Yelp.com

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] .As you noted, you redeemed a $promotional ad creditTo redeem the $credit towards Yelp ads, you were required to sign up for our Cost Per Click (CPC) advertising campaign and put a credit card on fileYou set your Cost Per Click monthly budget at $Once the promotion runs out, advertising continues until you stop your ads through your Yelp Business Account.Your advertising program was a self-serve program, which means that ads can only be turned off by the business through the Yelp Business AccountIf you only wanted to use your $promotion, you would have needed to log in and end the program once that credit was usedIn Step of your ad setup there were Q&A's on the right side of the page explaining that you could stop your ads any time through the Yelp for Business Owners site: "Can I stop any time? YesThere's no commitment or obligationJust come back to the Yelp for Business Owners site and stop your adsYou will be billed at the beginning of the next month for any clicks you bought before you cancelled."Below is a more detailed description of how the promotion was applied:August - 31, 2016- You received ad clicks which cost a total of $128.45- $of your $credit was used and you paid $0September - 26, 2016- You received ad clicks which cost a total of $269.80- You had $remaining promotional credit for this month because it was partially used in August- You paid $for advertising services delivered in SeptemberYou noted that you were tracking your ad spend in your Yelp Business AccountIn the Yelp Ads tab of your account, you can view a breakdown of how many ad clicks you received each month and your ad spend for each monthIf a breakdown for each month was not visible on the default Yelp Ads page, there are dropdown options where you can view this informationAdditionally, information about how much of your promotional credit had been applied is available in the Billing section of your Yelp Business Account.You ended your advertising program on September 26, We've forwarded your message to the appropriate parties for their consideration, but advertising services have been delivered in accordance with the Terms you agreed to, so at this time it appears we will not be able to offer you a refundThanks for understanding.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Hi Dr [redacted] ,Thank you for your response.Please be assured that we've evaluated the content of [redacted] **'s review are allowing the user to stand behind their reviewWe're unable assist you further in this matter.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns.You expressed concern with a personalized email you received from usWe want to clarify that the content of such emails is generated from information such as your search history, chehistory, and bookmarking activity.To learn more about how Yelp handles user information, please visit our Privacy Policy at [redacted] Regards,***Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/09/01) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] & Grill You expressed concern with the video hosting feature of your advertising program The advertising program you signed up for allowed you to create and upload a video to your business page, and the video hosting fee of $per month is for reserving space on the server for your video, even if you haven't yet produced the video Our records indicate that you discussed removing the video hosting feature with an account manager in March As it appears our account management team should have sent you a new advertising agreement back in March in order to remove the video hosting feature, we will be refunding the $per month video hosting fee you were charged for the months of April through August Our account management team also sent you a new advertising agreement on August 28, to remove the video hosting feature, but it appears you have not signed this new agreement Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 6, 2015/06/16) */ Hi ***, Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business pages for [redacted] You wrote, "After refusing to sign up for Yelps advertising service, Yelp removed all of our positive reviews and placed them under reviews not recommended." We want to assure you that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseFurthermore, there is zero relationship between the timing of when a review gets recommended and when a business decides to or declines to advertiseReviews can be recommended or not recommended days, weeks, or even months after they were first posted, and a Yelp sales representative doesn't have any influence over when that might happenWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ to learn more If you believe, however, that an individual has provided you with different information, we would like to investigate furtherTo that end, please provide us with the name of the individual whom you spoke with, their phone number, and the date and time of your conversation with them, if known You also expressed concern with the recommendation softwareAs you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measuredEven though it inevitably affects legitimate reviews from time to time and misses some fake ones, too, it helps protect the integrity of the site both for consumers (who will be less likely to be led astray by bogus reviews) and business owners (who will spend less time worrying about whether their competitors are writing negative reviews about them) It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsYou asked that all of your "reviews both positive or negative be posted as recommended," but please understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US You also expressed concern with some negative reviews, stating, "When we checked the name of the person rating our business, we had