We recently received an unsolicited online Yelp review from a client. (See our online review policy) Stated in its entirety:
“Had them virus check and clean 5 items on a rush order. They came and picked them up and delivered them the next day. Highly recommend them, very accommodating.”
In our minds, an innocuous, uncontroversial review??? Yelp thought differently and rejected the review for publication. We followed up for additional detail and received the following:
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From: Yelp HQ <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, March 31, 2024 10:29:00 PM
To: Don Fernandes <[email protected]>
Subject: Automated software concerns 14381068
Hi don,
We love hearing from our users, and we appreciate you taking the time to send us your feedback.
We use automated software to evaluate every review based on hundreds of signals of quality, reliability, and user activity on Yelp, with the goal of highlighting the most helpful and reliable reviews for our Yelp community.
The reviews that are recommended for any business can change over time as Yelp’s software learns more about the reviewer and the business. Sometimes, a review appears in the “not recommended” section simply because the software doesn’t know enough about the reviewer to recommend it.
That said, the recommendation software is entirely automated. It applies the same objective rules to every business and treats reviews of advertisers and non-advertisers exactly the same. This also means we can’t manually override the results for any single business or review based on individual feedback we receive.
For additional information, we’d like to refer you to our Trust and Safety website https://trust.yelp.com/recommendation-software/
-Yelp’s Trust and Safety Team
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Huh???
