Apple Maps Adds New Review Sources, Replacing Yelp Outside US In Many Cases
TripAdvisor and Booking.com reviews now appearing in search results.
Topic: Online Review
How The Sharing Economy Will Lead To The Growth Of Online Reviews
Marketing Land's Amy Gesenhues interviews Keynote Speaker & NYT Best Selling Author Bill Tancer for a preview of insights he will share about online reviews at SMX West in Silicon Valley, March 4, 2015.
BrightLocal Opens Its 2014 Local SEO Industry Survey
Local SEO firm BrightLocal has posted its third annual local SEO industry survey, asking SEO professionals to answer 20 questions on SEO business related topics like company turnover, services and fees. Anyone interested in taking the survey can do so on BrightLocal’s website up until this Friday, August 15. BrightLocal says it plans on posting […]
How To Generate Customer Experience Reviews For SEO – Part II
In part 1, we talked about some practical tips for converting a satisfied customer to a raving fan who is willing to talk about their experience with your service-based company online. In this article, we’ll discuss how to get that fan to talk about your website in a way that benefits your search marketing efforts. Creating […]
Survey Says Yelp The Most Influential Local Review Site
Yelp says it’s the most frequently used, most trusted and highest quality local reviews site, according to new Nielsen survey data. Some of those data were released on the company’s official blog two days ago. Beyond Yelp, the universe of competitors included in the survey were the following: Angie’s List Citysearch OpenTable TripAdvisor YP Zagat […]
Content Free: 25 Percent Of Google+ Reviews Are “Empty”
Investment firm Piper Jaffray has started tracking and comparing Google+ and Yelp reviews. For its inaugural report, the firm looked at a “snapshot of 950 places in 20 major cities” and compared review counts and depth across categories. The firm says it will continue to do so on a weekly basis going forward. Yelp holds […]
Yahoo Goes Live With Yelp Local Reviews
Last month the Wall Street Journal reported that Yelp reviews were being integrated into Yahoo search results. This morning Yahoo formally announced the partnership: Now when you use Yahoo Search to look up a local business in the U.S. on your smartphone, tablet, or PC, you’ll see user reviews, business information, and star ratings from […]
Yelp Supersizes Its Local Profiles, Makes Them Less Busy
Yelp has redesigned parts of its web UI to make them more visual and to surface more information. In particular business profile pages have been changed to emphasize images, featured user reviews and key pieces of local content, all of which are now more prominent. The changes are not yet live for me, which is […]
Yelp Q3 2013 Revenue Up 68% At $61.2 Million For The Quarter
Yelp released its Q3 2013 earnings report today, posting a 68 percent growth in revenue from the third quarter of 2012, with net revenue at $61.2 million for the quarter ending on September 30, 2013. Cumulative reviews on Yelp have increased 42 percent year over year, climbing to 47.3 million. Average monthly unique visitors grew […]
Yelp Outs More Businesses With Another Batch Of Paid Review Alerts
Yelp’s battle against phony reviews and unacceptable tactics to earn reviews continues today with the company posting another batch of “Consumer Alert” messages on business profile pages. This is the second time Yelp has announced that some businesses will be outed for trying to game its system. Back in October, Yelp put a message on […]
Five Steps To Successfully Navigate Negative Online Reviews
Last month, D.C. contractor Dietz Development made news when it filed a $750,000 Internet defamation lawsuit against its former customer, Jane Perez, for negative reviews she posted on Yelp and Angie’s List regarding renovation work at her home. The company claimed the reviews, which alleged that Dietz did not complete its work and stole jewelry […]
After Sting Operation, Yelp Outs 8 Businesses That It Caught Trying To Buy Reviews
Yelp is now showing “Consumer Alert” warning messages on the profile pages of eight businesses that it says it caught in a sting operation trying to buy reviews. As the New York Times reports, Yelp conducted a sting operation in which one of its employees pretended to be an “Elite” reviewer and responded to review […]
Restaurant Owner Slammed On Yelp For Supporting Obama
Over the weekend President Obama made a campaign stop at Big Apple Pizza in Ft. Pierce, Florida. The owner, Scott Van Duzer, is reportedly a registered Republican but is also a supporter of Obama. During a photo-op he bear-hugged Obama (with Secret Service permission). The story and the image (at right) received national media attention. […]