no record of anyone by that name ever visiting our store locationsSome of the raters were not even in the same state as our business locations." Generally speaking, if a review appears to reflect the experience and opinions of a reviewer while adhering to our Content Guidelines, it is our policy to leave the review upThat said, if you believe a review violates Yelp's Content Guidelines (http://www.yelp.com/guidelines), you can report the content by clicking the flag icon next to itYou'll need to be logged in to your account in order to view the flag iconFor instructions on how to report content, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/article/How-do-I-report-a-review?l=en_US If you have already received an email from us about our decision to remove or leave up content you reported, please know that our team carefully evaluates each report we receive before we come to a final decisionIf you would still like us to take a second look, you can submit a new inquiry by providing the case number (this is provided in our previously emailed response to the content you flagged) here: http://www.yelp-support.com/article/Can-I-request-a-second-evaluation-of-somethi...⇄ Finally, you asked for your business to be removed from Yelp; however, we don't remove business informationWhile some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the lawMore importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc Initial Consumer Rebuttal / [redacted] (3000, 8, 2015/06/30) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) Hi ***, In response to your answer "Businesses are not punished if they don't advertise with Yelp", we have three locations and at our [redacted] location, we had ten recommended reviewsThese ten positive reviews were posted between 9/13/to 12/18/As you stated, all ten positive reviews had been scanned by " Yelp's recommendation software "All ten reviews positively recommended our business for a three year period In your response, you stated "Reviews can be recommended or not recommended days, weeks, or even months after they were first posted." It should be noted that these ten reviews were rated positively by Yelp's recommended software for Three years, which is well past the time frame you are giving for specific reviews to be marked as "not recommended" After the third time that our business declined to sign up for Yelp's paid advertising, all ten positive reviews were removed and marked as "not recommended" for my businessThese ten reviews were not removed one at a time, or even over a period of months or yearsThese ten positive reviews were removed all at onceThis is not a common practice for Yelps software after leaving them marked as positively recommended for three yearsThis has left our business with ten reviews marked as " not recommended reviews" and can be verified per our account January 2015, I had a phone conversation with [redacted] from Yelp and her supervisor explaining the situationWe also began noticing reviews from customers who were not in our data base listed under our two other business locationsThey reviews were posted by people who never have purchased a service at any of our store locationsIn one example, a review was left on our business using extreme profanityThis reviewer is located in California, and our business locations are in FloridaYelp was notified of the situation and thought it was appropriate to mark it as "recommended for our business"Yelp was notified of these problems in writing on 10/11/2014, 12/17/and again on 3/10/Yelp was advised that the review did not meet their content guidelinesThe following are two content guidelines posted by Yelp: Accuracy: Make sure your review is factually correct Personal experience: We want to hear about your firsthand consumer experience, not what you heard from your co-worker or significant otherTry to tell your own story without resorting to broad generalizations and conclusory allegations It is obvious that if you have not had a service in our business location, you could not possibly meet the "Yelp criteria" for the reviewProfanity would also be prohibited in this case Yelp was notified in writing of these instances and responded back saying they would not remove the reviews It is clear that Yelp intentionally removed all ten recommended reviews that were posted for three years and placed them as "not recommended" after we declined to pay advertising feesIt is also clear that Yelp chose to leave "not recommended" reviews containing profanity for our additional business locations after the reviews clearly did not meet Yelps content guidelinesYelp claiming that their complex algorithm might have made a mistake, is not acceptable due to the fact we notified them in writing Based on the two above facts, we are asking Yelp to remove our business locations from their websiteYelp's business practices are not the standards our company expects, and we ask that we are not associated in any way with Yelp or their practices Sincerely, [redacted] Final Business Response / [redacted] (4000, 10, 2015/07/08) */ Hi ***, Thank you for your response You have again alleged that Yelp is manipulating your reviews because you declined to advertiseHowever, with respect to reviews, paying businesses have absolutely no advantageThe recommendation software does not distinguish between advertisers and free listings, and the revenue side of our business operates independently of the content side of our business, just as a newspaper might put a firewall between their advertising and reporting functions It also sounds as though you don't accept our explanation of the recommendation software, but we can only stand by our previous statementsYelp's recommendation software is an automated algorithm that attempts to weed out less reliable reviews while showcasing more reliable onesThis means that when reviews are