A Candid Yelp Advertising Review – Is Yelp Ripping People Off?
ByMaybe you know and maybe you don’t… but Yelp (a local search and reviews online service) offers paid advertising for businesses called the “Yelp Sponsorship Program“. Click on the link...»
To sum it up, according to the page advertising this opportunity, this Yelp Sponsorship program allows you to:
- Put up a slideshow of the images of your business.
- Highlight a user’s review that you like the most (as the business owner)
- Promote your business as a sponsored search result and on your competitors’ business pages. Target potential clients while they are making decisions about where to spend their money on a business like yours
It sounds all fancy spansy right? Sounds like you get even MORE control over your business listing which will help “put your best foot forward” and sneak attack your competitors, stealing all their would be clients.
But Stop the Music, Do These Yelp Advertising Features Actually Accomplish Anything? Or are They Just Fluff Designed to Lure You in so They can Zap You?
Suck Them in & Then ZAP Them!
Before we proceed, I’d like to first state that my experience and knowledge of this Yelp Sponsorship program comes from dealing with them on behalf of one of my clients. This client signed up with Yelp (despite my warnings – apparently Yelp’s salesman are SMOOOTH) and I got to learn all about this program.
Having said that, that’s only ONE experience which doesn’t make me an expert but it certainly makes me more knowledgeable of this Yelp marketing program than those who’s never experienced it.
Furthermore, in case you are not familiar with how Yelp works, anybody can post a business on Yelp, as long as it falls under one of their categories and is a “fit” per their policies. And the rightful owner can claim that Yelp page by jumping through some hoops and voila, you have a FREE listing about your business.
FREE Yelp Reviews Page
And for comparison’s sake, here’s an example of a PAID Yelp review page:
PAID Yelp Review Page
With that said… let’s examine feature #1.
The “Slide-Show”
Now, granted the larger images and the “slideshow” adds a bit more snazziness to the page but honestly, how big of a difference does it really make? If you wanted to see pictures, wouldn’t you be inclined to go visit the business’ actual website?
I’d love to see some split test on this…
Favorite Review
As far as feature #2, I suppose this is a good thing, like Yelp for Business Owners says, “put your best foot forward”. But then they go and shoot themselves in the foot by posting the “Rating Distribution” graph next to it. This graph, as you can see, shows all the reviews, INCLUDING the negative ones.
As humans, we are so inclined to ask “what’s wrong” that I reckon most wouldn’t take the “favorite reviews” at face value; they’d go and seek the worst reviews to find out why those folks gave bad reviews.
Yelp’s Business Owner’s Sponsorship Program feature #3 is my favorite.
Yelp Advertising… on Others’ Pages
So the idea here is similar to Google AdWords, when someone searches for a term related to your business, your listing shows up (as, “Sponsored Result”) with the hopes that your business gets clicked on.
Here’s the caveat though, Yelp is charging you per impression basis instead of per click basis. What this means is that whenever your listing shows up in this manner, it counts against your total allotted amount that you paid of (so you are paying “cost per impression”). If it were click based (cost per click) you would get charged ONLY if your ad gets clicked.
This brings into a few questions, the least of which are:
- So how much is it per impression?
- How many impressions can you expect to get (this is of course dependent on the search volume) – bear in mind that this is a LOCAL search and review online system. Which means»
- Are you able to test different the keywords with which your listing shows up (which is costing you money)?
- Are you able to TRACK the results you are getting on fine details? I.e.»
- How much control do you have over this campaign? After all, you ARE paying for it.
Before I Go On, Let’s Talk About Leakage
What is “leakage“? Well, in internet marketing optimization term, it means actions taken by your website visitor that doesn’t contribute to your ultimate goal (such as capturing the lead, making the sale, etc.) This often includes having active links which serve as distractions that take the visitor ELSEWHERE.
Now… take a good look at just about any Yelp review page, do you see leakage? Do you see links everywhere? But more importantly (and relevantly from a marketing perspective), do you see the box that says, “People Who Viewed This Also Viewed…”? Do you see how these links tend to be links to direct competition to the business review page you are viewing?
GEEZE! Can You Say, "Leakage Leakage Everywhere!"?
Yelp.com Pay Per Impression is a Friggin’ Joke (& Rip Off You Can Argue)
Okay, so going back to the sample list of questions listed earlier on. Let’s dig deeper and find out exactly what sort of program Yelp is running (and charging you for).
First of all, here’s the cost for Yelp’s advertising program:
$300/mo – promotes you to 1,500 people in your area looking for a business like yours.
$500/mo – promotes you to 4,000 people in your area looking for a business like yours.
$1000/mo – promotes you to 10,000 people in your area looking for a business like yours.
Blind Mouse TOY
So you are looking at $100 CPM (cost per thousand impressions) to $200 CPM to advertise on their network. In the AdWords world, this is ridiculously high for paying CPM unless you are in some highly competitive and profitable business like real estate and 401k portfolios (oh wait… given the crash of the economy, DOH!). Even then you are pushing it a bit. Folks who are paying high CPM on the pay per click networks have thoroughly tested their campaigns, have tracked EVERY single detail, and have all the control in the world.
But on Yelp? Hellllll no! You don’t know what your “campaign” looks like let alone have any control over it. You are like a blind mouse and they are the big bad kitty toying with you. And yet, they are still charging you an arm and a leg. And one quick look around Yelp will tell you that most businesses are NOT high-price markets, they are mostly smaller markets like restaurants.
This brings me to my second point of frustration when dealing with these Yelp folks, where’s the proof of these impressions people paid for??? Where are my listings showing up? And what’s the conversion rate?? Again, they tell you nothing and keep you blind.
YUCK.
Sales Team Who Doesn’t Know Jack and Preys on Toy Mice
Okay, so I had the opportunity to speak to a Yelp representative on the phone on my client’s behalf. Armed with my knowledge of AdWords, marketing, the works… I came prepared. Sadly for the person on the other line, that’s more than I can say for her.
I asked about all the things I mentioned before (about click through rates versus impressions, how I can track my campaign, how much control I have, etc.) and she was STUMPED. She couldn’t understand why we would care about such matters. As a matter of fact, I’d venture so far as to say she didn’t know JACK about marketing, and yet, she’s representing a team that’s suppose to help us market.
But what REALLY got to me was when I asked her about a 24 hour backout clause, which means that within 24 hours of the start of the campaign, if I am not satisfied with the results I am seeing, I can cancel. Nope she said… and the reason is because it takes time for the program to ramp up for me to really start seeing results.
EHHH? It’s the internet we are talking about here right? I can track clicks fairly easily right? Hmmm… okay.
So then I went on and asked what is the minimum sign up period, to which she replied, “6 months”.
OMGWTFBBQ, 6 month minimum at $325 a month where you have NO IDEA what’s going on?
For some reason,» Thanks but no thanks.
The Proof is in the Pudding – Proof that Yelp Sucked
Against my better judgment, my client went for it anyway, and looking at the chain of emails he received from Yelp along with how their program is setup, I can sympathize why.
See, Yelp is banking on folks NOT knowing the difference between “impressions” and “clicks”. They are banking on the fact that businesses will confuse “impressions” with “visitors” – as in, “For $300 a month I can get 1,500 NEW customers every month? SWEET, sign me up!“ They are banking on folks not knowing how to track their progress and not caring to either. They are banking on being able to just sweet talk their would be victim on the phone and dazzle them with fluff.
And worse yet, without the clients being able to track the campaign, Yelp is able to get folks to resign, again and again, by giving out meaningless stats.
Don't Let Yelp Do This to You
To give you a perspective of just how much SUCKINESS is in this program, with the aid of Google Analytics and my idea of adding a page that leads people to a printable in-store coupon, we were able to see how the program performed. Here are the stats, in 2 months time, Yelp drove 64 unique visitors to this special landing page (which again helps us track the comers from our Yelp advertising campaign) and of those 64 visitors, we got 9 customers that we can tell.
This meant 32/1,500 = 2% conversion from visitor to Yelp to the website and 0.3% from impression to actual customer. Put it another way, my client paid $72.22 for each of those clients – clients who are just diners to his restaurant.
NOTE:»Ouch.
Look, You Don’t Need to Pay for Yelp, Nor Do You Want To
Don’t get me wrong, Yelp.com is awesome, I use it all the time to get the low down on new restaurants, find a plumber, etc. But you don’t need to pay to use it! Business owners can get free Yelp review pages and those rank (from a search engine optimization perspective) just as well as the paid for pages.
This means you’ll get traffic regardless!
Hope this was enlightening for you. Like I said earlier on, I’ve had only one experience with Yelp and boy was it a horrible one. I’d love to hear some success stories and some proof that it worked.
Until then, don’t pay Yelp a dime to join in on their “Yelp for Business Owners” program, especially if you are a restaurant owner.
Raymond Fong
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NEWS FEED
If any business/person has been ripped off by Yelp the way I have I want to talk to you. Im trying to get a civil action lawsuit against them. Contact me ASAP. Thank you.
face4body@aol.com
My name is Chad Bergantz and I am Head of Marketing & Sales for SBN.com. I uderstand now why everyone is upset with yelp. We are actually are their competitors of Yelp and we are nothing like them. We are different and way cheaper with only a 3 month trial at $49 per month and a start up fee of $100. We have a great POPP (Pre Optimization Profile Page) and is definitely worth the price. We treat our customers right and you can work directly with me. If you have anybody else that would like some info, please contact me directly on my email or at my numbers listed below. I will explain everything, walk you through it slowly and give you a great deal. It will greatly improve your business and I will personally help you with anything you need. Feel free to contact me any time. cbergantz@sbn.com or my office at (949)873-1001 Ext 329
what happened to all the comments regarding YELP ..seems like they were all removed. If anyone is having problems with yelp I suggest you go to http://www.yelpscan.com and see the complete story …and maybe join the coalition. Google claimed they broke off negotiations to purchase Yelp because they weren’t being transparent…did they really believe they would change their stripes…no way
I knew Yelp was sketchy on the veracity of the reviews – but I wasn’t fully aware of how opaque their advertising program was. I have one client that’s quite happy with Yelp, but I don’t think they know exactly how well it’s doing for them. This post has now been forwarded to them. Thanks for the eye-opener.
you are very welcome..spread the word ..it appears to me that this is called extortion…www.Yelpscam.com
A reply to above posting by Chad Bergantz at SBN.com YOU HAVE TO BE JOKING… Your site is a bigger scam than Yelp, and even more expensive
And most important, your site actually has to have business listings ! ! ! I Searched IL, IN and I couldn’t find a single business listing. All search windows have the same results
Business Categories or listing for (IL or IN, PA… Etc. has the same info See below!
Automotive (10) Business & Professional (10) Health & Medicine (6) Travel & Transportation (11) Shopping (4) Education (8) Real Estate (8) Computers & Electronics (4) Personal Care & Service (5) Arts & Entertainment (7) Community & Government (9) Media & Communications (5) Clothing & Accessories (6) Food & Dining (7) Industry & Agriculture (5) Sports & Recreation (6)
I like the Yelp site and they actually have business listed. But I wouldn’t advertise on Yelp.com or SBN.com
Again… You must be joking, promoting your site!
I too was smoothed in by salesman Paul Cebulak from Yelp. This program doesn’t work at all. It is a total scam. And I only get 500 impressions per $300 a month!! At least you got 1500. I haven’t had a single email or call from a Yelp searcher in the 6 months I’ve subscribed and now that I want to quit – they hit you with a $600 early termination fee. I’ve used google adwords for years with much success and not truly understanding what Yelp was offering, thought it might be helpful. NOT EVEN CLOSE.
DO NOT JOIN YELP. You can use the site for free. I don’t even bother with Yelp anymore. I’m going for complete boycott.
I also don’t understand that I’m paying for the impression and then competitors show up on my home page when you click through. Crazy.
go to http://www.yelpscam.com and see the complete story . ..join the coalition !!
