Business Owner's Guide
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Tricky situations and other questions
One of my business' reviews disappeared. What happened?
To ensure a great experience for our millions of users our system sometimes doesn't show all reviews when you visit a business's page.
Why? Because Yelp reviews are relied upon by so many users and we feel it's our responsibility to to filter out untrustworthy reviews. Otherwise, we'd all be sifting through a lot of annoying spam. Does this mean we potentially lose a legitimate opinion? Yes, but we feel the benefits far outweigh the cost. Yelp is a community of real people with real reviews, not an anonymous review site. Additionally, it is important to note that our system screens for trust - not rating - so both positive and negative reviews are impacted equally.
Our system is designed to ensure that Yelp represents true word of mouth as accurately as possible and ideally, provides new customers the confidence they need to try your business. If you have suggestions about how we can improve this system, we would love to hear them. While we can't evaluate individual cases or re-instate specific reviews, we certainly appreciate your feedback and are continually striving to improve the service for you and your customers.
My business received a negative review. What can I do?
It's important to keep in mind that not every review your business receives will necessarily be positive nor will you agree with its content. Poor reviews can sometimes be difficult to swallow something we can certainly relate to as it is not uncommon for Yelp itself to receive poor reviews of ourselves -- even on our own site! Here are some things to think about when getting a poor review:
DON'T overestimate the impact of a single negative review. It happens to even the best businesses. In fact, in speaking to Yelp users, we've learned that negative reviews sprinkled in with favorable reviews often act to enhance the credibility of the positive reviews by illustrating the honesty and openness of the Yelp environment. That said, if you see a trend of negative reviews, you may want to take this feedback and determine if there is a way to improve your business.
DON'T lash out at the people who have written negative reviews about you. Tempting as that may be, we see that backfiring in some cases as the Yelp community may up the ante and even engage in "vigilante justice" by spreading more negativity (see below for alternative).
DO message your customers using Yelp for Business Owners. Thank your customers for writing about your business but be careful when messaging a customer that gave your business a negative review, be sure to put yourself in the mindset of your customer. Recognize that your tone may come across as defensive.
DO take the feedback to heart... but remember that each review is just one single opinion, and it's the entire set of the Yelp reviews together that really matters most.
What if there is a review for my business that I think is libelous? Will Yelp remove it?
Rarely. Yelp is a forum for people to voice their opinions, even if those opinions are negative or sarcastic.
But when we are made aware of a review that may violate Yelp's Review Guidelines, we will evaluate it and, if it clearly violates those guidelines, we will remove it or ask the user to change the violating content.
If you believe that a review of your business violates Yelp's Review Guidelines, please email us with your business name, city and state and the name of the reviewer who you believe has written the violating review. One of our excellent customer service reps will get back to you as soon as we can, though this can take several days.
I'm considering legal action against a reviewer and/or Yelp. What are the precedents here?
Before you decide to sue Yelp, you should keep in mind that Yelp is just a forum where people can post their opinions. If you believe a review is libelous or actionable for any reason, you may contact the user through the site to to express your concerns about the review.
A recent case on this issue, Zeran v. AOL, 129 F. 3 327, 330 (4th Cir. 1997), states: "By its plain language, § 230 creates a federal immunity to any cause of action that would make service providers liable for information originating with a third-party user of the service."
Here's another resource you may want to check out before you decide to sue: http://www.thefirstamendment.org/antislappresourcecenter.html
Does Yelp apply its Review Guidelines differently for clients? (If I become a Yelp sponsor, will you remove my negative reviews?)
No. The Yelp customer service team applies the Review Guidelines equivalently to sponsors and non-sponsors. So no, becoming a Yelp sponsor does not mean that negative review will be removed.
If you believe that a review violates the Review Guidelines, please contact the reviewer (your customer) first via Yelp private messaging. If you are not able to resolve the issue directly with the reviewer, send the URL of the review in question to our customer service team [link to feedback page] and someone will respond as soon as possible. Keep in mind that Yelp is based on free speech and that we only rarely remove reviews.
