelp-restaurants-covid-vaccine-requirements/ | url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
==Relationship with businesses== | |||
A ] study published in 2011 found that each "star" in a Yelp rating affected the business owner's sales by 5–9%.<ref name="fake">{{cite news |title=Fake Reviews Are Everywhere. How Can We Catch Them? |last=Gara |first=Tom | work=] |date=September 24, 2013 | url=https://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intelligence/2013/09/24/fake-reviews-are-everywhere-how-can-we-catch-them/ |url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170214201631/http://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intelligence/2013/09/24/fake-reviews-are-everywhere-how-can-we-catch-them/ |archive-date=February 14, 2017 |df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref name=Regularly>{{cite news | url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303847804579477644289822928 |title=Yelp Regularly Gets Subpoenas About Users |first=Angus |last=Loten |date=April 2, 2014 | work=] |url-status=live | url-access=subscription |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160422121355/http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303847804579477644289822928|archive-date=April 22, 2016|df=mdy-all}}</ref> A 2012 study by two ] economists found that an increase from 3.5 to 4 stars on Yelp resulted in a 19% increase in the chances of the restaurant being booked during peak hours.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/sep/02/ratings-boost-restaurants |title=How online reviews are crucial to a restaurant's takings|last=Doward |first=Jamie |work=] |date=September 1, 2012 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131113203121/http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/sep/02/ratings-boost-restaurants |archive-date=November 13, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> A 2014 survey of 300 small business owners done by ] found that 78% were concerned about negative reviews. Also, 43% of respondents said they felt online reviews were unfair, because there is no verification that the review is written by a legitimate customer.<ref name=Regularly/> | |||
==Controversy and litigation== | |||
{{See also|User review#Fake reviews}} | |||
Yelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses.<ref name=Weapon>{{cite news |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-09-09/yelps-newest-weapon-against-fake-reviews-lawsuits |title=Yelp's Newest Weapon Against Fake Reviews: Lawsuits | work=] |first=Patrick |last=Clark |date=September 9, 2013 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140702005747/http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-09-09/yelps-newest-weapon-against-fake-reviews-lawsuits |archive-date=July 2, 2014 |df=mdy-all }}</ref> Criticism of Yelp continues to focus on the legitimacy of reviews, public statements of Yelp manipulating and blocking reviews in order to increase ad spending, as well as concerns regarding the privacy of reviewers. | |||
===Astroturfing=== | |||
As Yelp became more influential, the phenomenon of business owners and competitors writing fake reviews, known as "]", became more prevalent.<ref name=criticaleye/><ref>{{Cite journal | url=https://hbr.org/amp/2020/11/how-fake-customer-reviews-do-and-dont-work | title=How Fake Customer Reviews do — and Don't — Work | journal=Harvard Business Review | date=24 November 2020 | last1=Proserpio | first1=Davide | last2=Hollenbeck | first2=Brett | last3=He | first3=Sherry | access-date=June 27, 2022 | archive-date=December 5, 2021 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211205032344/https://hbr.org/amp/2020/11/how-fake-customer-reviews-do-and-dont-work | url-status=live }}</ref> A study from Harvard Associate Professor Michael Luca and Georgios Zervas of ] analyzed 316,415 reviews in Boston and found that the percentage of fake reviews rose from 6% of the site's reviews in 2006 to 20% in 2014.<ref name="fake"/> Yelp's own review filter identifies 25% of reviews as suspicious.<ref name=problem>{{cite news | url=https://fortune.com/2013/09/26/yelps-fake-review-problem/ | title=Yelp's fake review problem | last=Roberts |first=Daniel | work=] | date=September 26, 2013 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130926231147/http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/09/26/yelps-fake-review-problem/ | archive-date=September 26, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> | |||
Yelp has a proprietary algorithm that attempts to evaluate whether a review is authentic and filters out reviews that it believes are not based on a patron's actual personal experiences, as required by the site's ].<ref name="Chafkin"/><ref>{{cite web|title=Sia Furler Seeks Revenge on Twitter and Yelp after Dry Cleaning Staff Ruins Fave Clothes|url=http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/556323/20140619/sia-furler-revenge-twitter-yelp-dry-cleaner.htm#.U7LLHKggUZw|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714232734/http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/556323/20140619/sia-furler-revenge-twitter-yelp-dry-cleaner.htm#.U7LLHKggUZw|url-status=dead|archive-date=July 14, 2014|website=International Business Times|date=June 19, 2014|author=Ma Evelyn Castino Quilas|access-date=July 1, 2014}}</ref> The review filter was first developed two weeks after the site was founded and the company saw their "first obviously fake reviews".<ref name=problem/> Filtered reviews are moved into a special area and not counted towards the businesses' star-rating.<ref name=problem/> The filter sometimes filters legitimate reviews, leading to complaints from business owners.<ref name=criticaleye/> New York Attorney General ] said Yelp has "the most aggressive" ] filter out of the crowd-sourced websites it looked into.<ref name=problem/> Yelp has also been criticized for not disclosing how the filter works,<ref name=problem/> which it says would reveal information on how to defeat it.<ref name="Chafkin"/> | |||
Yelp also conducts "sting operations" to uncover businesses writing their own reviews.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/yelp-ceo-jeremy-stoppelman-_n_2232091 | title=Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman Reveals How The Review Site Catches Phonies (Video) | work=] | date=December 3, 2012 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714213153/http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/03/yelp-ceo-jeremy-stoppelman-_n_2232091.html |archive-date=July 14, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> In October 2012, Yelp placed a 90-day "consumer alert" on 150 business listings believed to have paid for reviews. The alert read "We caught someone red-handed trying to buy reviews for this business".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/18/technology/yelp-tries-to-halt-deceptive-reviews.html?_r=0|newspaper=The New York Times|title=Buy Reviews on Yelp, Get Black Mark|date=October 18, 2012|first=David|last=Streitfeld|access-date=November 27, 2013|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140402044432/http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/18/technology/yelp-tries-to-halt-deceptive-reviews.html?_r=0|archive-date=April 2, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref name="cecil">{{cite web|last=Vega|first=Cecilia|title=Yelp Outs Companies That Pay for Positive Reviews|url=https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2012/11/yelp-outs-companies-that-pay-for-positive-reviews/|publisher=]|access-date=6 June 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130602165217/https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2012/11/yelp-outs-companies-that-pay-for-positive-reviews/|archive-date=June 2, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> In June 2013, Yelp filed a lawsuit against BuyYelpReview/AdBlaze for allegedly writing fake reviews for pay.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.marketwatch.com/story/yelp-steps-up-campaign-against-fake-reviews-2013-09-18 | title=Yelp steps up campaign against fake reviews | last=Pimental | first=Benjamin | work=] | date=September 18, 2013 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130922033904/http://www.marketwatch.com/story/yelp-steps-up-campaign-against-fake-reviews-2013-09-18 | archive-date=September 22, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref name="ABC News September 2013">{{cite web | url=https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2013/09/yelp-sues-firm-over-allegedly-posting-fake-reviews/ | title=Yelp Sues Firm Over Allegedly Posting Fake Review | publisher=ABC News | date=September 17, 2013 | access-date=September 27, 2013 | author=Kim, Suzanna | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130924062829/https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2013/09/yelp-sues-firm-over-allegedly-posting-fake-reviews/ | archive-date=September 24, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> In 2013, Yelp sued a lawyer it alleged was part of a group of law firms that exchanged Yelp reviews, saying that many of the firm's reviews originated from their own office. The lawyer said Yelp was trying to get revenge for his legal disputes and activism against Yelp.