Thanks. I came across this after spending 40 minutes on the phone with a sale person. I wasn’t leaning towards using yelp but I wanted to see what other’s experience had been.
chuck
This month we are fowarding the yelpscam site along with a letter requesting a complete investigation of the practices of Yelp.We have over 1000 complaints.Letters will go to the FTC and The Attorney General for the State of California.
Yelpscam
Thank you for this clear explination of the yelp problem.
I see yelp as a cancer spreading across the internet without regard for any one it harms. It is a money eating machine that has no care for anyone except itself.
Perhaps Google will find a loop hole in the law to shut them down for exploiting their search engines, but I for one belive that a petition to Google asking that yelp search results are removed, or at tne very least a “no yelp results” radio check box ( remeber my choice) be offered as a way to have choice in what I get from a google search.
Watch (share) this video and then decide if you would ever want to give yelp a penny of your money or your words of review.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=so7bfzoyIjI
NATHAN: Thank you for adding the youtube video, “…to see the rest of the story” go to YELPSCAM. com . It’s all at that site. Yelp is evil.
What Scott at Yelp told me will be my biggest benifit was to give me back office control that will allow me to remove negative comments about my business and off-course leave the good ones! How Ethical & responsible YELP!
Hi guys,
I have heard about Yelp before but I hesitated to open an account with them without having some research.
This thread helps me a lot to get to know it well. Thanks for the site, and also thanks for the video Alter’Nathan.
Elmar
Hi Elmar: Glad that the comments here helped you decide on not advertising on Yelp. This is an evil company that we hope, after government investigation, will either shut down, or force them to change how they do business. Go to yelpscam.com and see just how bad it is all over the country.
Here’s what happened to Yelp: “Yelp Reviews No Longer Appear in Google Maps”, source: http://ezlocal.com/blog/post/yelp-reviews-google-maps.aspx
Starting to see the first results of the Class action Law Suit against Yelp. Go to yelpscam.com go to the top of page 1 and you’ll find the link to the Law Suit …Join Us !!!
For 37 years I have owned a successful business in Berkeley. Know as Foster Coin and Stamp 2189 Bancroft Way Berkeley, CA 94704 510-845-3015. Myself and a few other businessmen have begun a boycott of Yelp advertisers. I, as do they, feel the company is far from ethical. As Bank of the West advertises with Yelp I pulled a large amount out of my account, and told the manager why. I will keep a checking account balance with less than $300 in this Bank until they see the errors of their ways. I have banked with this establishment for many decades. Ralph T. Foster I encourage all to boycott Yelp advertisers!!!!!
GOOD IDEA RALPH …and go to yelpscam.com and click on the link on page one re: Class action law suit and join in with us all. We will post you idea on the site if we have your permission.
Fight da good fight!
Good for you Ralph for taking a stand. I do hope that Yelp takes all of this into consideration and reform… I think they have a good free service (concept anyway), it’s just what goes behind the scenes that seem sketchy.
Raymond
I went into Bank of West today and was told at this time they do not advertise on Yelp. I saw an ad recently that appeared to be a Bank of West advertisement on a Yelp site. If I am in error I apologize to the bank. Be as may if you know someone you do business with that advertises on Yelp cease doing business with them. I ask everyone from now on if the advertise on Yelp and why. Ralph T Foster–Foster Coin and Stamp 2189 Bancroft Way Berkeley, CA 94704 510-845-3015.
Update from Ralph T Foster–Foster Coin and Stamp 2189 Bancroft Way Berkeley, CA 94704 510-845-3015.: Since my last posting I have talked to 8 businesses I trade with. Six, all big restaurants and busy coffee shops have been approached to advertise with Yelp but will not. I know owners well. After 40 years in Berkeley I have many friends here. One never heard of Yelp. The last was considering advertising, but after our talk no way. GET THE WORD OUT THANKS RALPH
I guess Yelp has finally started to worry about the the class action law suits (see http://www.yelpscam.com ..click on link on page one) so they made some phoney changes to how they control reviews. Unfortunately, for a person not involved with this mess,it appears far more than it is in reality. Yelp will now show all reviews that have been removed, BUT ..you have to screen thru all the posted reviews, and then down on the bottom in a place that is easy to miss, you click on removed reviews,and go thru a series of varification codes, and finally they pop up sometimes.
