If the fact some sites have been getting their mobile friendly tags in the search results along with the associated ranking boost, despite still serving what is essentially an app interstitial, it appears that Google is looking into taking action….manual action. I covered the issue at the beginning of January, showing how Yelp is serving […]
Couple to Pay $350k in Damages for False Local Reviews
Have you ever left a bad local business review with false information? You might want to rethink doing that in the future after a couple was ordered to pay $350,000 over false reviews they left for an attorney. The divorcing couple, Copia Blake and Peter Birzon left reviews that were not only opinion but that […]
Yelp Using App Interstitial But Keeps Mobile-Friendly Tag & Ranking Boost
When Google decided to make app interstitials a reason for losing a page’s mobile friendly tag in the search results along with the ranking boost, Yelp’s CEO Jeremy Stoppelman was one of the very vocal critics against it. But they eventually complied and removed their app interstitial in favor of the app install banner that […]
Yelp Adds New Active Cleanup Alerts for Local Businesses in the News
If you happened to look at the Facebook page of River Bluff Dental – aka the dental office owned by Cecil the Lion’s killer – you would have spotted a ton of one star reviews that were not reviews for the business itself, but rather thousands of people expressing outrage about the dentist and his […]
Bing Showcases Yelp Reviews in Search Results
If you are looking for reviews of a restaurant or business, Bing has you covered as they have added a new Yelp review box to their search results which highlight Yelp reviews when you search for “<business name> reviews” in Bing. Here is how it looks when you do a search for “<restaurant name> reviews.” […]
Yelp is Taking on the Reputation Management Industry by Filing Lawsuit
When talking about reputation management, there’s two different types of reputation management that they offer. Personal reputation management is one type, that focuses on improving the search results for personal names. The second type is reputation management for businesses, which most often is businesses who want to see glowing reviews while the negative ones are […]
Number of Yelp Visitors Drops; Yelp Plans to Increase Marketing Spend and Salesforce
Yelp might be losing a bit of their power in the online review space with news that users accessing the popular review site have dropped once again. The number of unique desktop visitors is at the lowest it has been since Q2 2013. Yelp saw 77.6M uniques in Q4 2014 compared with 80.5M in Q3. […]
Yelp Uses Private Yelp Messages to Find Paid Reviews Evidence
Yelp announced that they have released 61 new “Consumer Alerts” on the Yelp pages of businesses who have been found to be spamming the review system through either multiple reviews from the same IP address or who have been found offering payment or discounts for fake reviews. The businesses are flagged with alert notices for […]
Twitter Removes Bing Translations While Yelp Adds Them
Twitter has quietly removed the option to translate tweets from their platform. The addition made it easy for users to translate tweets made in other languages, something that was valuable for those working in international markets or simply those with friends around the world. The translation service definitely had some hiccups – especially when people […]
Should Yelp Flag or Remove Listings Where Owners Fine for Bad Reviews?
A story broke about a hotel that caters to wedding parties would fine the bridal couple a $500 fee for every bad review left by a wedding guest on Yelp or another review site. This fine would be taken from the deposit the Union Street Guest House in Hudson, New York collects when a couple […]