Yelp is a small business goldmine

Yelp is a local review site where consumers can register, rate and review the local businesses they frequent. Yelp offers a website that can be opened through any browser and used to search for local business information. It also offers a mobile billing service like Foursquare. The mobile app is actually very easy to use and has been mentioned by the likes of Apple CEO and founder Steve Jobs for its popularity and ease of use. Here are some stats from a recent and official press release from Yelp:

• The yelpers called a local business every two seconds via the mobile app.
• 35 percent of all searches on Yelp.com came from a Yelp mobile app.
• Every two seconds, a consumer generated directions to a local business.
• A photo was uploaded every 30 seconds from a Yelp mobile app.

Unlike other location-based services like Foursquare or Facebook Places, Yelp has an official employee, called a Community Manager in most major cities in the US and even select cities abroad. It is the job of these Community Managers to ensure that Yelp returns and rewards the Yelp community for contributing content and reviews to the website. Meetings are held monthly and in some cases weekly between fellow Yelpers and the Community Manager to have a little fun (usually food and drink) to discuss what is working and mainly to interact and have a good time.

This method of rewarding users is a great example of caring for people who are passionate about your business or service. As a result, Yelpers continue to use the service to connect and share local business information. It really is a beautiful thing.

And for a small business, the opportunities to connect with Yelpers and build a positive image are immense. It doesn’t take long either, just a few hours a month you will get it. Claiming your local business listing is free; then when people sign up or leave a review for you, just log in and thank them or reply as acknowledgment that you care. This will only set you apart from your competition. Then, as you get more comfortable with Yelp and the features it offers, dig a little deeper and start communicating more regularly with the Yelp community. My advice is to just get started and stay active; the rest will develop naturally.

We witnessed this first-hand when my girlfriend and I took a weekend getaway to a Bed-and-Breakfast. We had a great time and left a very positive review. Well, the owner of this particular business had never heard of Yelp before, but he uses Google regularly himself and our review appeared on the first page. In fact, he took the time to send us a personal email and went on to say that he couldn’t ask for better advertising. And that’s exactly Yelp, a form of word-of-mouth advertising.

That’s pure gravy and a great example of how a small business can use Yelp to maintain a positive online reputation on the internet, as well as to connect with consumers. Why not give your business a shot and see where it goes?