posted to your listing, not all of them will make the cutWe acknowledge that even some legitimate reviews will not be recommended, but we still believe that the recommendation software as a whole makes our site more trustworthy and useful to consumers As indicated in our prior response, the recommendation software is automated to help avoid the potential for human bias inherent in individual decision-making: we cannot reverse the software's decisions, either to suppress an active review or to restore a review that isn't currently recommendedThis also means (and I can say this with 100% certainty) that we cannot manually manipulate the recommendation software to favor an advertiser or punish a non-advertiser With regards to your comment, "It should be noted that these ten reviews were rated positively by Yelp's recommended software for Three years, which is well past the time frame you are giving for specific reviews to be marked as 'not recommended,'" we want to clarify that reviews can be recommended or not recommended years at any time after they were first postedThe software might pick up new information as time goes by that makes a reviewer seem more trustworthy, or the information we have about a reviewer can grow stale We do understand the recommendation software can be frustrating at times, and your feedback is appreciatedWhen it comes down to it, all review sites face the same challenge: how to identify fake reviews among the many millions of legitimate reviewsIt's no easy task, and there is always room for improvementWe hope to be able to continually improve on this issue You also expressed concern with a review "using extreme profanityThis reviewer is located in California." It sounds like you are referring to the review by [redacted] L on your [redacted] location, although it does not appear that you flagged this reviewWhile we recognize that each person has a different tolerance for strong language, Yelp generally lets reviewers tell their own story in their own wordsWith that in mind, we've looked at [redacted] L's original review and because this particular review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, we are leaving it upHowever, we have removed / L's review update of [redacted] because it falls outside our Content Guidelines You have again asked that your business listings be removed, but as previously stated, we don't remove business listing informationYelp is allowed to publish business names and publicly available information about businesses under the well-established fair use doctrine, as well as First Amendment principlesGenerally speaking, this means that we can display business names and trademarks "for purposes of comparison, criticism, point of reference, or any other such purpose." See New Kids on the Block vNew America Pub., Inc., F.2d 302, (9th Cir1992) Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc Final Consumer Response / [redacted] (4200, 12, 2015/07/17) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) Our original complaint dealt with the fact that Yelp removed all of our positive reviews that were posted for three years as soon as we refused Yelp's paid advertisingIn addition, Yelp continued to leave negative reviews that had extreme profanity and did not meet their content guidelines Yelp is punishing our business for making a Revdex.com complaintOn July 8th, Yelp altered the actual review by [redacted] L written on 2/26/by deleting portions of the conversationAfter deleting the business owners response to [redacted] L written on 2/25/along with portions of [redacted] L response back to the business written on 2/26/15, the review no longer accurately depicted [redacted] L overall experience of the business During the Revdex.com complaint, we noted that the [redacted] L original post did not meet Yelp's content guidelines while using extreme profanity 1) On 2/25/ [redacted] Lposted a comment about our business using extreme profanity giving our business a 1-star ratingYelp was notified that we could not find this person in our database under the name used and the extreme profanity violated their content guidelinesOn July 8th, 2015, Yelp responded by saying that the content was acceptable and that they believed this was a valid post 2) On 2/25/ [redacted] ***, the business owner responded to the same post attempting to gather additional information to try to help [redacted] L if she indeed visited the storeOn July 8th, 2015, Yelp removed the business owner's response to the reviewer that showed the business wanted to assist [redacted] L with her complaintThere were no content violations, and this was an import part of the review 3) On 2/26/ [redacted] L responded back to her original post stating everything was "ok" and gave the business a 3-star reviewYelp showed the overall review as three stars that accurately depicted the customers feeling's of the businessOn July 8th, 2015, Yelp deleted this portion of the post that only left the original post that was the 1-star rating and admitted to doing it By deleting the business owner's attempt to satisfy the customer along with the reviewer's most recent post to the original review, Yelp is not showing how the situation was handled or the customer's most accurate feelings of their experience In yelps response they claim the following: As indicated in our prior response, the recommendation software is automated to help avoid the potential for human bias inherent in individual decision-making: we cannot reverse the software's decisions, either to suppress an active review or to restore a review that isn't currently recommendedThis also means (and I can say this with 100% certainty) that we cannot manually manipulate the recommendation software to favor an advertiser or punish a non-advertiser Yelp responded to the [redacted] L review by saying the following: "While we recognize that each person has a different tolerance for strong language, Yelp generally lets reviewers tell their own story in their own wordsWith that in mind, we've looked at [redacted] L's original review and because this particular review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, we are leaving it up." After Yelp removed the business owner's response, and the Stacie L updated response, didn't they override the computers original recommendation and "suppress" an active review? This is another example of how Yelp continues to be untruthful in their business practices Based on the original claims that continue to support the fact that Yelps business practices do not match our company's standards nor do they accurately account for customer experiences, we ask to be removed from the Yelp site Sincerely, [redacted]