Study: 72% Of Consumers Trust Online Reviews As Much As Personal Recommendations
The findings of this year’s Local Consumer Review Survey (2012) show a positive shift in consumer trust and appreciation of online reviews. Approximately 72% of consumers surveyed said that they trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations, while 52% said that positive online reviews make them more likely to use a local business. About […]
Judge Throws Out Class Action Lawsuit Against Yelp
Yelp is off the hook, again. A judge has thrown out a class action lawsuit filed against Yelp that alleged the company tried to extort small businesses by promising to remove negative reviews in exchange for money. As we reported when the suit was first filed in February 2010, the plaintiffs — which included a […]
How Yelp Crushed Citysearch & Yahoo Local … & Why Google Is Stealing Yelp’s Playbook
A fascinating study published last year compares the reviews and reviewers at three local business websites: Yelp, Citysearch and Yahoo Local. And, in explaining how Yelp overtook the other two, it also hints — in my opinion — at how Google is trying to beat Yelp by using Yelp’s own playbook. Citysearch and Yahoo Local […]
Yelp: Google Told Us “Our Way Or The Highway”
If you wanted to see Yelp reviews for a particular restaurant you could either go to Yelp.com or you could go to Google’s Place Page for that same location — and that’s what Yelp is worried about. For the past year or so Yelp and Google have been a little like the two Koreas, not […]
Review Sites’ Rancor Rises With Prominence of Google Place Pages
Friends or enemies? Partners or competitors? Google’s relationship with review sites like TripAdvisor and Yelp is as complicated as ever, and the disputes are likely to increase as the search giant pursues mobile and local ambitions that center around its controversial Place pages. The rancor stems from the way Google aggregates content from various review […]
Survey: 6-10 Local Business Reviews Required For Trust
UK based SEO firm BrightLocal has released a second wave of findings from a consumer survey conducted in September 2010 (n=2,012 US & UK residents), which asked about local search behavior and online reviews. The first round of findings was released in December. This second release includes numerous findings. However I’ll focus on several that […]
Survey: Local Reviews Gaining In Importance
UK based SEO firm BrightLocal recently conducted an online survey of just over 2,000 consumers in the US and UK to determine local search usage patterns and attitudes. There are no real surprises in the data but it validates other surveys about local search. Among other findings it reinforces the importance of reviews for online […]
Google Markets HotPot In Portland & Breaks Its Own Rules On Local Reviews
Google is launching a new campaign in Portland, Oregon, today that’s designed to promote HotPot, the company’s recently announced service that invites users to review local businesses and then feeds those reviews into Google Places. The marketing is clever and the benefits for local businesses seem obvious, but there’s a problem: Google is breaking its […]
Google Segmenting, Categorizing Reviews On Places Pages
Google is now “segmenting” and separating local reviews from third parties such as Yelp from those of its own user-reviews. It has also added favicons next to the third party reviews to offer some “branding” on Places Pages. David Mihm noticed this yesterday. Here’s what it looks like on a Places Page for popular San […]
Live Blog: SMX Keynote Conversation With Yelp COO, Geoff Donaker
Good morning! It’s almost time for day two of SMX East to begin and the plan is to live blog this morning’s keynote conversation between Yelp COO Geoff Donaker and Search Engine Land Executive Editor, Chris Sherman. But first, I’m the master of ceremonies and so I need to run up to the stage and […]
Google Now Lets Businesses Respond To Reviews On Places
In case there was any question about whether Google is serious about its relationship with business owners, the company is now letting businesses that have claimed their Places listings respond to reviews: Starting today, if you’re a verified Google Places business owner, you can publicly respond to reviews written by Google Maps users on the […]
With Lawsuits Looming, Yelp Separates Reviews From Advertising
With several lawsuits pending and words like “extortion” being thrown around like baseballs on opening day, Yelp is making changes that it hopes will end the confusion (and lawsuits) over how it operates. The first change — and most important one, in my opinion — is that advertisers will no longer be able to choose […]
Got Questions For Big Players In Local Search?