<ref name=Weapon/> An effort to win dismissal of the case was denied in December 2014.<ref>{{Cite web|url = https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/12/bizarre-yelp-lawsuit-over-alleged-fake-reviews-to-finally-move-ahead/|title = Bizarre Yelp lawsuit over alleged fake reviews to finally move ahead|date = December 10, 2014|access-date = January 12, 2015|website = ars technica|last = Farivar|first = Cyrus|url-status = live|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150110042658/http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/12/bizarre-yelp-lawsuit-over-alleged-fake-reviews-to-finally-move-ahead/|archive-date = January 10, 2015|df = mdy-all}}</ref> In September 2013, Yelp cooperated with Operation Clean Turf, a sting operation by the New York Attorney General that uncovered 19 astroturfing operations.<ref name=problem/> In April 2017, a Norfolk, Massachusetts, jury awarded a jewelry store over $34,000 after it determined that its competitor's employee had filed a false negative Yelp review that knowingly caused ].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.patriotledger.com/news/20170405/quincy-center-jeweler-wins-suit-over-yelp-review|title=Quincy Center jeweler wins suit over Yelp review|access-date=April 26, 2017|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170427003703/http://www.patriotledger.com/news/20170405/quincy-center-jeweler-wins-suit-over-yelp-review|archive-date=April 27, 2017|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
In December 2019, Yelp won a court case that challenged the company's explanation of how its review recommendation software worked. The court ruling stated that "None of the evidence presented at the trial showed anything nefarious or duplicitous on the part of Yelp in connection with the assertions made in the Challenged Statements."<ref>{{Cite web|title=Demetriades v. Yelp|url=https://digitalcommons.law.scu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3136&context=historical|access-date=2022-02-08|archive-date=February 8, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220208132431/https://digitalcommons.law.scu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3136&context=historical|url-status=live}}</ref> This was one of a number of court cases that ruled in favor of Yelp over the years.<ref>{{Cite web|last1=Liability|first1=] · in Derivative|last2=Marketing|date=2020-03-01|title=Yelp Finally Defeats a False Advertising Lawsuit Over Its Review Functionality-Demetriades v. Yelp|url=https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2020/03/yelp-finally-defeats-a-false-advertising-lawsuit-over-its-review-functionality-demetriades-v-yelp.htm|access-date=2022-02-08|website=Technology & Marketing Law Blog|language=en-US|archive-date=February 8, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220208132432/https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2020/03/yelp-finally-defeats-a-false-advertising-lawsuit-over-its-review-functionality-demetriades-v-yelp.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
===Alleged unfair business practices=== | |||
Yelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses.<ref name=Weapon/> There have been allegations that Yelp has manipulated reviews based on participation in its advertising programs.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-yelp-town-hall-reviews-20130820,0,501302.story | title=Tempers flare at Yelp's town hall for small business owners in L.A. | last=Chang | first=Andrea | work=] | date=August 21, 2013 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130929084537/http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-yelp-town-hall-reviews-20130820,0,501302.story | archive-date=September 29, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> Many business owners have said that Yelp salespeople have offered to remove or suppress negative reviews if they purchase advertising.<ref name=criticaleye/><ref>{{cite news |title=Yelp Blames Greedy Lawyers for Extortion Allegations |url=https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/yelp-blames-greedy-lawyers-for-extortion-allegations-jw/2090383/|first=Jackson |last=West| date=March 1, 2010 | work=] |url-status=live| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131112140111/http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/tech/Yelp-Blames-Greedy-Lawyers-for-Extortion-Allegations-jw-85840862.html |archive-date=November 12, 2013 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> Others report seeing negative reviews featured prominently and positive reviews buried, and then soon afterwards, they would receive calls from Yelp attempting to sell paid advertising.<ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp accused of bullying businesses into paying for better reviews|first=Sophia|last=Harris|website=]|date=January 14, 2015|url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/yelp-accused-of-bullying-businesses-into-paying-for-better-reviews-1.2899308|access-date=January 15, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150117173853/http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/yelp-accused-of-bullying-businesses-into-paying-for-better-reviews-1.2899308|archive-date=January 17, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
Yelp staff acknowledged that they had allowed their advertising partners to move their favorite review to the top of the listings as a "featured review", but said the reviews were not otherwise manipulated to favor the partner businesses.<ref name="registerregister"/> Such featured reviews were shown with a strip above them that said "One of 's Favorite Reviews" and "This business is a Yelp sponsor."<ref name="registerregister">{{cite news|url=https://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/13/yelp_sales_pitch/|title=Yelp 'pay to play' pitch makes shops scream for help|first=Cade|last=Metz|date=August 13, 2008|work=]|access-date=August 20, 2008|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080820044259/http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/13/yelp_sales_pitch/|archive-date=August 20, 2008|df=mdy-all}}</ref> The company also said it might have had some rogue salespeople that misrepresented their practices when selling advertising services.<ref name="registerregister"/> In response to the criticism of their allowing their advertising partners to manipulate the review listing, Yelp ceased its "featured review" practice in 2010.<ref name=FastTweak/> | |||
Several lawsuits have been filed against Yelp accusing it of extorting businesses into buying advertising products. Each has been dismissed by a judge before reaching trial.<ref name=criticaleye/> In February 2010, a class-action lawsuit was filed against Yelp alleging it asked a Long Beach veterinary hospital to pay $300 a month for advertising services that included the suppression or deletion of disparaging customer reviews.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/02/yelp-sued-for-alleged-extortion/ |title=Yelp Accused of Extortion |last=Zetter |first=Kim |magazine=] |date=February 24, 2010 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121222192459/http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/02/yelp-sued-for-alleged-extortion |archive-date=December 22, 2012|df=mdy-all}}</ref> The following month, nine additional businesses joined the class-action lawsuit,<ref>{{cite news |last=Ali |first=Sarmad |url=https://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/03/17/small-businesses-join-lawsuit-against-yelp/ |title=Small Businesses Join Lawsuit Against Yelp |newspaper=The Wall Street Journal |date=March 17, 2010 |access-date=January 3, 2013 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130116192515/http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/03/17/small-businesses-join-lawsuit-against-yelp/ |archive-date=January 16, 2013 |df=mdy-all }}</ref> and two similar lawsuits were filed.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.pantagraph.com/business/review-site-yelp-under-fire-in-business-lawsuits/article_ed48d532-3380-11df-9928-001cc4c03286.html | title=Review site Yelp under fire in business' lawsuits |first=Rachel | last=Metz | agency=] | publisher=] | date=March 20, 2010 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923230426/http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9EHQGEG0.htm | archive-date=September 23, 2015| df=mdy-all}}</ref> That May the lawsuits were combined into one class-action lawsuit,<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/173991/business-owners-seek-to-revive-payola-lawsuit-agai.html | title=Business Owners Seek To Revive Payola Lawsuit Against Yelp | last=Davis | first=Wendy | work=Media Post | date=May 4, 2012 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130910104303/http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/173991/business-owners-seek-to-revive-payola-lawsuit-agai.html#axzz2Pn05cAgv | archive-date=September 10, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> which was dismissed by San Francisco U.S. District Judge ] in 2011. Chen said the reviews were protected by the ] and that there was no evidence of manipulation by Yelp.<ref>{{cite web |last=Fowler |first=Geoffrey A. |url=http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204505304577002170423750412.html |title=Yelp Is Cleared in Lawsuit |newspaper=] |date=October 28, 2011 |access-date=January 3, 2013 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121216022511/http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204505304577002170423750412.html |archive-date=December 16, 2012 |df=mdy-all }} {{subscription required}}</ref> The plaintiffs filed an appeal.<ref name="IBT July 2013">{{cite web | url=http://www.ibtimes.com/yelp-extortion-rampant-say-small-business-owners-class-action-lawsuit-against-review-bully-appealed | title=Yelp Extortion Rampant, Say Small-Business Owners As Class-Action Lawsuit Against Review 'Bully' Appealed | website=] | date=July 12, 2013 | access-date=August 4, 2013 | author=Zara, Christopher | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130726181503/http://www.ibtimes.com/yelp-extortion-rampant-say-small-business-owners-class-action-lawsuit-against-review-bully-appealed | archive-date=July 26, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> In September 2014, the ] upheld the dismissal, finding that even if Yelp did manipulate reviews to favor advertisers, this would not fall under the court's legal definition of extortion.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Yelp-can-give-paying-clients-better-ratings-5731200.php |title=Yelp can manipulate ratings, court rules |first=Bob | last=Egelko | work=] |date=September 4, 2014 |url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140926140834/http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Yelp-can-give-paying-clients-better-ratings-5731200.php |archive-date=September 26, 2014 |df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | title=Court Decides Yelp Can Change Ratings | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/05/business/court-decides-yelp-can-change-ratings.html |agency=] | work=] |date=September 4, 2014 | url-access=limited |url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141006080620/http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/05/business/court-decides-yelp-can-change-ratings.html?_r=0 | archive-date=October 6, 2014 | df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | title=Court Sides With San Francisco-Based Yelp In Lawsuit From Small Business Owners | url=https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/09/04/court-sides-with-san-francisco-based-yelp-in-lawsuit-from-small-business-owners-9th-circuit-court-of-appeals-online-reviews/ | work=] | date=September 4, 2014 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141006103104/http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/09/04/court-sides-with-san-francisco-based-yelp-in-lawsuit-from-small-business-owners-9th-circuit-court-of-appeals-online-reviews/ |archive-date=October 6, 2014 |df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
In August 2013, Yelp launched a series of town hall style meetings in 22 major American cities in an effort to address concerns among local business owners. Many attendees expressed frustration with seeing Yelp remove positive reviews after they declined to advertise, receiving reviews from users that never entered the establishment, and other issues.<ref name="IBT July 2013"/><ref name="LA Times August 2013">{{cite news | url=https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-yelp-town-hall-20130822,0,4360994.story | title=Yelp gets an earful from L.A. business owners | newspaper=Los Angeles Times | date=August 21, 2013 | access-date=September 2, 2013 | author=Chang, Andrea | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130826211758/http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-yelp-town-hall-20130822,0,4360994.story | archive-date=August 26, 2013 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> A 2011 "working paper" published by ] from Harvard Associate Professor Michael Luca and Georgios Zervas of ] found that there was no significant statistical correlation between being a Yelp advertiser and having more favorable reviews.<ref name=Regularly/><ref>{{citation|title=Fake It Till You Make It: Reputation, Competition, and Yelp Review Fraud|first1=Michael|last1=Luca|first2=Georgios|last2=Zervas|date=November 8, 2013|access-date=September 28, 2014|url=http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=45151|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140922075315/http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=45151|archive-date=September 22, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> The Federal Trade Commission received 2,046 complaints about Yelp from 2008 to 2014,<ref name=Regularly/> most from small businesses regarding allegedly unfair or fake reviews or negative reviews that appear after declining to advertise.<ref name=brewafight>{{cite news | title=Yelp Reviews Brew a Fight Over Free Speech vs. Fairness | url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303847804579477633444768964| first=Angus | last=Loten | work=] | date=April 2, 2014 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141217040719/http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303847804579477633444768964 | archive-date=December 17, 2014| df=mdy-all}}</ref> According to Yelp, the Federal Trade Commission finished a second examination of Yelp's practices in 2015 and in both cases did not pursue an action against the company.<ref>{{cite news | title=Yelp Says FTC Won't Act on Complaints About Its Reviews | first=Rolfe | last=Winkler | url=https://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/01/06/yelp-says-ftc-wont-act-on-complaints-about-its-reviews/ | work=] | date=January 6, 2015 | url-access=subscription | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150107074748/http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/01/06/yelp-says-ftc-wont-act-on-complaints-about-its-reviews/ | archive-date=January 7, 2015 | df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | url=https://money.cnn.com/2015/01/07/technology/ftc-yelp-reviews/ | title=Yelp: You can trust our reviews | first=Sara | last=O'Brien | website=] | date=January 7, 2015 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150107170158/http://money.cnn.com/2015/01/07/technology/ftc-yelp-reviews/ | archive-date=January 7, 2015 | df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
Journalist ] of the '']'' also criticized Yelp in 2014 for the practice of selling competitors' ads to run on top of business listings and then offering to have the ads removed as part of a paid feature.<ref>{{cite news | title=Yelp's practices sound to some like extortion | url=https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2014-mar-31-la-fi-lazarus-20140401-story.html | work=] |date=March 31, 2014 | url-access=limited | url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150211195958/http://articles.latimes.com/2014/mar/31/business/la-fi-lazarus-20140401 |archive-date=February 11, 2015| df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
The 2019 film '']'' documents Yelp's alleged business practices.<ref name=milliken2015>{{cite news|url=http://www.ibtimes.com/yelp-movie-san-francisco-filmmaker-takes-billion-dollar-bully-1843536|title=Yelp The Movie: San Francisco Filmmaker Takes On 'Billion Dollar Bully'|first=Christopher|last=Zara|work=]|date=March 11, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150315033732/http://www.ibtimes.com/yelp-movie-san-francisco-filmmaker-takes-billion-dollar-bully-1843536|archive-date=March 15, 2015}}</ref> | |||
