Several years ago on a trip to San Francisco I discovered a very resourceful website called Yelp. Heard of it? If not, there’s no doubt Yelp will be popping up in your city sometime soon. Yelp, Inc. is a Web 2.0 company that operates a social networking, user review, and local search web site of the same name. According to Wikipedia, over 25 million people access Yelp's website each month, putting it in the top 100 of U.S. Internet web sites. Founded by Jeremy Stoppelman in 2004 the site is near to becoming an international household name. In the spring of 2009 Yelp crossed the pond venturing into new UK territory.
There are lots of fantastic tales to read on Yelp, most of which come from quip personal anecdotes regarding local haunts by the site’s regular community contributors, but there is also a controversial story regarding the enterprise. An extortion claim is a journalist’s wet dream, and the question as to whether Yelp hides negative reviews for a price is an interesting concept to explore. Yelp strongly denies the allegation, but it does seem suspicious that the site seems to thrive despite little advertising. What’s the business model?
Yelp runs quite similarly to Google’s search results. Businesses can pay for top results on internal searches. In other words, sponsored results. A fantastic concept in my opinion. Users see what the community is saying, but businesses are also provided with an opportunity to get attention. In many ways, Yelp is an interactive Yellow Pages with Web 2.0 capabilities. It is also an example of how to get around the SEO minefield by using a smaller website to gain traffic and potentially increase sales.
Other tools were implemented to breakdown potential walls including a free REST- and JSON-based application programming interface (API). The API provides access to business listing details, reviews, photos, and ratings and can be used to add business information to a website, widget, or mobile application. The API has been used to integrate business reviews into existing Google Maps applications such as on Zillow.com and HotelMapSearch.com. Additionally, Yelp implemented Facebook Beacon, a part of Facebook's advertisement system that sends data from external websites to Facebook, ostensibly for the purpose of allowing targeted advertisements and allowing users to share their activities with their friends. Certain activities on partner sites are published to a user's News Feed. Yelp is also mobile and can be used on the go through Apps and a smart-phone friendly site.
Many similar sites exist, but Yelp’s success stems from it’s foundation in community framework. By using user generated content and not turning to professional writers for their reviews the end result is a cultivation of peer to peer networking that fuels habitual behavior.