Next week, I’m moderating a session at the Where 2.0 conference involving big names in local search: Bing, Google, Yahoo and Yelp. Got some questions you want put to the panel about current challenges in local and where things are going? Let me know! The panel, The Big Picture, from the Big Players, begins at […]
New Online Destinations Create Local Marketing Opportunities For Small Businesses
These days, local marketing can seem a lot more complicated to the average small business owner than it used to be—and for very good reason. With advances in digital offerings, small businesses are now confronted with a growing range of possibilities for their ad dollars. Moreover, owners are faced with the harder task of determining […]
Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against Yelp Alleging “Extortion”
It must be the season for litigation. Two class action law firms have filed suit in Los Angeles federal court claiming that Yelp has attempted to “extort” money from small businesses by offering to remove negative reviews in exchange for payment. The suit contends: Yelp runs an extortion scheme in which the company’s employees call […]
Citysearch Brings Twitter & Local Search Together
There’s been a lot of talk lately about the inevitable collision of local search and social media, and specifically how social conversations are impacting the local search space. Reviews have been a part of local search for years, and sites like Citysearch, Insider Pages, Yelp, and others practically created and/or perfected the local-directory-with-consumer-reviews model. Today, […]
Yelp Allows Business Owners To Talk Back On Site
Yelp has partly been successful because it was so focused on the consumer. Other competing local sites, such as Cox’s Kudzu or most of the internet yellow pages sites, among others, have for a long time tried to strike more balance between businesses and consumers. For example, they have allowed business owners to respond or […]
Yelp Case Settled, But Bigger Issues Remain For Search & Reviews
A lawsuit over a Yelp.com review has been settled, but the larger issue of how business owners, customers, and review sites will co-exist online remains wide open. CNET is reporting that a San Francisco chiropractor and his disgruntled patient have settled their differences over a negative review that the patient posted on Yelp. Dr. Steven […]
Citysearch Debuts Broad Redesign: More Social, Local & Mobile
The venerable local arts and entertainment guide Citysearch, which has, in the last couple of years, confronted a new generation of challengers (mostly notably Yelp), launched a broad redesign last night. The comprehensive new site introduces the ability to get more listings and content at the neighborhood level, allows users to sign in using Facebook […]
Google Enables Local Reviews From Mobile Phones
According to the Google Mobile Blog, the company is now giving users the ability to rate and review local restaurants from their mobile handsets via a browser (screenshot below). On the details page for a local business, users can “sign in and write review.” Though somewhat buried, Google has made the process very simple; one […]
Internet Now The Primary Local Medium
Last week, Judy’s Book joined the list of companies that have tried but stumbled or wiped out in local. The market’s complexity and business model challenges make it tough for most startups to succeed. Yet, paradoxically, consumers have clearly embraced the “local Internet” and are using it with increasing frequency to find local information online. […]
Survey: Search Now Top Resource For Local Information
Local SEM firm WebVisible and Nielsen last year surveyed U.S. consumers about their local search behavior. There were some very interesting and striking findings. For example, 51% of users were doing category searches for local businesses without a geographic modifier. Today findings from a second wave of that survey were released. The second survey is […]
The Good, The Bad, & The Incredible Usefulness Of User-Generated Content
Here’s a callout to the community! From all of us who operate locally focused sites, thanks are in order to the users who write reviews about local businesses such that others can make more informed decisions. User-generated reviews, as we have mentioned in past columns, are not a ‘silver bullet’ that can build or sustain […]
Google Maps Adds User Generated Reviews
The Google Lat Long Blog announced that Google Maps now allows for user-generated reviews. We covered in the past that Google had reviews from third-party sources, but now Google allows any logged-in user to add reviews for any business listing, similar to how it recently allowed maps to gain user data.
Google Adds Local Reviews In Search Results
The Google Blog announced that when you conduct searches at Google.com for local specific information, you may get local reviews and business comparisons. For example a search on pizza 10010 returns three results, all with five stars, from pizza restaurants in NYC. Here is a screen capture: