Restaurant Reviews on Yelp?

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There are a few problems I find with online reviews.

First is the fallacy that the customer is always right. I'll give you an example. A friend of mine teaches wine education classes, and one night had a group of five young ladies come in who, unbeknownst to him, were throwing a bachelorette party for one of the girls in their group. Now there are usually 25-30 people in a class, and they typically pay $20-50 each to attend a 2-hour session. So there were other customers in attendance. In addition, the class was already in progress when this group showed up 10 minutes late.

The girls (I'll call them "girls" because they were all under 25), aside from being loud and disruptive, were clearly already a few sheets to the wind when they arrived. Because of this, my friend refused to serve them wine and politely asked them to leave, explaining that he legally isn't allowed to serve people who appear intoxicated. He also added that he would gladly refund what they had paid for the class. They left without incident, he continued the class, and thought that was the end of it.

Within two days he had several one-star reviews show up on Yelp. It seems the ringleader of the bunch had gone and asked a number of her friends to trash his business by writing unfavorable reviews, even though many of the complainers had never even set foot there. Apparently Yelp's automated content review caught and removed quite a few fake posts, but didn't catch all of them. He was able to get the remaining bad reviews removed, but it took almost a week and a lot of his own time to do so.

Another problem is that few people understand there are different levels that fall between one and five stars. If you look at reviews on Amazon, you see many 5-star reviews, some 1-star reviews, but not much that falls in between. I once had an online seller send me an email questioning my 4-star review and asking that I change it to 5-stars. I told him that I thought the product was only worth 4 stars; it was a good product, but had one design flaw I didn't particularly care for. I thought I was being generous with 4 stars. After his email, I did update my rating. I lowered it to 3 stars, noting his not-so-nice email pressing me to rate it higher. Never heard from him after that. ;)
 
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Not so much an online review but...

When I was bought a new car in 2011, the salesman was taking me through the owner's manual and the car's features before he gave me the keys. At the end of the session, he explained to me that Honda would send me a review form to rate the salesman and the entire purchase process. He further explained I should give him a five star rating because anything less was considered a negative review by Honda!

Then the sales manager came over and thanked me for the purchase and reiterated the importance of my giving them a five star rating. I politely thanked them and left.

I did not give them a five star review. I think it was 4 stars.

A week or so after I brought the car home I got a phone call from the salesperson who was very upset that I gave him a 4 star rating. He went on for a minute or two before I ended the conversation.

I later complained to the dealership about this behavior. Some time later, I noticed the salesman was gone.
 
The funny part of that is that I would probably have given them a five star rating if they had not told me what to do on the survey.
 
Exactly! I have had salespeople say they would like me to and if I give a review they hope I will be favourable and I don't mind a comment - but if they badger or be pushy about it I will tell them to their faces just how I feel about people who beg for stardom! :LOL:

on a second note - some mention it because in quite a few cases people don't even know that reviews could be or were given - so I give them the benefit of the doubt. It is just possible they are trying to make people aware. (hmmm, hoping)
 
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Well, actually, come to think of it... I've never even been to Yelp much less read or contributed to it but will assume it's the same as all the rest of the garbage out there for people with nothing better to do... :ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
 
Well, actually, come to think of it... I've never even been to Yelp much less read or contributed to it but will assume it's the same as all the rest of the garbage out there for people with nothing better to do... :ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
It's really handy for finding a place to eat, etc., when you're on the road. We stopped at a restaurant in Ohio on our way to Michigan that I found on Yelp. It had good reviews with pictures of the food and the restaurant. It was a little out of our way, but it was delicious and had a great outdoor seating area. It worked out very well and I wrote a nice review for them.
 
Lately Google keeps popping up on my phone asking me to review a place I'd just been to. I'm guessing it is sort of the same thing?

I should probably turn off the Google Maps tracker but I keep it on so they can find my body should I disappear into one of our country ditches. :D
 
I should post a link to my deli and explain a few things from the owners' perspective...I use trip advisor a lot when deciding on places to eat...I get how helpful it is..but, you have to be able to filter out a lot of reviews to try and get a real feel as to how the place is..
 
Just like a bell curve, I throw out the top and bottom reviews, then read the 2, 3, and 4 star (out of 5) reviews to see what the pros and cons are. Works for Amazon reviews, Yelp, Trip Advisor, CNet, Consumer Reports, AVSForums, and so many more.
 
Just like a bell curve, I throw out the top and bottom reviews, then read the 2, 3, and 4 star (out of 5) reviews to see what the pros and cons are. Works for Amazon reviews, Yelp, Trip Advisor, CNet, Consumer Reports, AVSForums, and so many more.
+1... good way to look at reviews...

Ross
 
Incidentally, I told my friends that went to dinner with me that evening about my 2-star review. They're telling me that they can't find my review.
Hmm... I see my review on the restaurant site when I'm logged on to Yelp but I don't see it when I'm logged off. Weird. Perhaps they're "reviewing" my review before going public with it ??
This restaurant has around 1300 reviews, averages over 4 stars, but there are also a bunch of 1-star reviews as well, to put things in perspective.
 
I believe that there is a great difference between a negative review and a hateful review..

Those being sued, most likely, are in the latter category.. I'd hope so anyway..

Ross

I don't think so. I've seen the article about this woman being sued by business, because she posted negative review about pizza delivery. her post on FB did no seem out of line at all. And now she is in trouble. Cort sited with business.
 

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