But when yelp was trying to sell me the adv. crap,I was told by the salesman that studies by yelp, reveal people on an average only ready the first 3 reviews, therefore they would never get to these hidden ones on the far bottom after all the views. Secondly, I asked the salesman, “if I sign up for the adv. ($6000/year) ,could the removed good reviews be restored. He told me once a review is removed, it is gone for ever”. Huh..then how all of a sudden can they reappear now???? Liar ..liar
Secondly, they will no longer have a businesses favorite review shown on the top, even if you adv. with Yelp. That was one of the major selling points for the sales person, now what will they dream up ..this is not a plus for businesses but a big negative. PEOPLE JUST HAVE TO UNDERSTAND, the new PR release is a fraud…Visit http://www.yelpscam.com and join the class action law suits.
Interesting article Raymond. So the question remains: How can Yelp make their “Yelp for Business Owners” program better? How can businesses justify paying $300 to $1000 per month for premium business listings? Perhaps a call for greater transparency?
This is sad…
“Okay, so I had the opportunity to speak to a Yelp representative on the phone on my client’s behalf. Armed with my knowledge of AdWords, marketing, the works… I came prepared. Sadly for the person on the other line, that’s more than I can say for her. I asked about all the things I mentioned before (about click through rates versus impressions, how I can track my campaign, how much control I have, etc.) and she was STUMPED. She couldn’t understand why we would care about such matters. As a matter of fact, I’d venture so far as to say she didn’t know JACK about marketing, and yet, she’s representing a team that’s suppose to help us market.”
A business owner can fall for this sort of thing once or twice. But unlike you, who will know the waste of ad dollars was b/c of the way the yelp program was structured, staffed and priced…most business owners after getting burned a couple of times will just assume that all ad reps are liars.
Makes the job harder for honest media sales people like me and many of my Valpakian colleagues.
A day doesn’t go by, that someone doesn’t e-mail yelpscam.com with another horror story about extortion by yelp sales people and a complaint about good reviews disappearing, and bad ones popping up after he /she refuses to advertize on Yelp. We refer them all to the class action law suit and suggest they consider joining. I don’t think Yelp has any idea of how many businesses will eventually be part of the law suit and there testimonies will sink YELP.
and now a 4th law suit against Yelp by a Dentist in San Fran…how much longer can yelp go on before it closes the doors and goes out to find a real job? Yelpscam
I just got off of the phone with a Yelp salesperson and I did my usual “[XYZ product] sucks” google search and found this site. Thank you! Thank you!
I help my husband with the business side of his electrical contracting business and the entire Yelp pitch made me uncomfortable. I am not a web marketing professional, or anything close to it, but I do have a grad degree in psychology – so I’m comfortable with statistics and research. That said, my warning bells went off when I asked the salesperson for 3 things to help me make our decision: (1) a copy of the research she cited saying that yelp users view 3 company profiles before making a decision, (2) an analytics report from yelp showing how often “electrical contractor” & “electrician” was used as a search term by Yelp users in the Austin metro area, and (3) a written description of the ad packages & rates she was verabally describing. She replied that she had to talk to a manager to find out copies of numbers 1 and 2 were available and that number 3 DID NOT EXIST. I was prepared for her to deny me access to number 1, since it may be a paid/copyrighted industry report; but, what kind of web-based business can’t pull a simple analytics report? And I simply could not fathom why they would not print and distribute their prices after they’d spent 30 minutes on the phone with me… until now.
I was quoted $300/mo for 450 ads (“impressions”, thanks Raymond). I see now that that price and number of ads may actually vary — some of you say $300, some say $350, and the video that Nathan posted shows a business owner was charged $310 and change. Why? Further, that is a ridiculously high price given that I can’t track back the leads (thanks again for the quick-and-dirty conversion rate calculation).
