Yelp, Negative Reviews, and claims of Fraud and Scam from Small Business Owners
September 15th, 2009Maybe you’ve already heard of this issue, but I discovered it recently and wanted to share it with my readers. There are folks out there who are claiming that a popular online review site, Yelp, will take down negative reviews if small business owners pay them to. Seriously?!
Here are some of the articles that I’ve found regarding Yelp and small business owners who claim they are being told that in exchange for money, Yelp will reduce negative reviews of the business on their website. While I haven’t had any personal experience with Yelp, I think small business owners should at least be aware of these allegations.
“Yelp and the Business of Extortion 2.0″
East Bay Express News
“Local business owners say Yelp offers to hide negative customer reviews of their businesses on its web site … for a price.”
BEWARE: Yelp.com is a fraud!
ScottWorldBlog.WordPress.com
“Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to call your attention to a very nefarious website called yelp.com, which you should avoid at all costs.”
CrossFit East Bay Rest Day 090223: Yelp Is A Scam
Cross Fit East Bay Website
“I can confirm that Yelp has been incredibly aggressive in trying to get me to advertise, and has removed six five-star reviews of CFEB after I declined to advertise.”
“Yelp ‘pay to play’ pitch makes shops scream for help”
The Register
“Over the last years, five San Francisco Bay Area businesses have told The Register that the company has offered to “push bad reviews to the bottom” of their Yelp pages if they paid to advertise on the site.”
--------------
J. Olkoski
Aldebaran Web Design, Seattle
Jill Olkoski has a BS in Engineering, a BS in Computer Science and an MA in Clinical Psychology. She delights in using her advanced technical and psychological skills to help small business owners develop cost-effective and successful websites.
September 26th, 2010 at 9:21 pm
Let me start by saying that I am a business owner and whose business is obviously listed on http://Yelp.com. My business is called Kis Kiss Mediterranean Cafe & Hookah Lounge, http://kiskisshookahlounge.com. We had good & bad reviews as any other place, but more good ones, total of 47 reviews sine we’ve been in the business for over 6 years.
Couple of months ago I got a phone call from a http://Yelp.com sales representative (whose name was Mathew) offering me to advertise on http://Yelp.com for about $300 per week, which I of course declined. A couple of days later http://yelp.com removed 42 of my companies’ reviews!!! Leaving us with only bad reviews…this type of activity is clearly fraudulent so please sway away from http://yelp.com!!!
April 11th, 2011 at 10:41 pm
I have had similar experiences with Yelp for Business. My representative’s name is Daira who is worthless as a consultant for Yelp. I have had my reviews which I have had for many years prior to signing up with Yelp for Business owners removed to a filter which now only shows one review. Now small businesses are having a hard time without having this sort of scam games played with our reputation.
Yelp uses authentic reviews both good and bad to manipulate businesses to be coerced into forceful advertising with them. They make unsubstantiated claims that it is because of Yelp that you’re seeing high traffic to your site. This is a lie as Yelp has no monopoly on search engines. My success for online internet business has not increased (especially since the majority of my customers are repeat customers not directed to me from Yelp) even though they claim that it has.