In 2018, in the case ''Hassell v. Bird'', the California Supreme Court held by a narrow 4–3 margin that a business cannot force Yelp to remove a review, even if the review is defamatory of the business.<ref name="AP News">{{cite web | title=California high court: Yelp can't be ordered to remove posts | website=AP News | url=https://www.apnews.com/62dd5ebf5fac4f04810ce80f39df77d4/California-high-court:-Yelp-can%27t-be-ordered-to-remove-posts | access-date=July 7, 2018 | quote=Online review site Yelp.com cannot be ordered to remove posts against a San Francisco law firm that a judge determined were defamatory, a divided California Supreme Court ruled Monday in a closely watched case that internet companies warned could be used to silence online speech. | date=July 2, 2018 | archive-date=July 2, 2018 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180702231352/https://www.apnews.com/62dd5ebf5fac4f04810ce80f39df77d4/California-high-court:-Yelp-can%27t-be-ordered-to-remove-posts | url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite court |url=http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S235968.PDF |title=Archived copy |access-date=July 4, 2018 |archive-date=November 19, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181119124812/http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S235968.PDF |url-status=dead }}</ref> | |||
A 2019 investigation by ] and the podcast Underunderstood found that in some cases, Yelp was replacing restaurant's direct phone numbers with numbers that routed through ], which would then charge restaurants for the calls under marketing agreements GrubHub has with restaurants.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/wjwebw/yelp-is-sneakily-replacing-restaurants-phone-numbers-so-grubhub-can-take-a-cut |title=Yelp is Screwing Over Restaurants By Quietly Replacing Their Phone Numbers |date=August 6, 2019 |access-date=August 7, 2019 |archive-date=September 21, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200921152808/https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/wjwebw/yelp-is-sneakily-replacing-restaurants-phone-numbers-so-grubhub-can-take-a-cut |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
===Political expression and politically motivated ratings=== | |||
Eater reported that between 2012 and 2015, a number of users who review restaurants on the site have posted reviews that contained comments about the political activities and political views of businesses and their owners or have submitted ratings affected by political motivations. The article found that in some instances, the Yelp review area for a business has become flooded with such review submissions after a business was involved in politically sensitive action. Yelp has removed reviews of this nature and has tried to suppress their submission.<ref name=SocialProtest>{{cite news|title=Why Yelp Emerged as a Site for Social Protest|first=Amy|last=McKeever|date=May 19, 2015|url=http://www.eater.com/2015/5/19/8588185/yelp-social-protest-trolling-memories-pizza|publisher=Eater|access-date=May 22, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150521234144/http://www.eater.com/2015/5/19/8588185/yelp-social-protest-trolling-memories-pizza|archive-date=May 21, 2015|df=mdy-all |work=]}}</ref> | |||
===Litigation over review content=== | |||
According to data compiled in 2014 by the Wall Street Journal, Yelp receives about six subpoenas a month asking for the names of anonymous reviewers, mostly from business owners seeking litigation against those writing negative reviews.<ref name=Regularly/> In 2012, the Alexandria Circuit Court and the Virginia Court of Appeals<ref>{{cite web|title=Yelp Is In Court Deal With Free Speech Issues Yet Again|first=Jillian|last=D'Onfro|date=April 4, 2014|url=http://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-free-speech-defamation-2014-4#ixzz3ASk4cg1X|website=Business Insider|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150508035332/http://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-free-speech-defamation-2014-4#ixzz3ASk4cg1X|archive-date=May 8, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> held Yelp in contempt for refusing to disclose the identities of seven reviewers who anonymously criticized a carpet-cleaning business. In 2014, Yelp appealed to the ].<ref name=brewafight/><ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp battles to keep local reviewers anonymous|date=April 4, 2014|first=Eric|last=Sherman|access-date=July 4, 2014|url=http://www.cbsnews.com/news/yelp-battles-to-keep-local-reviewers-anonymous/|publisher=ABC News|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140715002256/http://www.cbsnews.com/news/yelp-battles-to-keep-local-reviewers-anonymous/|archive-date=July 15, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> A popular public argument in favor of Yelp at the time was that a ruling against Yelp would negatively affect ] online. The judge from an early ruling said that if the reviewers did not actually use the businesses' services, their communications would be false claims not protected by free speech laws.<ref>{{cite news|title=Facebook, Google, Twitter side with Yelp in Virginia Supreme Court case, report says|url=http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2014/11/facebook_google_twitter_side_with_yelp_in_virginia_supreme_court_case_regarding.html|newspaper=Syracuse|first=Allie|last=Healy|date=November 4, 2014|access-date=November 13, 2014|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141108041341/http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2014/11/facebook_google_twitter_side_with_yelp_in_virginia_supreme_court_case_regarding.html|archive-date=November 8, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> The Virginia Supreme Court ruled that Yelp, a non-resident company in the state of Virginia, could not be subpoenaed by a lower court.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.foster.com/duff-on-hospitality-law/virginia-supreme-court-holds-that-yelp-cannot-be-subpoenaed-in-virginia|title=Virginia Supreme Court Holds that Yelp! Cannot be Subpoenaed in Virginia|last=Duff|first=Greg|date=April 24, 2015|website=Foster Garvey|access-date=January 3, 2020|archive-date=January 3, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200103175558/https://www.foster.com/duff-on-hospitality-law/virginia-supreme-court-holds-that-yelp-cannot-be-subpoenaed-in-virginia|url-status=live}}</ref> Also in 2014, a California state law was enacted that prohibits businesses from using "disparagement clauses" in their contracts or terms of use that allow them to sue or fine customers that write negatively about them online.<ref>{{cite news|title=Congress's Fight for Your Right to Yelp|first=Laura|last=Ryan|url=http://www.nationaljournal.com/tech/congress-fight-for-your-right-to-yelp-20140915|access-date=September 16, 2014|newspaper=National Journal|date=September 15, 2014|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140915162934/http://www.nationaljournal.com/tech/congress-fight-for-your-right-to-yelp-20140915|archive-date=September 15, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Yelp without fear, says new California law|first=Doug|last=Gross|publisher=CNN|url=http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/12/tech/web/california-law-yelp/|access-date=September 16, 2014|date=September 12, 2014|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140916064835/http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/12/tech/web/california-law-yelp/|archive-date=September 16, 2014|df=mdy-all}}</ref> | |||
===Investigations=== | |||
A 2020 ''Business Insider'' investigation questioned the culture, ethics and practices within Yelp.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-insiders-disturbing-stories-high-pressure-corporate-sales-culture-2020-11|title=Heavy drinking, sex tapes, and a pyramid scheme: Yelp insiders speak out about the company's high-pressure sales culture|publisher=Business Insider|access-date=7 November 2020|archive-date=November 7, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201107130502/https://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-insiders-disturbing-stories-high-pressure-corporate-sales-culture-2020-11|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-sales-tactics-insiders-say-sales-reps-misleading-aggressive-2020-10|title=Yelp sales tactics: Insiders say sales reps are misleading, aggressive|publisher=Business Insider|access-date=7 November 2020|archive-date=November 1, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201101001914/https://www.businessinsider.com/yelp-sales-tactics-insiders-say-sales-reps-misleading-aggressive-2020-10|url-status=live}}</ref> An April 2022 Vice article highlighted that some Elite reviewers use their status to sell reviews.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjbqvd/buy-yelp-elite-reviews|title=The Trusted Yelp 'Elite' Reviewers Who Sell Their Reviews for Cash|date=April 26, 2022|publisher=Vice|access-date=28 April 2022|archive-date=April 28, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220428063051/https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjbqvd/buy-yelp-elite-reviews|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