Hi Joevon,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for County Plumbing & Rooter.You wrote, "I have been having our customers go online & post their recent experiences with my company, on Yelp in an effort to build my company's online reputation & almost ever recent post gets pushed to a 'reviews that are currently recommended' page." Please note that we expressly advise businesses not to ask their customers for reviews since most businesses tend only to ask their happiest customers, not the unhappy onesThese self-selected reviews tell only part of the story, and we don’t think that’s fair to consumersYou can find more information here: [redacted] It's important to note that Yelp uses automated software to recommend the most helpful reviews from the Yelp communityThe software looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on YelpMost of all, however, it's looking for people who are intrinsically motivated to share the wide range of rich and detailed experiences they have every day with local businesses (as opposed to people who were asked to write a review by a business owner)As a result, your best bet to get high quality and unbiased reviews about your business is to provide a memorable and amazing customer experience – it has nothing to do with asking your customers to post on Yelp.Because our recommendation software is automated, the Yelp Support team cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewOur recommendation software is automated precisely so that it can apply the same objective standards to every business and every review without being overridden by someone's personal preferencesThat said, our recommendation software runs on a daily basis, so reviews that aren't currently recommended may be recommended in the future, and vice versaYou also expressed concern with some negative reviewsIf you come across content that you feel may violate Yelp's Content Guidelines [redacted] ), please let our moderators know by reporting itYou can do so by finding the content in question, clicking the flag icon on the website or the More Options/Overflow Menu (dots) on the appYou'll need to be logged into your account to report content.To learn more, please visit: [redacted] While reporting content doesn't guarantee that it'll be removed, our team looks at every inquiry and carefully evaluates the content against our guidelinesAdditionally, please note that the Yelp Support team's evaluation of reviews against our Content Guidelines is separate from actions taken by Yelp's automated recommendation softwareEach case will be reviewed by our team in the order it was receivedTypically, you will receive a response to your report of a review within a few business daysIf you don't believe you've received our response, please be sure to check all email and spam folders (you may want to add [redacted] to your contact list).Regards,HelenYelp Inc

Hi [redacted] ,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for ***.We appreciate your feedback, and have forwarded your message to the appropriate partiesIt looks like you spoke with a manager, [redacted] on May 2, 2017, the day after you filed this Revdex.com complaintAs you may recall, we have refunded you $and are offering you a $promotional credit to your account for future advertising on Yelp.Please feel free to reach out to our Account Management team if you would like to use this new promotional credit and set up another advertising programRegards,***Yelp Inc

Hi [redacted] Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding the sales calls you were receiving regarding your business page for The [redacted] on Yelp.We've gone ahead and confirmed with our Sales team that you no longer wish to receive any communication from themIf for any reason you continue to hear from them, please let us know at [redacted] Regards,***Yelp Inc

*i [redacted] ,T*ank you for writingWe are glad to *ave t*is opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] We first want to address your comment, "Once I declined, and canceled advertising wit [redacted] t*em, all of my star reviews written from past real customers, w*o *as pictures as proof t*at t*ey *ad service wit [redacted] us- *as been deleted from my yelp account due to t*ere automated software." We want to clarify t*at a business's decision w*et*er or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect *ow t*e reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punis*ed if t*ey don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded wit [redacted] preferential treatment wit [redacted] regards to t*eir reviews if t*ey do advertiseWe understand t*ere are some misconceptions about t*is, so we invite you to visit [redacted] to learn more.As you may *ave read, t*e goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to s*owcase more reliable contentT*e recommendation software establis*es an objective standard against w*ic [redacted] every review can be measured, and looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on YelpIt's important