Yelp: What Do You Dislike About It?

What are its weaknesses, as seen by users?

[Planet13]

Hi there, Everyone:

As an end user (not as a business owner), can I ask what you DON'T like about yelp? Are there times when you are looking up something on yelp and wishing they had more information / different information?

I am thinking of doing a directory for some niche businesses and am looking at how I can get it to rank over sites like yelp and patch (the aol version of yelp).

Thanks in advance.

[Soma]

1) Don't like that it's become a popularity contest. Everyone wants to rate everything in order to become part of the in crowd, get elite status, and be the first to rate a place. Which leads to ridiculous reviews of businesses, people reviewing places that haven't even opened yet thus there's no way they could have been there to give a legit review, and reviewing places that shouldn't be reviewed like McDonalds.

2) The directions suck big time. I don't know how many times I've used their address to map a route and the place ends up being 2-3 blocks off course. Not even close to where the real address is. Would be great if the site could validate the address somehow.

3) It would be great if the first person to review the business would have to enter details such as website address, phone, and hours of operation. All 3 of those are pertinent pieces of info but one or more are often left out which means I have to search the web outside of Yelp to get the info.

[rocknbil]

It's mostly a young crowd, a very self-absorbed and opinionated crowd, who could care less about who they affect because they know absolutely everything and if you don't agree you're irrelevant. It's OK though. So did I when I was 25. It reminds me of mySpace, but a grown up and dangerously "adult" version.

[Planet13]

Wow, thanks Soma and rocknbil. You are right in mentioning the attitudes of the yelpers.

Would it be fair to say that you sometimes don't leave a review because you might incur the wrath of the cooler-than-thou crowd?

so for a directory site to be appealing, it would have to be / have:

1) No crappy-attitude by reviewers
2) make sure reviews are of real (already opened) locations
3) More precise location / directions
4) More complete informational details (hours of operations, etc.,)

Thanks in advance. Let me know if you can think of anything else.

[dpd1]

I don't like review sites in general, for a number of reasons...

You get the self proclaimed 'pro' reviewer types, who fancy themselves as some sort of official writer... when they're really just some 20 something kid living at home with too much time on their hands.

The transaction is disproportionate to the power of the review... Somebody spends $10 on a hamburger, then if there's some little thing they don't like, they proclaim the place is somehow not worthy, to potentially thousands of people. That's a ridiculous amount of power to wield for $10. What if the cook's kid was sick all night and he had an off day... Too much power for way too little of an experience.

Most people lean towards negative and feel that there must always be SOME negative comment made, even when things were generally good.

Fake reviews... I recently was looking for a place to do business with. I emailed them and got a response from Alex. I then remembered that the first glowing review for the place on Yelp was signed Alex. Coincidence? Probably not, because I found another review site that had a review signed Alex as well.

Many review systems often seem to just be a collection of disgruntled people. Individuals have no problem finding the time trying to destroy somebody when they're ticked off, but generally have a harder time finding time to compliment.

Lastly... The trivial things that some people view as significant flaws are often times beyond absurd.

The only way reviews work is when you have a large enough sampling to get a decent broad spectrum of experiences. God help the small business that has the one or two cranky people who were the only ones that gave a review. It would be interesting to maybe have no reviews posted, until a certain number have been collected.

Overall, I think Yelp's layout is too busy and sort of annoying in function.

[Planet13]

Most people lean towards negative and feel that there must always be SOME negative comment made, even when things were generally good.

It's funny that you mention that. It kind of seems that way to me, too.

One thing I remember hearing was an interview with a waitress at a nice restaurant out in Napa county, here in Northern California. She said the worst people are the "yelpers" because they will be thoroughly enjoying their dinners, eating every bit off their plates, and having a wonderful time.

Then when it comes to ask for the check, they hint how they regularly do reviews on yelp, and imply that a break in the price would be appreciated. She says it feels like she is being held hostage.

It would be interesting to maybe have no reviews posted, until a certain number have been collected.

I think that is a great suggestion!

[dpd1]

Then when it comes to ask for the check, they hint how they regularly do reviews on yelp, and imply that a break in the price would be appreciated. She says it feels like she is being held hostage.

It feels like extortion, because it is. It pretty much indicates where a lot of those routine reviewer's heads are at. If it were me, I'd flat out ask them if they were inferring that they would give me a bad review if I didn't give them a break, then keep their name from their card. If anything popped up and sounded familiar, I would pursue it legally. That technically is in fact, extortion... Something that Yelp itself has been directly accused of in class action lawsuits. Lawsuits specializing in web defamation have been skyrocketing, and will only continue. People have actually been arrested after accosting people that gave them bad reviews.