==Community== | |||
According to '']'' most reviewers (sometimes called "Yelpers"<ref name="SFGate1"/>) are "well-intentioned" and write reviews in order to express themselves, improve their writing, or to be creative. In some cases, they write reviews in order to lash out at corporate interests or businesses they dislike.<ref name="Chafkin"/> Reviewers may also be motivated by badges and honors, such as being the first to review a new location,<ref name="SFGate1"/> or by praise and attention from other users.<ref name="nytloi"/> Many reviews are written in an entertaining or creative manner.<ref name="SFGate1"/> Users can give a review a "thumbs-up" rating, which will cause it to be ranked higher in the review listings.<ref name=criticaleye>{{cite news | url=https://www.latimes.com/local/la-xpm-2013-apr-20-la-me-banks-yelp-20130420-story.html | title=Turning a critical eye on Yelp | last=Banks | first=Sandy | work=] | date=April 20, 2013 | url-access=limited | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140423055240/http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-banks-yelp-20130420,0,7824145,full.column | archive-date=April 23, 2014 | df=mdy-all }}</ref> Each day a "Review of the Day" is determined based on a vote by users.<ref name=eatandtell/> According to ''The Discourse of Online Consumer Reviews'' many Yelp reviewers are internet-savvy adults aged 18–25 or "suburban baby boomers".<ref name="discourse"/> | |||
Reviewers are encouraged to use real names and photos.<ref name="discourse">{{cite book|last=Vasquez|first=Camilla|title=The Discourse of Online Consumer Reviews|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a2p7AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT6|date=June 19, 2014|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing|isbn=978-1-4411-9684-2|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160501081714/https://books.google.com/books?id=a2p7AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT6|archive-date=May 1, 2016|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Each year members of the Yelp community are invited or self-nominated to the "Yelp Elite Squad" and some are accepted based on an evaluation of the quality and frequency of their reviews.<ref name="yhdnaoi"/><ref name="latimes"/> Members may nominate other reviewers for elite status. Users must use their real name and photo on Yelp to qualify for the Elite Squad.<ref name=eatandtell/> To accept a nomination, members must not own a business. Elite Squad Yelpers are governed by a council and estimated to include several thousand members. Yelp does not disclose how the Yelp Elite are selected.<ref name="SFGate1"/><ref name="yhdnaoi">{{cite magazine|date=June 2, 2011|title=Yelp's Online Reviewing Mafia|url=http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_24/b4232083260194.htm|access-date=March 20, 2013|magazine=BusinessWeek|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130308040026/http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_24/b4232083260194.htm|archive-date=March 8, 2013|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Elite Squad members are given different color badges based on how long they've been an elite member.<ref name="latimes"/> The Yelp Elite Squad originated with parties Yelp began throwing for members in 2005,<ref name="latimes"/> and in 2006 it was formally codified;<ref name="yhdnaoi"/> the name came from a joking reference to prolific reviewers that were invited to Yelp parties as the "Yelp Elite Squad"."<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/><ref name="Chafkin"/> Members are invited to special opening parties, given gifts, and receive other perks.<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/><ref name="latimes">{{cite news|title=For some Yelp reviewers, it pays to be Elite|first=Jen|last=Harris|url=https://www.latimes.com/food/la-fo-0502-yelp-20150502-story.html|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|access-date=May 8, 2015|date=May 1, 2015|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150505052750/http://www.latimes.com/food/la-fo-0502-yelp-20150502-story.html|archive-date=May 5, 2015|df=mdy-all}}</ref> As of 2017, there are over 80 local Elite Squads in North America.<ref name="yhdnaoi"/> | |||
As of 2017, Yelp employed a staff of over 80 community managers that organize parties for prolific reviewers, send encouraging messages to reviewers, and host classes for small business owners.<ref name="Chafkin"/> Yelp reviewers are not required to disclose their identity, but Yelp encourages them to do so.<ref name=AmbitiousPlan/> | |||
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Latest revision as of 06:40, 10 January 2025
Directory service and online review forum This article is about the Internet company. For other uses, see Yelp (disambiguation).
Screenshot Yelp.com homepage | |
Type of business | Public |
---|---|
Traded as | |
Founded | October 2004; 20 years ago (2004-10) |
Headquarters | 350 Mission Street, San Francisco, California, U.S. |
Owner | Jeremy Stoppelman (6.3%) |
Founder(s) | |
Key people |
|
Industry | Local search, business ratings and reviews, online food delivery, local homeowner services |
Products | Online advertising |
Revenue | US$1.34 billion (2023) |
Operating income | US$79 million (2023) |
Net income | US$99 million (2023) |
Total assets | US$1.01 billion (2023) |
Total equity | US$750 million (2023) |
Employees | 4,872 (2023) |
URL | yelp |
Native client(s) on | iOS, Android, Windows |
References: |
Yelp Inc. is an American company that develops the Yelp.com website and the Yelp mobile app, which publishes crowd-sourced reviews about businesses. It also operates Yelp Guest Manager, a table reservation service. It is headquartered in San Francisco.
Yelp was founded in 2004 by former PayPal employees Russel Simmons and Jeremy Stoppelman. It has since become one of the leading sources of user-generated reviews and ratings for businesses. Yelp grew in usage and raised several rounds of funding in the following years. By 2010, it had $30 million in revenue, and the website had published about 4.5 million crowd-sourced reviews. From 2009 to 2012, Yelp expanded throughout Europe and Asia. In 2009, it entered unsuccessful negotiations to be acquired by Google. Yelp became a public company via an initial public offering in March 2012 and became profitable for the first time two years later.
As of December 31, 2023, approximately 287 million reviews have been contributed to Yelp. In 2023, the company had over 36 million desktop unique visitors and over 60 million mobile web unique visitors. Yelp estimates that over 55% of its audience has an annual household income of more than $100,000.
The company has been accused of using unfair practices to raise revenue from the businesses that are reviewed on its site – e.g., by presenting more negative review information for companies that do not purchase its advertising services or by prominently featuring advertisements of the competitors of such non-paying companies or conversely by excluding negative reviews from companies' overall rating on the basis that the reviews "are not currently recommended". There have also been complaints of aggressive and misleading tactics by some of its advertising sales representatives. The company's review system's reliability has also been affected by the submission of fake reviews by external users, such as false positive reviews submitted by a company to promote its own business or false negative reviews submitted about competing businesses – a practice sometimes known as "astroturfing" – which the company has tried to combat in various ways.
Company history (2004–present)
Origins (2004–2009)
Two former PayPal employees, Jeremy Stoppelman and Russel Simmons, founded Yelp at a business incubator, MRL Ventures, in 2004. Stoppelman and Simmons conceived the initial idea for Yelp as an email-based referral network, after Stoppelman caught the flu and had a difficult time finding an online recommendation for a local doctor. Max Levchin, the co-founders' former colleague as founding chief technology officer of PayPal and founder of MRL Ventures, provided $1 million in Angel financing. MRL co-founder David Galbraith, who instigated the local services project based on user reviews, came up with the name "Yelp". Stoppelman explained that they decided on "Yelp" for the company's name because "it was short, memorable, easy to spell, and was familiar with 'the help' and 'yellow pages'".