Anyway, no thanks Yelp. You annoyed us when you removed reviews when our company was only 6 months old for being “suspiciously positive”. I like Nathan’s youtube suggestion. I’ll post our reviews on Prometheus Electric’s website.
Thanks again!
I started working for a client who owns a restaurant. The client had started a business account with Yelp before I started working with them, the cost 500 per month.
I started doing an analysis of what he is getting for his money. From their statistics on the business info page, it costs my client around $16 per click for the advertising (they do provide click through info as well as impressions now). If you take the 10% rule, it costs around 166 per customer gained from the Yelp subscription.
Since this is a new business, the increased visibility doesn’t hurt, but the cost can be better used elsewhere. I don’t really see the issue with Yelp and screwing with reviews. I do see a program that just isn’t worth the cost for the limited benefit.
In short, client will allow subscription to expire as I submit his business to the myriad of free sites all over that do the exact same thing for free. The 500 spent on Yelp will be redirected to Opentable and other sites with a much better cost benefit ratio.
I would suggest that you both go to yelpscam.com , also on page one is a link to the four law suits (2 are class action)and see the complete story. We have seen some businesses charged as much as $1000/month on a 12 month contract. Don’t be surprised when you cancell your clients contract, for the positive reviews to disappear and a host of negative one’s pop up from So-called)elite yelpers. Most people call that extortion. Yelpscam
Hey Ed,
If you are getting all these letters related to people and their issues with Yelp, why don’t you post them under your letter button.
I’d like to read them all.
DB
If you go to Yelpscam, you’ll find a page with articles from all over the country. If you click on the articles you will see thousands of comments from business.. Ed
Ed,
If you want people to visit your site, which you obviously do by the number of times you are promoting it here, then you need something original on it. I can search Google for people complaining about anything and everything just as easily as clicking your link to do the same.
If you don’t have anything original or unique on your site, then why would anyone visit it? Currently, you have page after page complaining about how bad Yelp is…..but with factual information to back up your opinions. If you want to Player Hate, back it up with supporting material on your site.
DB
I wish I had seen this earlier, I worked with Yelp when they were first starting in NYC and it was great for the brand. Now it is utterly wretched.
I specifically asked questions in regards to their changing platform which I knew about from blogs and apparently their salespeople had no idea about. They literally sold a product through with lies and are now saying too bad there is nothing we can do about it.
I can not imagine ANY other company doing such a thing and can only imagine how badly they take advantage of business owners who don’t have advertising experience.
I was a huge proponent of Yelp as a media buyer/planner for NYC tourism companies and as a user and elite yelper. No longer.
Hi Nicole: I hope you have gone to yelpscam and seen the full story of how bad Yelp really is …in the old days they called this the “Protection Racquet” This is the sane thing ..now just using the net as the source of danger. There are 4 lawsuits(2 are class action),I hope Yelp is still around when they get to court. The testimony from hundreds of businesses should make governmental agencies take note and start their investigation,if they haven’t already. Some people at the top of Yelp need to serve some real time in jail for what they have done to businesses all over the country…this is criminal..guess some people will do anything just for the $$$$.
Ed… you’ve plastered your yelpscam link all over this post’s comment section. As someone already pointed out, they get it. Please stop responding to every single comment on this thread with the same message which is to go visit yelpscam… Thanks.
