August 18, 2011

Life for retailers, particularly restaurant owners, used to be simpler. That was the life without customer review sites, whereas now, every citizen can poke holes in your customer service efforts. This post looks at successful approaches business owners can use to make Yelp into a marketing and sales tool, as opposed to letting it work against them.

Restaurant reviews seem to be the most popular on Yelp, but the service covers many other categories. It used to be that a restaurant would only get an official newspaper review every so often, but with mobile applications and social media, restaurants are under a constant deluge of “citizen reviewers.” In fact, nearly every business faces this same sort of scrutiny and opportunity.

Some will scoff when told it is an opportunity to be reviewed. In every customer interaction, there is a lesson and a chance to shine. Review sites up the game, for sure, but if you provide honest, good service, you can thrive online and in real life.

Here are four success stories to learn from:

Bagelheads

Bagelheads, located in Tallahassee, Florida, has 14 reviews. When the owner, Ben Giles, wasn’t as active online in 2009, there were a few not so favorable remarks. He told me that he likes those reviews, learns from them, and believes that customers can see his progression. Now that is a great attitude.

He likes that you can respond to posts directly and get a chance to give a personal feel to the customer. It shows that you care, and is useful in addressing problem areas. His advice is to use some sort of checkin reward that is visible to the customer when they see you on Yelp. They also created a scannable QR code for the website to give customers more info on their social media efforts, which include Yelp.

Findwell

Findwell is a real estate brokerage in Seattle. CEO Kevin Lisota told me that it is important to hit the basics on these sites: Make sure that your business is not only listed, but that the information is accurate and completely filled out. Consumer trust increases when they can find a photo, website, e-mail address and sometimes special discount offers, rather than just a generic listing.

Their reviews have been overwhelmingly positive. Lisota said that negative reviews can be more beneficial than a great review. It teaches him and his staff new lessons and shows consumers how his business behaves when things go wrong, which is super important today.

In a Pickle

In a Pickle is a small restaurant in Waltham, Massachusetts that credits a ton of their business success to their activity and outreach to customers and fans on social media. With 173 reviews and a 4.5 star rating, owner Tim Burke is doing something right. He estimates that 30-40 percent of new business is generated through Yelp. Out of all of his activity on social media channels, he has made it a priority to make sure they have a high rating on the site. He openly says how not having a high rating on Yelp would be disastrous to his business.

Tim knows that customers who are already following him on social media are fans of his food—they wouldn't have liked his Facebook page or followed his Twitter handle if they weren't—so he leverages all of his social channels to encourage customers to review the restaurant themselves. He even sent me this tweet, where he thanked a customer.

Castle Ink

Castle Ink is in the printer ink cartridge business, which is a pretty competitive industry. Bill Elward, president of the company, said that review sites like Yelp are a blessing in the industry. Yelp and similar sites help consumers weigh their options by providing honest feedback on quality. They are active on Yelp, Google, City Search and now credit 10 percent of all orders placed as having originated at one of these review sites.

Yelp is not just for restaurant owners. Most businesses can grow their sales and online presence with review sites like Yelp. From almost every business owner I heard this one bit of advice—recognize that you are going to get reviewed whether you want it or not. Online tools such as Yelp will continue to grow in prevalence, and it pays to embrace them and participate in the active online discussion with your past, current and future customers.

Please share your success story with me here in the comments.

Related Topics

• Marketing

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TJ McCue, Article, social media, review sites, Yelp, Restaurants, Bars, and Other Food , Restaurants, Bars, and Other Food Service Establishments

Join the conversation ( 8 )

• findwell 9 months ago

  

  Yelp does have great tools for business owners to interact with their own business listing. If you haven't done so, you should claim your business's Yelp profile at: https://biz.yelp.com/. That's where you can add more details, photos, etc. It also allows you as the business owner to post responses to various reviews or to message folks that have left a review for you.