According to Fortune, Yelp's initial email-based system was "convoluted". The idea was rejected by investors and did not attract users beyond the cofounders' friends and family. Usage data showed that users were not answering requests for referrals, but were using the "Real Reviews" feature, which allowed them to write reviews unsolicited. According to The San Francisco Chronicle, "the site's popularity soared" after it was re-designed in late 2005 with the distinctive Burst logo. Yelp raised $5 million in funding in 2005 from Bessemer Venture Partners and $10 million in November 2006 from Benchmark Capital. The number of reviewers on the site grew from 12,000 in 2005, to 100,000 in 2006. By the summer of 2006, the site had one million monthly visitors. It raised $15 million in funding from DAG Ventures in February 2008. In 2010, Elevation Partners invested $100 million; $75 million was spent on purchasing equity from employees and investors, while $25 million was invested in sales staff and expansion. Yelp grew from 6 million monthly visitors in 2007 to 16.5 million in 2008 and from 12 to 24 cities during the same time period. By 2009, the site had 4.5 million reviews. By 2010, Yelp's revenues were estimated to be $30 million and it employed 300 people.
Private company (2009–2012)
Yelp introduced a site for the United Kingdom in January 2009 and one for Canada that August. The first non-English Yelp site was introduced in France in 2010; users had the option to read and write content in French or English. From 2010 to 2011, Yelp launched several more sites, in Austria, Germany, Spain, and the Netherlands. International website traffic doubled during the same time period. An Australian website went live in November 2011. It was supported through a partnership with Telstra, which provided one million initial business listings, and was initially glitchy. By the end of 2012, Yelp was publishing reviews for establishments in 20 countries, including Turkey and Denmark. Yelp's first site in Asia was introduced in September 2012 in Singapore, which was followed by Japan in 2014.
In December 2009, Google entered into negotiations with Yelp to acquire the company, but the two parties failed to reach an agreement. According to The New York Times, Google offered about $500 million, but the deal fell through after Yahoo offered $1 billion. TechCrunch reported that Google refused to match Yahoo's offer. Both offers were later abandoned following a disagreement between Yelp's management and board of directors about the offers. In June 2015, Yelp published a study alleging Google was altering search results to benefit its own online services.
Yelp began a service called Yelp Deals in April 2011, but by August it cut back on Deals due to increased competition and market saturation. That September, the Federal Trade Commission investigated Yelp's allegations that Google was using Yelp web content without authorization and that Google's search algorithms favored Google Places over similar services provided by Yelp. In order to avoid an FTC anti-trust lawsuit, in January 2014, Google agreed to allow services like Yelp the ability to opt out of having their data scraped and used on Google's websites.
Public entity (2012–present)
Having filed for an initial public offering (IPO) with the Securities Exchange Commission in November 2011, Yelp's stock began public trading on the New York Stock Exchange on March 2, 2012. In 2012, Yelp acquired its largest European rival, Qype, for $50 million. The following year, CEO Jeremy Stoppelman reduced his salary to $1. Yelp acquired start-up online reservation company SeatMe for $12.7 million in cash and stock in 2013. Yelp's second quarter 2013 revenue of $55 million "exceeded expectations", but the company was not yet profitable.
In 2012/13, Yelp moved into its new corporate headquarters, occupying about 150,000 square feet on 12 floors of 140 New Montgomery (the former PacBell building) in San Francisco.
The company was profitable for the first time in the second quarter of 2014, as a result of increasing ad spending by business owners and possibly from changes in Google's local search algorithm. The algorithm dubbed Google Pigeon made authoritative local directory sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor more visible. Over the course of the year, Yelp websites were launched in Mexico, Japan, and Argentina. Also in 2014, Yelp expanded in Europe through the acquisitions of German-based restaurant review site Restaurant-Kritik and French-based CityVox.
In early February 2015, Yelp announced it bought Eat24, an online food-ordering service, for $134 million. Then in August 2017, Yelp sold Eat24 to Grubhub for $287.5 million. The acquisition resulted in a partnership to integrate Grubhub delivery into the Yelp profiles of restaurants.
In late 2015, a "Public Services & Government" section was introduced to Yelp, and the General Services Administration began encouraging government agencies to create and monitor official government pages. For example, the Transportation Security Administration created official TSA Yelp pages. Later that year Yelp began experimenting in San Francisco with consumer alerts that were added to pages about restaurants with poor hygiene scores in government inspections. Research conducted by the Boston Children's Hospital found that Yelp reviews with keywords associated with food poisoning correlates strongly with poor hygiene at the restaurant. Researchers at Columbia University used data from Yelp to identify three previously unreported restaurant-related food poisoning outbreaks.
On November 2, 2016, concurrent with its earnings report for Q3 2016, Yelp announced it would drastically scale back its operations outside North America and halt international expansion. This resulted in the termination of essentially all international employees across Yelp's 30+ international markets from the sales, marketing, public relations, business outreach, and government relations departments. Overseas employees now primarily consist of engineering and product management staff. These layoffs affected only 175 individuals or 4% of its total workforce.
In March 2017, Yelp acquired the restaurant reservation app Nowait for $40 million. In April 2017, Yelp acquired Wi-Fi marketing company Turnstyle Analytics for $20 million.
In early 2020, Yelp listed space at 55 Hawthorne Street, San Francisco, for 235 employees as available for sublease. Business closures and stay-at-home orders during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States caused a massive decline in searches on Yelp (down 64–83% from March to April, depending on category) and company revenues. On April 9, the company announced it would lay off 1,000 employees, furlough about 1,100 with benefits, reduce hours for others, cut executive pay by 20–30%, and stop paying the CEO for the rest of 2020.
In September 2021, Yelp announced that it was relocating its corporate headquarters to a smaller space at 350 Mission Street to be subleased from Salesforce.
On June 1, 2023, Yelp decided to close its offices in Phoenix, Arizona and Hamburg, Germany. According to an announcement made by the company, less than 6 percent of the available workstations in these offices were being utilized. This move comes after Yelp had already shut down its New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. offices.
As of mid-2023, Yelp maintains a single remaining office in the United States in San Francisco. Additionally, the company will continue its operations in Toronto, Canada, and London, United Kingdom. The closure and downsizing of these offices are expected to result in approximately $27 million in annual cost savings for Yelp during the 2023–24 fiscal year. As of February 2024, its website listed reviews for establishments in 32 countries.
Features
Screenshot The homepage of Yelp's iPhone app. | |
Type of site | Local online reviews |
---|---|
Available in | 15 languages |
Owner | Yelp, Inc. |
URL | www |
Commercial | Yes |
Registration | Optional |
Users | 142 million unique visitors per month |
Launched | 2004; 21 years ago (2004) |
Current status | Online |
Written in | Python, Java, and a custom framework |
Yelp's website, Yelp.com, is a crowd-sourced local business review and social networking site. The site has pages devoted to individual locations, such as restaurants or schools, where Yelp users can submit a review of their products or services using a one to five stars rating scale. Businesses can update contact information, hours, and other basic listing information or add special deals. In addition to writing reviews, users can react to reviews, plan events, or discuss their personal lives.
