We received a question from one of our clients today regarding Yelp and why they weren’t showing any reviews while a lot of customers were telling him they were submitting. It turns out he is a victim of the Yelp filtered reviews; which is one of the reasons we don’t really like Yelp for small business. Here is how it works:

The Problem

The problem with this algorithm approach is that it puts way too much weight on established “Yelpers”. We can understand that in the world before Facebook, it was easy to put up anonymous reviews and pump up your place while tearing down your competitors. But we aren’t in that world anymore. Being able to sign in via Facebook and post a review or use my Google account solves this problem because it’s easy to see I am a REAL person. However, Yelp’s algorithm seems to value the established Yelper who has followers. This way new people or less established people have less chance to publish a review on a site. And conversely if an established Yelper gives you a bad review; it goes right onto the site without recourse which can have disastrous effects for a small business.

Becoming like Digg?

Yelp is becoming dangerously close to becoming like Digg, where a small group of people could ultimately control what landed on the front page. In our opinion, the filtered review is one of the reason we dislike Yelp. While its understandable that they are trying to build trustworthy sources, those days are over. Simply, if you have a Facebook Id, you should be trusted and your review should appear on a business page. It should have nothing to do with the amount of reviews you have written over the years and the amount of followers you have. If you are identified as a person, your voice should count just the same as someone whose account has been on Yelp for years.