Yelp giveth and Yelp taketh away; at times with cruel results that a business never saw coming.

Take La Viola for example; a popular family-owned restaurant that has been operating in Philadelphia since 2001. Several days ago the business linked to an ugly incident in which a group of thugs allegedly assaulted a gay couple shortly after eating at the establishment. The Philadelphia Police Department released a surveillance video of the accused individuals as they walked along the street where the attack took place. This followed by a photo posted on Twitter of the same individuals supposedly eating at La Viola. When a Philadelphia magazine posted this in a news article, many internet users flocked to Yelp to voice their anger.

Only their anger is not directed at the accused thugs, its directed at La Viola.

A restaurant that regularly received four and five star-reviews suddenly found themselves flooded with one-star reviews and threats that accused them of being homophobic and refusing to cooperate with police investigators.

“Boycott La Viola for not assisting the police in identifying the diners who attacked a group of gays,” wrote Ginger K. of Mount Laurel, N.J. on Yelp. “Pure BS from restaurant management.”

“I have previously enjoyed La Viola, but choosing to stand by and do nothing is just as bad as participating…” wrote Kate M. of Philadelphia in another Yelp review

The fact that La Viola was in fact fully cooperating with police didn’t seem to matter.

While the missions of sites like Yelp are to provide accurate reviews of businesses while filtering out the noise; it doesn’t take much more than a mob to show how much damage these sites can cause. Unfortunately, businesses like La Viola get caught on the receiving end.

This kind of incident is not isolated. Whether it’s the California restaurant whose “No Strollers” policy made national headlines, or the New York clinic under criticism for a surgical procedure that may have led to Joan Rivers’ death, businesses find themselves the center of unwanted media attention all the time. And the more low-key the business, the more likely that its Yelp page is its most public online resource.

Businesses would be very wise to employ a Reputation Management strategy to deal with potential scenarios such as this. Companies like Digital Firefly can help.

What is Reputation Management?

Is the understanding or influencing of an individual’s or business’s reputation. Its original term coined as public relations; but advancement social media made it primarily an issue of search results. There are also ethical forms of reputation management, such as responding to customer complaints. In layman’s terms, it’s like an insurance policy to limit the online damage to your business.

It’s not certain whether La Viola had a Reputation Management strategy in place prior to the incident, but it is attempting to fight back against the high amounts of negative online content. The restaurant released a statement in which they are fully cooperating with authorities. The police also confirmed this. And the Philadelphia magazine that published the initial story has published a follow up that tries to clarify the issue.

It will be some time before we know the full extent of the damage done to La Viola’s reputation. However, this much is certain; it doesn’t take much more than a group acting on false information to take an entire organization down through Yelp.