to note t*at t*e software applies t*e same analysis to everyone, and t*at it affects bot [redacted] positive and negative reviewsPlease also understand t*at t*e recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override t*e software to recommend or not recommend a review*owever, t*e system is not static -- reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as t*e system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors.To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: [redacted] We also want to be clear t*at actions taken by our automated recommendation software are separate from t*e Yelp Support team's evaluation of reviews against our Content GuidelinesWe allow users to post reviews and p*otos, and rely on t*e Yelp community to report content t*at t*ey believe is questionableIf someone reports a review by flagging it, our Support team will evaluate t*e review against our Content Guidelines ( [redacted] ) and will remove t*e review if it is found to be in violation of our guidelines.You expressed concern wit [redacted] Edit [redacted] E.'s review of your businessWe understand t*at a negative review about an experience you don’t recognize is very frustratingWe *ave taken anot*er look at t*is review but, after careful consideration, we reac*ed t*e same conclusion as before and are unable to remove t*e review as it does not appear to fall outside our Content GuidelinesIf a review appears to reflect t*e reviewer’s personal experiences and opinions, it is our policy to let t*e user stand be*ind *is or *er review.You also asked for your business to be removed from Yelp; *owever, we don't remove business informationW*ile some business owners mig*t prefer to keep a lower profile, t*is kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under t*e law.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] You expressed concern with the recommendation softwareAs you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable content The recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured, and looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on Yelp.It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsPlease also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static -- reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors.To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: [redacted] You also expressed concern with a "review of a different store unrelated to mine." It looks like you are referring to [redacted] reviewUpon further evaluation, this review was found to be in violation of our Content Guidelines and it has been removed.To address your question about how our content is monitored, we allow users to post reviews and photos, and rely on the Yelp community to flag content that they believe is questionableFor future reference, if you believe a review violates Yelp's Content Guidelines [redacted] , you can report the content by clicking the flag icon next to itYou'll need to be logged in to your account in order to view the flag iconWhile reporting content doesn't guarantee that it'll be removed, our team looks at every inquiry and carefully evaluates the content against our guidelinesEach case will be reviewed by our team in the order it was receivedTypically, you will receive a response to your report within a few business daysIf you don't believe you've received our response, please be sure to check all email and spam folders (you may want to add [redacted] m to your contact list).For instructions on how to report content, please visit: [redacted] Regards,***Yelp Inc

Everything in red is my response as rebuttal to Yelp's response in black Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: ...Our records indicate you redeemed a $promotional ad credit on August 15, To redeem the $credit towards Yelp ads, you were required to sign up This is the scam you are running I did NOT sign up for a cost per click advertising campaign I signed up for a free promotion offered by Yelp That’s the difference My intention was NEVER to be billed out of my own pocket but to use the promotion and “evaluate” my experience See Bing Ads Example Attached By the way, you don’t allow people to use the promotion unless they enter their credit card info Another part of sleeze Bing does not require a credit card and allows you to use the promotion, why don’t you? As you can see from the Bing Ads (the legitimate way to run a promotion), they notified me continuously throughout my “promotional” experience about the money that had been spent, then they pause the campaign so that I could evaluate my experience Yelp chooses NOT to notify those who signed up for the promotion because they know people (like myself) will unknowingly be charged for your exorbitant Ads by Yelp, then hide behind a “sign up” to not provide a refund This is sleazy The CA AG’s office should be notified of your business practices Below is a more detailed description of how the promotion was applied: August - 31, 2017- You received ad clicks which cost a total of $240.33- $of your $credit was used and you paid $0September - 26, 2017- You received ad clicks which cost a total of $449.30- You had $remaining promotional credit for this month because it was partially used towards your August ads- $of your remaining $credit was uses and you paid $for advertising services delivered in SeptemberYou can view ad click and billing information in the Yelp Ads and Billing tabs of your Yelp for Business Owners Account at [redacted] As you can see on the Yelp Ads tab, you received a total of ad clicks during your campaign at an average cost of $per click There are two problems with your calculations 1st, I approved, under the promotion, of $per day as you can see from the cancellation email attached If you followed my approval of $per day (which you should have, and I accept your calculations