  • TJ McCue 9 months ago

    

    Great counsel, findwell. Thanks for sharing it. I know that I've advised many people to do that with Google Places. The same would be true here. I believe you can also add deals, coupons, special offers and create your own Groupon-like world of offers and drive your own traffic!

• Hugh Jassole 9 months ago

  

  Yelp is a sham ---and is not a friend to small business.. Yelp is an unregulated forum for faceless people to smear small businesses. They often screen out good reviews but they allow ulgy and unreliable reviews from faceless posters, which can often hurt small businesses.. They are not available to deal with any of these issues. Yelp has no customer relations dept for businesses who have been maligned and smeared by malicious and false reviews.. Meanwhile, they try to sell advertising to the same businesses who have been smeared and damaged by ugly false reviews.

  • Katherine Ostiguy 9 months ago

    

    Actually, Yelp is the ONLY site that I have seen pull unreliable reviews. I have reported 3 false reviews (not of my own biz -- of others in the area) that were from past employees, two 5-star and one 1-star, and Yelp informed me that they were all removed for violating TOS.My own biz did have an ultra-positive review filtered initially, but after several months they did add it to my page. (And in Yelp's defense, I can see how it was "sketchy" from their perspective -- the customer was brand-new to Yelp and made two super-positive reviews and that was it.)I also appreciate that Yelp allows biz owners to reply to reviews, because those responses can speak louder than the initial poor rating. Does the biz owner go crazy or does s/he handle it like a professional?

    • TJ McCue 9 months ago

      

      Hi Katherine, wow, great comment that helps us all sort out how to manage and participate with Yelp and other review sites. I agree -- I use the owner response as much or more than the review rating system. If you respond as irrationally as some consumers do when reviewing a site, it just shows you as a person that most people won't want to deal with. Extreme opinions and comments are probably best kept to yourself.... What I think some people don't realize, consumer or owners, is that your comments can and often do show up high in a Google search result. So, for example, if you were a job candidate somewhere and you made some irate, juvenile, foolish comment about a restaurant -- when I search your name as an employer I am going to see that link and review. I can guarantee that is going to influence my decision to interview you or hire you. Some of the decency and courtesy that an in-person conversation requires is also needed in online conversations. Perhaps more so -- it is essential online...

  • TJ McCue 9 months ago

    

    hi Hugh, I've heard that a lot. That's the reason I went looking for positive stories. Have you been there lately or used it as a consumer or business owner? I'm curious about your experience and would like to hear more. I believe they've done a good job of curbing the anonymous garbage and that they've built smart filtering. I don't think its a sham. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that point. It's a game changer. 18 Million consumers go there each month. 2MM go to Foursquare. 1/2 Million go to Gowalla. 20% of Google's searches are local-specific.... That is HUGE. It is a massive trend and one that is not going away. My main point here is that business owners should not stick their head in the sand and hope for it to go away. For me personally, I read the 1-star reviews and still go to a place. I often write off the 1-star reviewer because they are a whiner, cry-baby, prima dona that just likes to rant. I think most intelligent people discard the wild, stupid reviews and give a place a try. When you see how companies are combining Yelp or Foursquare with their other marketing, it is a force of opportunity. I don't have the link handy, but American Express created a partnership (of some sort) with Foursquare and it makes it a no-brainer for me to share with my friends what I'm doing (which is a fun thing, sometimes). Tell me more about your business and experiences with Yelp. I'm genuinely curious and interested in the conversation.ThanksTJ

• Hugh Jassole 9 months ago

  

  Yelp is a sham.. They allow malicious unsubstantiated reviews to hurt many small businesses.. They are non responsive.. It is impossible to make contact with anybody at Yelp other than somebody selling advertising.. They are not a friend to small business!!!

  • TJ McCue 9 months ago

    

    Read above. I think they'll delete this duplicate comment from you, but if not, please read my response to your original comment. I think Yelp presents an opportunity and is not a sham.