78% of businesses listed on the site had a rating of three stars or better, but some negative reviews were very personal or extreme. Some of the reviews are written entertainingly or creatively. As of 2014, users could give a "thumbs-up" to reviews they liked, which caused these reviews to be featured more prominently in the system. As of 2008, each day a "Review of the Day" was determined based on a vote by users.
72% of Yelp searches are done from a mobile device. The Yelp iPhone mobile app was introduced in December 2008. In August 2009, Yelp released an update to the iPhone app with a hidden Easter Egg augmented reality feature called Monocle, which allowed users looking through their iPhone camera to see Yelp data on businesses seen through the camera. Check-in features were added in 2010.
Yelp users can make restaurant reservations in Yelp through Yelp Reservations, a feature initially added in June 2010; in 2021 the service was consolidated with others into "Yelp Guest Manager". Yelp's reservation features have been done through SeatMe, which was acquired by Yelp in 2013. Prior to that, Yelp had offered reservation services through OpenTable. In 2013, features to have food ordered and delivered were added to Yelp as well as the ability to view hygiene inspection scores and make appointments at spas. Yelp's content was integrated into Apple Inc.'s Siri "virtual assistant" and the mapping and directions app of Apple's September 2012 release of the iOS 6 computer operating system.
In March 2014, Yelp added features for ordering and scheduling manicures, flower deliveries, golf games, and legal consultations, among other things. In October 2014, the company, working in collaboration with hotel search site Hipmunk, added features to book hotels through Yelp.
Yelp started a 7–10% cash-back program at some US restaurants in 2016 through a partnership with Empyr, which links credit card purchases to online advertising.
On February 14, 2017, Yelp launched Yelp Questions and Answers, a feature for users to ask venue-specific questions about businesses.
In June 2020, Yelp launched a COVID-19 section that enables businesses to update their health and safety measures as well as their service offering changes. Starting January 2021, users can provide detailed feedback regarding what health and safety measures the business has implemented through editing in the COVID-19 section on Yelp business pages.
In April 2023, Yelp introduced Yelp Guaranteed, which provides a refund of up to $2,500 if something goes wrong with a project. It also improved its search features with AI and added the option to add video to reviews. In April 2024, Yelp released Yelp Assistant, an AI chatbot that helps users find a professional for a project. It also introduced an API that allows developers to search Yelp data from other applications, and made other improvements.
Features for businesses
Yelp added the ability for business owners to respond to reviews in 2008. Businesses can respond privately by messaging the reviewer or publicly on their profile page. In some cases, Yelp users that had a bad experience have updated their reviews more favorably due to the business's efforts to resolve their complaints. In some other cases, disputes between reviewers and business owners have led to harassment and physical altercations. The system has led to criticisms that business owners can bribe reviewers with free food or discounts to increase their rating. However, Yelp users say this rarely occurs. A business owner can "claim" a profile, which allows them to respond to reviews and see traffic reports. Businesses can also offer discounts to Yelp users that visit often using a Yelp "check in" feature. In 2014, Yelp released an app for business owners to respond to reviews and manage their profiles from a mobile device. Business owners can also flag a review to be removed, if the review violates Yelp's content guidelines.
Yelp's revenues primarily come from selling ads and sponsored listings to small businesses. Advertisers can pay to have their listing appear at the top of search results or feature ads on the pages of their competitors. In 2016, advertising revenue grew at a rate of 30% year over year. Yelp will only allow businesses with at least a three-star rating to sign up for advertising. Originally a sponsored "favorite review" could place a positive review above negative ones, but Yelp stopped offering this option in 2010 in an effort to deter the valid criticism that advertisers were able to obtain a more positive review appearance in exchange for pay.
On June 5, 2020, Yelp launched a tool to allow businesses on the platform to identify themselves as black-owned, allowing customers to search for black-owned companies they want to support. There were more than 2.5 million searches for black-owned businesses on Yelp from May 25 to July 10. Searches for black-owned businesses were up 2,400% in 2020. In August 2021 Yelp added a feature to let users filter businesses based on their COVID precautions.
Relationship with businesses
A Harvard Business School study published in 2011 found that each "star" in a Yelp rating affected the business owner's sales by 5–9%. A 2012 study by two University of California, Berkeley economists found that an increase from 3.5 to 4 stars on Yelp resulted in a 19% increase in the chances of the restaurant being booked during peak hours. A 2014 survey of 300 small business owners done by Yodle found that 78% were concerned about negative reviews. Also, 43% of respondents said they felt online reviews were unfair, because there is no verification that the review is written by a legitimate customer.
Controversy and litigation
See also: User review § Fake reviewsYelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses. Criticism of Yelp continues to focus on the legitimacy of reviews, public statements of Yelp manipulating and blocking reviews in order to increase ad spending, as well as concerns regarding the privacy of reviewers.
Astroturfing
As Yelp became more influential, the phenomenon of business owners and competitors writing fake reviews, known as "astroturfing", became more prevalent. A study from Harvard Associate Professor Michael Luca and Georgios Zervas of Boston University analyzed 316,415 reviews in Boston and found that the percentage of fake reviews rose from 6% of the site's reviews in 2006 to 20% in 2014. Yelp's own review filter identifies 25% of reviews as suspicious.
Yelp has a proprietary algorithm that attempts to evaluate whether a review is authentic and filters out reviews that it believes are not based on a patron's actual personal experiences, as required by the site's Terms of Use. The review filter was first developed two weeks after the site was founded and the company saw their "first obviously fake reviews". Filtered reviews are moved into a special area and not counted towards the businesses' star-rating. The filter sometimes filters legitimate reviews, leading to complaints from business owners. New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman said Yelp has "the most aggressive" astroturfing filter out of the crowd-sourced websites it looked into. Yelp has also been criticized for not disclosing how the filter works, which it says would reveal information on how to defeat it.
Yelp also conducts "sting operations" to uncover businesses writing their own reviews. In October 2012, Yelp placed a 90-day "consumer alert" on 150 business listings believed to have paid for reviews. The alert read "We caught someone red-handed trying to buy reviews for this business". In June 2013, Yelp filed a lawsuit against BuyYelpReview/AdBlaze for allegedly writing fake reviews for pay. In 2013, Yelp sued a lawyer it alleged was part of a group of law firms that exchanged Yelp reviews, saying that many of the firm's reviews originated from their own office. The lawyer said Yelp was trying to get revenge for his legal disputes and activism against Yelp. An effort to win dismissal of the case was denied in December 2014. In September 2013, Yelp cooperated with Operation Clean Turf, a sting operation by the New York Attorney General that uncovered 19 astroturfing operations. In April 2017, a Norfolk, Massachusetts, jury awarded a jewelry store over $34,000 after it determined that its competitor's employee had filed a false negative Yelp review that knowingly caused emotional distress.
In December 2019, Yelp won a court case that challenged the company's explanation of how its review recommendation software worked. The court ruling stated that "None of the evidence presented at the trial showed anything nefarious or duplicitous on the part of Yelp in connection with the assertions made in the Challenged Statements." This was one of a number of court cases that ruled in favor of Yelp over the years.