of leads), the total is $315, not $that you claim I owed $x leads = $ 2nd, I don’t accept that I had leads from these ads Please see the Activity Reports and the Activity Feeds attached It shows from the time period the ads were running, I received “leads” And those leads were questionable at best, which I’ll give more detail later With regards to your concern that the cost of a click increased, while you may have seen an estimated price per click during the sign up process, it is important to keep in mind that that amount is an estimate based on demand from businesses in your category and area, and that the cost per click may change over time based on demandThe price you pay per click is based on competition and relevance, but you'll always pay the least amount needed to win the click This is another unethical practice by Yelp When I signed up for the “promotion”, I requested to spend NO MORE THAN $per day, as per the cancellation email attached It doesn’t say ESTIMATE Now I understand how the cost of leads can vary, which is fine, but double in price as you mentioned at $per click?? Most Ad providers, i.e., Google, Bing, FB, etc will stay within the bid amount within 10% which is reasonable give the variation But to say it doubled is wrong and unethical It’s also a way to rationalize the $spent in ads within 5-weeks We also want to clarify that ad clicks, user views, and Customer Leads are separate entities of information An ad click is when a person clicks on your business's Yelp adWhen a user is searching on Yelp for a business in a certain area, we do our best to provide that user with a Yelp Ad applicable to their searchYelp Ads appear above the natural search results, on your competitors' business pages, and in various other places around the websiteThe Yelp Ad has the notation "Ad" in next to the business nameClicking on your ad impression will take the user to your business page on Yelp, and you were being charged when someone clicked on your ad Most Ad providers, i.e., Google, Bing, FB, etc., will direct the click to the website so to allow the user to make the decision to contact the business You add another layer into the mix by pushing the user to the business page of Yelp Then to the site if they choose We all know, this reduces greatly the conversion to the actual site and is not a good business practice So a business owner can use their whole budget in Yelp ads and not even see one hit to their website from the ad??? And at your $per click?? That is very scammy at best We want to clarify that the location information in this section may be based on the information the user provided in their profile, which might not reflect their actual locationPlease keep in mind that the activity you see on the Activity Feed and Customer Leads sections of your account is not necessarily from users who have clicked on your ad, and could be from users who found your page by another means, such as our natural search results What??? You don’t follow the IP address like all the other ad providers?? And allow contamination from other cities and states to perhaps click on the ad in error and the business owner is charged $32? This is a poor business practice if what you are saying is true and that local people have just entered wrong locations into their profiles Sincerely,Shane ***

Hi [redacted] ,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] .We are sorry to hear you were not satisfied with your advertising campaignWe want to clarify that when advertising with a Cost Per Click (CPC) program, you were electing to pay every time a user clicked on your ad impressionYou were also paying for an enhanced Yelp profile, which included features such as competitor ad removal and a photo slideshow on your Yelp listing.With regards to your comment, "He also promised a $credit then after sending the contract he changed his mind and said his manager would not approve the credit," our records indicate that a promotional credit was actually applied, but had been incorrectly set upPer the terms of your advertising agreement, you had a total monthly Cost Per Click budget of $2,125, and should have received an additional $2,towards your first month's Cost Per Click BudgetHowever, you actually received a total of $worth of extra Cost Per Click ads spread over April, May, and part of June before the error was caught by our finance teamThis error was written off so that you were not for the extra ad clicks you received.It looks like there is currently an outstanding balance of $6,for advertising services delivered from March 1, through July 19, 2016.You also alleged, "He also promised that Yelp would take down any negative reviews." We want to be clear that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit [redacted] to learn more.Additionally, you wrote, "I emailed cancellation before contract started." Our records indicate you signed your advertising agreement on February 23, 2016, with a service start date of March 1, 2016, and we were unable to locate a cancellation request from you for during that time frameCould you please forward us the email (including headers) to [redacted] , so that we can look into this further? Please be sure to indicate that it is in regards to Revdex.com case # [redacted] .Regards,***Yelp Inc

