Yahoo Local Integrates Editorial Reviews

professional editorials-- no mazda needed

[arinick]

Seeing some content I haven't seen before on Yahoo Local-- 'Editorial Reviews'.

These are professional reviews written by a third-party (who, by the way, receives a logo placement with direct backlink from each listing).

This content is not being treated as backfill, as it is appearing above user-generated reviews. Users apparently have no control over whether they are reviewed by this provider or not. This provider's own site lists only 9 contributors!

The good news is that if you get one of these reviews, it is just more content for your YLocal listing. More content means more to match searches.

Looks like they inked their deal for this back in 2004.

Very interesting.

[eWhisper]

I find that the 'is this review helpful' doesn't even appear for these listings. Seems Yahoo is considering these reviews as more useful than user voted data.

[bostonBeans]

Do you have an example query? I looked (briefly) and did not come across any of these Editorial Reviews.

Thanks
-bB

[arinick]

Here's an example: Yahoo Search [local.yahoo.com]

Imagine this scenario: Your "Editorial Reviewer" comes to your restaurant-- just out of bad luck, gets a bad taco. He writes a bad review, which gets listed first in your paid Yahoo Local enhanced listing--- there is no way to ever trump it, no matter if 100s of people say "Wow, what great tacos". It will always be first, and will always be the authority cited.

Dangerous ground citing opinion as authoritative data, isn't it?

[pleeker]

Dangerous ground citing opinion as authoritative data, isn't it?

Only if you think people aren't smart enough to separate facts from opinions.

Let's face it - having opinions / reviews on web pages is becoming more accepted, and so hopefully the end user is becoming more adept at recognizing and processing the material. (For example, one bad review isn't always gonna stop you from seeing the film, is it?)

[arinick]

I'm not sure I entirely agree, as your model puts a lot of faith in users being able to learn a brand new interface rapidly (how long did it take people to search more than 2 words in Google?).

On the other hand, I do notice that YLocal isn't allocating review stars with these editorials, so perhaps an eye-tracking study would prove that these authoritative reviews aren't all that effective afterall, as users are probably likely to skip it for one with glitz and color.

[pleeker]

I was referring more specifically to shopping-based sites, where reviews are becoming part and parcel of the presentation.

Amazon's had reviews for at least 5-6 years now, and last month when I shopped across the web and back for a new monitor, a good 75-80% of the sites I visited -- even smaller sites I'd never heard of -- we're all supporting user-generated reviews on the product pages.

[cubfan]

Arinick, I agree with you about the potential problem of Editorial reviews trumping user generated reviews. A novice user could easily interpret the logo'd Gayot review as the authoritative opinion on the business.

On the other hand, when I buy a book from Amazon the first review is always the editorial review, and then I scroll down to read user reviews. I know the difference between the two, but I can't speak for novice users. This would be interesting to explore.

That said, I welcome Mr. and Mrs. Gayot to review any of my clients YahooL listings:)