Why Not Being Active On Yelp Is Costing You Business
Posted under: According to Search Engine Land, there were two dominant websites for online business reviews in the early 2000s. The site brought to the forefront that there was a new leader at the top of the ladder whose name was Yelp — and this was back in 2009. Now while the original study was conducted in 2009, it does verify why not being active on Yelp is costing you business.
Fast forward to March, 2011, and Yelp appeared on HubSpot’s The Ultimate List: 50 Local Business Directories. What is so notable about it is that Yelp was number 4 out of 50 with only Google, Bing and Yahoo! being ahead of them.
Now that’s mighty impressive!
The bottom line is that if you’re not active on Yelp, it could be costing your business. No, I’m not talking about signing up for a business account at Yelp; anyone that is a small business can do that. What I’m talking about is really becoming active and using Yelp to its full potential . Let’s see how.
Missed Local Search Visibility
Say you are looking for a website design company – say Twelve Oaks Group — if you are not listed in Yelp’s directory, you have missed an opportunity for a potential client to contact you — and that means you could be losing sales! Yelp had over 71 million visitors to their site in Q1, 2012. Don’t miss out!
Related to missed sales is Yelp is a way to connect customers to your small business by offering deals. A deal is you making an offer through Yelp to buy a certificate that’s being offered by a third-party vendor. Or, you could become the third-party.
Missed Recommendations
Yelp is a great way to review businesses, as well as receive feedback from other businesses. According to Yelp, “Yelp Business Accounts allow businesses to share information with the Yelp Community. Simply put, it’s word of mouth — amplified.”
Missed Networking Opportunities
When you think about it, Yelp is a super place to network with other business. You would miss out on that rapport you can get by not:
- getting in touch with people who can be of help to you,
- collecting and updating their contact information or
- maintaining regular communication with messages to and from other businesses.
Missed Reporting
Besides the “misses” listed above, there is one more I want to bring to your attention. Everyone wants to know how their small business is doing once they sign up for a subscription to a site like Yelp. They understand this and have a way for you to track your company’s progress. If you don’t have a gauge for how your business is doing, how can you hope to improve? Yelp takes care of that with up-to-date trends and statistics.
I’ve given you quite a lot to think about, now haven’t I? The bottom line is that not being active on Yelp is costing you business. So I recommend you hop to it now and sign up for Yelp.
Image from Yelp FAQ
Twelve Oaks Group
Tennessee-based Twelve Oak Group is unique in its approach to its customers. Each team member is committed to helping grow small business, making local government more accessible, and enhancing communities with their web design and consulting services expertise. We will not deviate from this approach!
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