Yelp now says it has 29 million monthly uniques and 9 million reviews. A majority of users (54%) are over 35; however the largest single group is 18-34.
Yelp is one of the few sites now only selling its own traffic. The major search engines also do but Citysearch and yellow pages publishers all sell a network.
Do you think this approach is sustainable for Yelp or do you believe the company will need to adopt a similar “network” approach for advertisers?
Screenwerk 
February 5, 2010 at 2:58 pm
I don’t think Yelp needs a network focus if it can offer ad value. Unlike the network guys like YP.com ans Superpages.com, Yelp has focused on content vs ads and is now experiencing the rewards.
February 5, 2010 at 4:00 pm
The Yelp brand is very strong and that’s a key to both selling and being able to only sell your own traffic
February 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm
Restaurateurs I’ve interfaced with, the perception of Yelp is mixed. Some are suspicious about the authenticity of their reviews and others rely on it as a means of customer communication. Only one advertised with Yelp, but they didn’t feel that they needed to since they already had well established exposure on Yelp.
It’s difficult for them to pull off the organic community network as well as deliver advertising value…
I question how/if they will change their advertising model without “selling out” the Yelpers. Can they really obtain a substantial revenue flow to justify these valuations?
February 10, 2010 at 9:03 am
David’s got a great point about the perception of Yelp, and we are seeing more and more faked reviews. It seems the Internet Marketing Strategy for Local Businesses Express Pack comes fully loaded now with white hat and black hat practices. I would estimate that 10 percent or higher of IM activities by business are negative in nature and include ripoffreport.com, negative reviews in all the rating sites, and complaintsboard.com.
That being said, we got a free chocolate fondue from Melting Pot after posting a great review after a visit (and it was yummy I might add). I think some businesses are monitoring and encouraging the use of these rating sites as an ORM tool as well as a marketing tool.
Long live Yelp, provided (as David mentioned) that they don’t sell out their patrons.
February 16, 2010 at 4:25 am
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