Alleged unfair business practices
Yelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses. There have been allegations that Yelp has manipulated reviews based on participation in its advertising programs. Many business owners have said that Yelp salespeople have offered to remove or suppress negative reviews if they purchase advertising. Others report seeing negative reviews featured prominently and positive reviews buried, and then soon afterwards, they would receive calls from Yelp attempting to sell paid advertising.
Yelp staff acknowledged that they had allowed their advertising partners to move their favorite review to the top of the listings as a "featured review", but said the reviews were not otherwise manipulated to favor the partner businesses. Such featured reviews were shown with a strip above them that said "One of 's Favorite Reviews" and "This business is a Yelp sponsor." The company also said it might have had some rogue salespeople that misrepresented their practices when selling advertising services. In response to the criticism of their allowing their advertising partners to manipulate the review listing, Yelp ceased its "featured review" practice in 2010.
Several lawsuits have been filed against Yelp accusing it of extorting businesses into buying advertising products. Each has been dismissed by a judge before reaching trial. In February 2010, a class-action lawsuit was filed against Yelp alleging it asked a Long Beach veterinary hospital to pay $300 a month for advertising services that included the suppression or deletion of disparaging customer reviews. The following month, nine additional businesses joined the class-action lawsuit, and two similar lawsuits were filed. That May the lawsuits were combined into one class-action lawsuit, which was dismissed by San Francisco U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in 2011. Chen said the reviews were protected by the Communications Decency Act of 1996 and that there was no evidence of manipulation by Yelp. The plaintiffs filed an appeal. In September 2014, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld the dismissal, finding that even if Yelp did manipulate reviews to favor advertisers, this would not fall under the court's legal definition of extortion.
In August 2013, Yelp launched a series of town hall style meetings in 22 major American cities in an effort to address concerns among local business owners. Many attendees expressed frustration with seeing Yelp remove positive reviews after they declined to advertise, receiving reviews from users that never entered the establishment, and other issues. A 2011 "working paper" published by Harvard Business School from Harvard Associate Professor Michael Luca and Georgios Zervas of Boston University found that there was no significant statistical correlation between being a Yelp advertiser and having more favorable reviews. The Federal Trade Commission received 2,046 complaints about Yelp from 2008 to 2014, most from small businesses regarding allegedly unfair or fake reviews or negative reviews that appear after declining to advertise. According to Yelp, the Federal Trade Commission finished a second examination of Yelp's practices in 2015 and in both cases did not pursue an action against the company.
Journalist David Lazarus of the Los Angeles Times also criticized Yelp in 2014 for the practice of selling competitors' ads to run on top of business listings and then offering to have the ads removed as part of a paid feature.
The 2019 film Billion Dollar Bully documents Yelp's alleged business practices.
In 2018, in the case Hassell v. Bird, the California Supreme Court held by a narrow 4–3 margin that a business cannot force Yelp to remove a review, even if the review is defamatory of the business.
A 2019 investigation by Vice News and the podcast Underunderstood found that in some cases, Yelp was replacing restaurant's direct phone numbers with numbers that routed through GrubHub, which would then charge restaurants for the calls under marketing agreements GrubHub has with restaurants.
Political expression and politically motivated ratings
Eater reported that between 2012 and 2015, a number of users who review restaurants on the site have posted reviews that contained comments about the political activities and political views of businesses and their owners or have submitted ratings affected by political motivations. The article found that in some instances, the Yelp review area for a business has become flooded with such review submissions after a business was involved in politically sensitive action. Yelp has removed reviews of this nature and has tried to suppress their submission.
Litigation over review content
According to data compiled in 2014 by the Wall Street Journal, Yelp receives about six subpoenas a month asking for the names of anonymous reviewers, mostly from business owners seeking litigation against those writing negative reviews. In 2012, the Alexandria Circuit Court and the Virginia Court of Appeals held Yelp in contempt for refusing to disclose the identities of seven reviewers who anonymously criticized a carpet-cleaning business. In 2014, Yelp appealed to the Virginia Supreme Court. A popular public argument in favor of Yelp at the time was that a ruling against Yelp would negatively affect free speech online. The judge from an early ruling said that if the reviewers did not actually use the businesses' services, their communications would be false claims not protected by free speech laws. The Virginia Supreme Court ruled that Yelp, a non-resident company in the state of Virginia, could not be subpoenaed by a lower court. Also in 2014, a California state law was enacted that prohibits businesses from using "disparagement clauses" in their contracts or terms of use that allow them to sue or fine customers that write negatively about them online.
Investigations
A 2020 Business Insider investigation questioned the culture, ethics and practices within Yelp. An April 2022 Vice article highlighted that some Elite reviewers use their status to sell reviews.
Community
According to Inc. Magazine most reviewers (sometimes called "Yelpers") are "well-intentioned" and write reviews in order to express themselves, improve their writing, or to be creative. In some cases, they write reviews in order to lash out at corporate interests or businesses they dislike. Reviewers may also be motivated by badges and honors, such as being the first to review a new location, or by praise and attention from other users. Many reviews are written in an entertaining or creative manner. Users can give a review a "thumbs-up" rating, which will cause it to be ranked higher in the review listings. Each day a "Review of the Day" is determined based on a vote by users. According to The Discourse of Online Consumer Reviews many Yelp reviewers are internet-savvy adults aged 18–25 or "suburban baby boomers".
Reviewers are encouraged to use real names and photos. Each year members of the Yelp community are invited or self-nominated to the "Yelp Elite Squad" and some are accepted based on an evaluation of the quality and frequency of their reviews. Members may nominate other reviewers for elite status. Users must use their real name and photo on Yelp to qualify for the Elite Squad. To accept a nomination, members must not own a business. Elite Squad Yelpers are governed by a council and estimated to include several thousand members. Yelp does not disclose how the Yelp Elite are selected. Elite Squad members are given different color badges based on how long they've been an elite member. The Yelp Elite Squad originated with parties Yelp began throwing for members in 2005, and in 2006 it was formally codified; the name came from a joking reference to prolific reviewers that were invited to Yelp parties as the "Yelp Elite Squad"." Members are invited to special opening parties, given gifts, and receive other perks. As of 2017, there are over 80 local Elite Squads in North America.
As of 2017, Yelp employed a staff of over 80 community managers that organize parties for prolific reviewers, send encouraging messages to reviewers, and host classes for small business owners. Yelp reviewers are not required to disclose their identity, but Yelp encourages them to do so.
See also
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External links
- Official websites
- Yelp Reservations official website
- Business data for Yelp Inc.:
Online food ordering services | |
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Meal delivery | |
Meal kits | |
Online grocery delivery | |
Reservations | |
Defunct | |
Software | |
Volunteered geographic information | |
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Collaborative mapping | |
Geotagging | |
Participatory monitoring and crowdmapping | |
Travel literature |
- 2012 initial public offerings
- American companies established in 2004
- American review websites
- Android (operating system) software
- Companies based in San Francisco
- Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange
- Consumer guides
- Geosocial networking
- Internet properties established in 2004
- IOS software
- Online companies of the United States
- Recommender systems
- Restaurant guides
- South of Market, San Francisco
- WatchOS software
- Windows Phone software
- Volunteered geographic information