Raymond
We have a predominate salon in Los Angeles for the past 10 years and have been written up in over 60 magazines worldwide for being the “best of” and are on countless TV shows. We did not know what Yelp was until 2009 nor did we care. When we looked at Yelp and noted many good reviews. Then we started getting calls to “sponsor”- a sponsor is when you willingly give money to sponsor an event or charity. Lets use the real term when it pertains to Yelp- “pay to play buy having your name come up first on the search site”. We declined because in the past 9 years there has been no need to advertise on a search engine like Yelp to get our business. Then shortly after the decline a horrible review came on, then another two. We knew something was odd because the review referenced having their hair done by the owner during a time when the owner was out of the country filming. And one review that personally attacked the owner for his conduct outside of the business while he was working out at his gym. I contacted Yelp to have the reviews removed based on the reviewer’s violation of the Yelp’s Terms of Conduct and reviewers numerous unfounded accusations and inaccurate statements. The reviews were removed. However, shortly after that another review came up that stated “several years ago I got my hair done at…” Most all of our good reviews were gone and only 3 remain. So, we “sponsored” or should I say payed the extortionist for 3 months, good reviews returned however no increase in revenue from Yelpers patronizing the business. Then as any smart business owner seeing no increased revenue we terminated the “sponsorship”. Just recently there is an update by the bad reviewer stating blatant lies & last week a scathing 5k plus review. Moreover, if you look at the stats on the “business trends page views” it has gone from sponsorship period of 148 clicks to 45 clicks, please note prior to sponsorship we were at 177 clicks per page. We just find this fishy. Our City Search is vastly different than Yelp’s, although we understand our business cannot satisfy everyone and there will be disgruntled clients that need to vent, Yelp’s conduct is unacceptable.
We confider Yelp the modern day SCHOOL YARD BULLY. Its amazing how our business can be selected as on of the “Best Top Ten Cutters in the World” by ELLE UK magazine, “Best Salon” by ALLURE magazine 2007 & 2009 (voted by the subscribers), “Top Ten Amazing Blowouts” by INSTYLE, however on Yelp we only have 6 reviews.
Been a while since I’ve posted, but have an update on my Yelp experience.
The owner attempted to cancel and was informed there was a 1000 cancellation fee. Makes more sense to just let it expire. I’ve been monitoring Yelp and noticed that the hidden reviews are restored as new reviews are written. It seems really good or poor reviews that were hidden are ofset with really good or bad reviews being written. In other words, if a 4 star review is written, a 2 star review may be restored.
The above has happened several times and the overall review of the business, even with 5 recent excellent reviews, has stayed exactly the same.
Some weird stuff going on in dem der hills.
i am so happy to see sites like this and yelpscam.com. i emailed them today. i had no idea but like the bulldog i am i caught on to this nonsense quick when i noticed my 5 star reviews leaving as quick as they came.
and i spent a good half hour with their slick saleperson. its obvious they are extorting business. it is like some magical formula removes the reviews and then the magically come back.
and 4-500 a month? hahaha i call bs
Wow, I can not believe how incompetent all of you are. First of all, let me say that I am a small business owner, I have been advertising with Yelp for over 2 years and have seen amazing results–just the other week, I had a record number of new clients, all who found me on Yelp (I know this because to get my special offer, the client must mention they found me on yelp). The program has paid for itself since month 1 and some of my best and highest valued clients came from Yelp. THANK YOU YELP! Never in my 2 years+ with Yelp have I ever had anyone tell me they would take down negative reviews and they have always been very transparent when I request numbers and explanations. Sounds like all of you have no idea about their review filter?! HELLO–this is why reviews disappear and re-appear over time, regardless of the rating given. They do this so that shady biz owners can’t go on and write 100 5 star reviews about themselves, nor can a competitor go on and write negative reviews on another businesses profile. This maximizes the integrity of their site, and I truly appreciate it, because when you go onto Citysearch and see a business that has 100 5-star reviews, it looks fishy and people don’t trust it. This is also why Yelp is kicking everyone’s ass right now with over 38 million unique users each month and tens of thousands of advertisers who love the program–because of their trustworthy content.
So, I only feel bad for all you and you’re extreme misunderstanding–as the rest of us who actually have a clue, are banking big time off of the YelpAd Program. Keep up the good work, Yelp! I love your site, and you have turned my business, as well as several others I know (and tens of thousands I don’t know) into gold
And so sorry for all of you wasting your time with silly class action law suits. Yelp isn’t going anywhere–that’s a fact. 
Good for you
From a purely scientific marketing perspective, Yelp has a ways to go.
How much are you paying a month for Yelp? Have you compared that with the results you’d get with other forms of marketing? Or maybe even NOT paying Yelp and stick with the free program they offer? Curious to know.