Yelp is working to increase transparency on how user reviews are shown to customers. This move is happening after three lawsuits alleged that Yelp manipulates reviews based on whether or not a company is advertising with the site.
Now, anyone that wants to see which reviews are being identified by Yelp’s automated review filter can now so do by clicking a link to a separate page that has the content. The search site is also getting rid of its “favorite review” feature that was a big part of its advertising during the past four years.
“Today we’ve taken steps to make it even more clear that Yelp treats review content equally for advertisers and non-advertisers alike and that there is no relationship between advertising and a business’ reviews on Yelp,” said Jeremy Stoppelman, Yelp’s chief executive officer and co-founder.
“While Yelp is helping millions of consumers find millions of great local businesses each month — and consumer traffic and business advertisers continue to reach new highs — myths have persisted about how review content is displayed on Yelp.”
Getting rid of “favorite review” is a way to make it known that reviews on the site is different from advertising. Now, advertisers can post a video to their Yelp pages.