Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in • Hacker News Board

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#21

Post by jacquesm » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:39 PM UTC

metalliqaz wrote: post #13

I would like very much to grab my pitchfork and point it menacingly at Yelp, but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. There are many, many stories of bad (and incriminating) behavior on behalf of Yelp salespeople over the phone, but I have never heard a recording. Even though most claims indicate that the harassing calls are repeated many times. Somebody record one of these calls and become Inte…

> but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14237684

You think they made that up?

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#22

Post by jordanlev » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:40 PM UTC

dboreham wrote: post #18

The thing is: this is how the rest of the journalist/advertising world always worked, right?

No. For a long time, newspapers explicitly walled off their business / sales / ad people from the journalists.

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#23

Post by metalliqaz » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:41 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #21

metalliqaz wrote: post #13

I would like very much to grab my pitchfork and point it menacingly at Yelp, but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. There are many, many stories of bad (and incriminating) behavior on behalf of Yelp salespeople over the phone, but I have never heard a recording. Even though most claims indicate that the harassing calls are repeated many times. Somebody record one of these calls and become Inte…

> but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14237684 You think they made that up?

I don't know, but there's no link to anything. Don't even know the name of the establishment. I can't change my consumer habits on the word of "that guy's friend"

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#24

Post by Someone1234 » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:41 PM UTC

tarr11 wrote: post #15

I wonder if disavowing links on Google could help. The problem for most businesses is Yelp listings rank very highly for their name. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/2648487?hl=en

That isn't how a disavow works.

It won't impact Yelp's pagerank, it will only impact your business site's pagerank (likely in a negative way). In essence you're saying "don't use Yelp to evaluate my site's reputation." Which would likely de-rank you and could result in Yelp appearing before the official site of your business.

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#25

Post by oconnor663 » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:41 PM UTC

metalliqaz wrote: post #13

I would like very much to grab my pitchfork and point it menacingly at Yelp, but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. There are many, many stories of bad (and incriminating) behavior on behalf of Yelp salespeople over the phone, but I have never heard a recording. Even though most claims indicate that the harassing calls are repeated many times. Somebody record one of these calls and become Inte…

Reminds me of the unmet challenge to prove that airlines charge different ticket prices based on your browser cookies: https://www.reddit.com/r/LifeProTips/comments/1ekv6e/lpt_bou...

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#26

Post by an_account » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:41 PM UTC

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #2

This happened about 2 years ago? I'm curious if the legal scrutiny that happened about this time changed anything. Example: http://nypost.com/2014/10/13/restaurant-fights-yelps-alleged...

IIRC a judge determined that it's not legally a racket because yelp has control over what they do with their platform.

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#27

Post by ryanwaggoner » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:43 PM UTC

HappyTypist wrote: post #4

I have a friend who left Yelp after 2 months. Told me that he'd get aggressive legal action if he revealed "how Yelp really makes money".

This is such garbage. Yelp might be the worst company on the planet, but "anonymous internet poster who has a friend who worked there two months and claims something unspecified-but-fishy is going on" is completely worthless.

"A friend of mine said he'd be threatened with legal action if he revealed what HappyTypist does on Saturday nights."

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#28

Post by [deleted] » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:43 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #21

metalliqaz wrote: post #13

I would like very much to grab my pitchfork and point it menacingly at Yelp, but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. There are many, many stories of bad (and incriminating) behavior on behalf of Yelp salespeople over the phone, but I have never heard a recording. Even though most claims indicate that the harassing calls are repeated many times. Somebody record one of these calls and become Inte…

> but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14237684 You think they made that up?

[deleted]

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#29

Post by ryanwaggoner » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:45 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #21

metalliqaz wrote: post #13

I would like very much to grab my pitchfork and point it menacingly at Yelp, but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. There are many, many stories of bad (and incriminating) behavior on behalf of Yelp salespeople over the phone, but I have never heard a recording. Even though most claims indicate that the harassing calls are repeated many times. Somebody record one of these calls and become Inte…

> but I have yet to see one of these stories with hard evidence. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14237684 You think they made that up?

Yes? No? Who knows? That's literally worthless as evidence of anything other than someone's ability to post an internet comment.

Re: Business cancels Yelp advertising contract, negative reviews start pouring in

#30

Post by corndoge » Mon, May 01, 2017, 2:45 PM UTC

clxsi wrote: post #14

swsieber wrote: post #10

It'd be interesting to figure out how Yelp generates the negative reviews. I'd love to see somebody setup a "honeypot" business - fake, doesn't exist in real life (well, physically/location wise)... and then sign up with Yelp and then cancel. Do that with a good 10-100 fake businesses, and could you drum up a case against Yelp?

This is a really good idea.

If you have money to blow on advertising contracts and are willing to lie on the contracts or spin up 10-100 LLCs