Hi Lisa,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for Lolarue.We've forwarded your message to the appropriate partiesAs you may recall, a Customer Success Manager, Collin, reached out to you by email to clarify our cancellation policies and your billing cycleWe want to clarify that your advertising program had an initial 6-month term, and per the terms of your advertising agreement, your program continued to renew automatically on a monthly basis until we receive a cancellation request from youWe require days written notice to Yelp's account management team if you wish to terminate your advertising programWe received a cancellation request on January 31, 2018, so your advertising program was set to cancel on March 2, Your advertising program was billed in arrears, which in your case means that we typically bill on the 12th of the month for advertising services that were delivered from the 12th of the previous month through the 11th of the current monthThus, the $charge you paid on February 12, was for the advertising services you received from January - February 11, The final charge of $that you paid on March 12, was for was for the advertising services you received from February - March 2, 2018.Your advertising program has been terminated effective March 2, and you paid your final charge on March 12, 2018, so you will not incur further chargesIf you have further questions or concerns, please feel free to call the number Collin provided in his emailRegards,HelenYelp Inc

Hi Vassil,Thank you for your response.Please be assured that this situation has been reviewed extensivelyWe stand by our decision to leave Sean M.'s review up since it appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer.As you may recall from the previous correspondence you've had with the Yelp Support team, while we share your concern about the possibility of a defamatory review on our site, we don't adjudicate disputes between businesses and their reviewersCongress acknowledged this quandary by passing legislation that provides statutory immunity to online service providers such as Yelp for the content of third-party postsSee U.S.C§The case law is legion and unanimous in support of online service providers because of concerns that they would otherwise be forced to remove third party posts every time someone raised issue with their contentsSee [redacted] *** Inc., F3d (9th Cir2003); [redacted] , Inc., F.3d (4th Cir1997); [redacted] , Cal4th (Cal2006).We encourage you to contact the reviewer directly using the direct messaging function on our site in order to constructively address your concerns We do not recommend that you engage in anything other than a well-meaning dialog with the reviewer in order to sort out any misunderstandings.You also asked for your business to be removed from Yelp; however, we don't remove business informationWhile some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the lawMore importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses.Yelp is allowed to publish business names and publicly available information about businesses under the well-established fair use doctrine, as well as First Amendment principlesGenerally speaking, this means that we can display business names and trademarks "for purposes of comparison, criticism, point of reference, or any other such purpose." See New Kids on the Block vNew America Pub., Inc., F.2d 302, (9th Cir1992).Regards,HelenYelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/08/14) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] We are sorry to hear you are not satisfied with your advertising campaignTo be clear, while the goal of advertising on Yelp is to drive more traffic to the business page through features such as sponsored search results, which may ultimately result in more customers, we of course cannot guarantee a certain level of resultsWhen advertising with an impressions-based program, you are paying for the delivery of a certain number of targeted ad impressions (in your case, ad impressions per month) as well as additional features such as competitor ad removal and a photo slideshow As advertising services are being delivered in accordance with your advertising agreement, we cannot offer a refundThat said, as you may recall from the email you recently received from our Account Management team, we have waived the early termination fee of $Your advertising program is set to cancel as of August 31, 2015, and you will not incur further charges Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc

Hi Paul,Thank you for your response.Yelp's Terms of Service prohibit both compensating someone to write or remove a review, and being compensated to write or remove a review (you can find our Terms of Service here: [redacted] Please forward any additional correspondence you had with this user to [redacted] , so that we can better understand the situation and take action where necessary.Regards,HelenYelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/08/10) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for Rego [redacted] Animal Clinic Please note that we don't remove business listing informationWhile some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the lawMore importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses You also expressed concern with [redacted] M's review of your businessThe review has been evaluated by the Yelp Support team and left up, as it was not found to be in violation of our guidelinesYelp does not take sides in factual disputesRather, if a review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, it is our policy to allow the user to stand by his/her review Thanks for understanding Regards, [redacted] Yelp, Inc Initial Consumer Rebuttal / [redacted] (3000, 7, 2015/08/12) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) Do not have any permission about disclosed bisness informationPublished on purposed only bad reviewsGood reviews are always hidingClinic has very good reputation on google and FacebookSo yelps doing illegal activities, pushing bisness owners pay for additional serviceYelp should go to investigation Final Business Response / [redacted] (4000, 9, 2015/08/21) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for your response You wrote, "Do not have any permission about disclosed bisness information." It sounds as though you are again asking that your business listing be removed, but as previously