[Automan Empire]

God help the small business that has the one or two cranky people who were the only ones that gave a review. It would be interesting to maybe have no reviews posted, until a certain number have been collected.

This. The first Yelp about my B&M was one star over the price, after it was agreed upon before beginning successful repairs on her widget, and the competitor who first charged more for unnecessary ineffective widget repairs got more stars. Bizarre on the face of it, but it was the only Yelp for over 6 months, and it palpably hurt business. Waiting for a statistically meaningful number of samples makes sense, but taking away the instant gratification factor will probably reduce the motivation to post reviews to nil, so such a system sounds difficult to get rolling.

Maybe a system of removing moronic reviewers from the pool.
[Everything about the place was good, but] one star off because they're too far from my house.
I swear to Gaia I saw that in an actual review. Customers aren't as discerning as you'd hope, in following reviews, in my personal experience. Reviewers can say whatever they please with no consequences, but what white hat techniques does the reviewee have available, besides waiting for happy customers to Yelp?

[Soma]

Exterminate the troublemakers. The final solution.

[rocknbil]

^ ^ LOL

Would it be fair to say that you sometimes don't leave a review because you might incur the wrath of the cooler-than-thou crowd?

What, sometimes? How about never. I once went to a restaurant based on the raves of Yelp reviews. For $40 I got about 3 ounces of food (but it was really, REALLY pretty on the plate - I guess I was supposed to take a picture and post it on Facebook, report into Foursquare and move up the mayorship ladder, to demonstrate my uber coolness) and a watered down drink. Looking around the room, every single woman in the place had those short black dresses. You know the ones. The ones most of them can't even fit in (the words "muffin top" come to mind.)

I swear to Gaia I saw that in an actual review.

"Ahh (some HOOKAH lounge) how I've missed you, but how you've changed. I used to spend hours in your arms, reading (insert pseudo-intellectual book here), discussing the fate of humanity with like minded intellectuals. I visited you on Friday, the San Diego summer air drifing in through your open arms, but you've lost something, it's just not the same between us . . . . "

PuuuuuleeeeeAAAAAase. Yeah . . Yelp. LOL

[Planet13]

"...the words "muffin top" come to mind."

Are you sure it wasn't a Bootydoo?

(You know, a bootydoo... where your belly sticks out more than your booty do. It's all the rage...)

PuuuuuleeeeeAAAAAase. Yeah . . Yelp. LOL

I see your point. maybe someone out there has a wordpress plugin for stopping morons from posting reviews?

[Planet13]

This. The first Yelp about my B&M was one star over the price...

Had something similar happen to us. A regular customer - who we "break all the rules for" to provide the best customer service possible - reviewed our store. She RAVED about us, saying how much she loved it and how it was one of only about three different stores she shops at.

Then she gave us only four stars instead of five. Huh?

Fortunately, all of our other reviews are five star, but we only have less than ten reviews total - most of them legitimate, even ;)

[dpd1]

This. The first Yelp about my B&M was one star over the price, after it was agreed upon before beginning successful repairs on her widget, and the competitor who first charged more for unnecessary ineffective widget repairs got more stars. Bizarre on the face of it, but it was the only Yelp for over 6 months, and it palpably hurt business. Waiting for a statistically meaningful number of samples makes sense, but taking away the instant gratification factor will probably reduce the motivation to post reviews to nil, so such a system sounds difficult to get rolling.

And that's why the whole system is inherently flawed... They're never going to do something like that, because they want participation, they want traffic, they want crap filling up pages... Any kind of crap, whether it's logical, fair... whatever. Which is why a system like that should not have the power to destroy somebody's business.

It's like the Dun & Bradstreet scam. They still hold the title for being the "official" method of checking how reputable a business is financially... Yet, they will have third party sales reps from other countries tell people on the phone that they will bump up their credit rating, if they buy a package from them. Extortion. You can't even do business with the government without having a DUN. Total scam.

It's easy to say... Well, people are smart... They'll ignore the cranks. Maybe... Maybe not. I've seen people post stuff on forums, asking if everybody thinks it will be safe dealing with some guy on ebay, because he has a single negative. Then you go and look and the guy has one neg out of thousands of positives. What on earth would even make somebody focus on the one neg? But that's how a lot of people's minds work. So it definitely does make a difference.

[Planet13]

Then you go and look and the guy has one neg out of thousands of positives. What on earth would even make somebody focus on the one neg?

That is a very good point.