stated, we don't remove business listing informationYelp is allowed to publish business names and publicly available information about businesses under the well-established fair use doctrine, as well as First Amendment principlesGenerally speaking, this means that we can display business names and trademarks "for purposes of comparison, criticism, point of reference, or any other such purpose." See New Kids on the Block vNew America Pub., Inc., F.2d 302, (9th Cir1992) We also want to be clear that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ to learn more With regards to your concerns with the recommendation software, as you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measuredEven though it inevitably affects legitimate reviews from time to time and misses some fake ones, too, it helps protect the integrity of the site both for consumers (who will be less likely to be led astray by bogus reviews) and business owners (who will spend less time worrying about whether their competitors are writing negative reviews about them) It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsPlease also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc Final Consumer Response / [redacted] (4200, 11, 2015/08/25) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) 99% reviews for my bisness was published from people never been her or have financial issues, sent to collection agencyand it is unclear why all good reviews never publishedI think Yelp does conspiracy, corrupted, has no idea about ethics and try to damage my bisnessI was wondering whyBecause all above it should be investigated by special agency

Hi [redacted] ,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] .You expressed concern with [redacted] reviewWe’ve taken another look at [redacted] review, but have reached the same conclusion as before and are leaving the review upIf a review appears to reflect the reviewer’s personal experiences and opinions, it is our policy to let the user stand behind his or her review.As you noted, you've already used your free business account to post a public comment on this reviewMany reviewers respond favorably to business owners willing to engage in constructive conversation, and at the very least, other Yelp users appreciate seeing business owners take a proactive approach to dealing with customer concerns.You also expressed concern with the recommendation softwareAs you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured, and looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on Yelp.It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsPlease also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static -- reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors.To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: [redacted] You also wrote, "Now I have a customer who wish to post reviews but are unable to because Yelp states, Your review isn't posted yet! Check your inbox (or spam folder) for an email from yelp, and click the confirmation link to post.' However, our customers never receive the emails?" If a user is having trouble confirming their account, they can find troubleshooting tips and a link to contact us for further assistance if necessary at [redacted] We also want to address your comment, "As of today, when I try to login to the business account, Yelp responds, Unknown Email Address 'We couldn't find a Yelp for Business Owners account associated with [redacted] Yelp for Business Owners requires a different account than your Yelp.com loginTo create an account, claim your business.'" It looks like the email address associated with your Business Account was changed from [redacted] to another email address in JuneWe don't disclose this information, but I've emailed a password reset message to the address associated with the account.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: It is one thing to express your personal opinion and experience(as Yelp states) and it is another to flat out lie! There is a difference and we are asking that Yelp recognize this and remove the review based upon thisIf [redacted] would have said the work passed city inspection codes but he was still displeased than that would have been his personal feelings,experience and opinionInstead [redacted] lied and said the work did not pass now how do you think that looks to a maybe potential customer? Where Is [redacted] rebuttal and proof backing this accusation? Also why isn't Yelp asking that [redacted] provide proof? Sincerely, [redacted]

Hi [redacted] ,Thank you for your response.It sounds like you are disputing the accuracy of the reviews by [redacted] Our team has taken another look at the review by [redacted] *, and we reached the same conclusion as before and are unable to remove the reviewWe've also looked at [redacted] review, and have elected to leave it upWe don't take sides in factual disputes; if a review appears to reflect the reviewer’s personal experiences and opinions, it is our policy to let the user stand behind his or her review.In some situations, business owners may want to message the reviewer privately, or post a public response explaining their own version of eventsIt looks like your colleague [redacted] has already responded to [redacted] review, and he might consider responding to [redacted] *.'s review tooMany reviewers respond favorably to business owners willing to engage in constructive conversation, and at the very least, other Yelp users appreciate seeing business owners take a proactive approach to dealing with customer concerns [redacted] can access these features using our free accounts for business owners [redacted] and he can find more information about how to respond to reviews here: [redacted] These decisions aren’t always easy, but please know we looked at these reviews closely before reaching our decision.Regards,***Yelp Inc