Yelp Fact Sheet Sustaining How to Remove Negative Review & Rating

Table Of Content

• • Things to Avoid When You Are Hit by A Negative Review On Yelp
  • How Will You Find Out Legitimate Yelp Reviews?
  • How Will You Spot the Fabricated Yelp Reviews?
  • The Easiest Manner to Remove Negative Yelp Reviews?
  • What if Your Yelp Review Disappears?
  • How to Improve Your Yelp Rating?
  • Conclusion of Yelp Info Removal

Amidst all the painful things, seeing someone criticizing you publicly and smearing your name is the hard one to digest.

The scenario becomes even worse when people are smearing your good name on one of the top-rated sites like Yelp. But, it’s common these days that unsatisfied and grumpy customers or even ex-employees express their grievances through these popular business directory sites.

Now, we can classify the scenario into two-part,

• Genuine reviews based on facts.
• The malicious lying to frame you badly.

We will help you figure out the ways to deal with both scenarios.

But, the question comes here, why are reviews important? And why should you deal with yelp reviews more tactically?

Well, 50% of the young people look at reviews while they look for a local business. Also, 90% of people who are aged over 50 are likely to look at reviews before they make a purchasing decision.

That’s why review management is an important part of online reputation repair strategies. 

Let’s have a look at the image below to understand the importance of reviews in modern businesses,

The shocking news here is yelp has more than 145 million unique visitors each month and 82% of them are intended to make a purchasing decision.

Have a look at US demographics of Yelp users,

So, if your business has a wall of defamatory reviews, then you’re opening up the chances for your competitors to take away all the customers.

One of Neil Patel’s blog says,

“Negative online reviews and negative sentiment against your brand can hamper your local search rankings. Only 5% of consumers will convert after encountering a negative review of your product.”

You know the worst part here?

The yelp.com reviews can seep into the Google search result when people type in your brand name. Hence it’ll harm your reputation in a drastic way.

So, you should remove negative yelp reviews before the crisis enters through your door.

But, people often freak out in these scenarios and make the situation even worse while handling negative reviews.

So, let’s first understand what you should not do when you are hit by a wall of negative reviews on Yelp.

What Are the Things to Avoid When You Are Hit by A Negative Review On Yelp?

In this horrifying situation when your people are bashing your business publicly, it’s important to know what not to do rather than what to do.

Here are some cheat-sheet to follow to ease the process of removing reviews from yelp,

• Don’t Respond Hastily

The initial response right after seeing a yelper talking low about your business may involve obscenities from your end.

So, don’t respond immediately after seeing a review. Take some time and come out with a professional, reasonable, and polite reply.

For example, If the review looks completely embarrassing, your response to such reviews will be like this,

“Dear ‘name of the yelper’ sorry to hear that you had to face such an experience from our end. But, we’re thankful to you for bringing the matter into our attention. We will closely monitor our services from now on. We hope to serve you better next time.”

• Don’t Try to Threaten Yelp!

Don’t ever think of threatening yelp or Google for showing the negative reviews on the top.

These sites help users to find authenticate and useful information before they avail of their services.  You can’t sue them over a review. Rather a polite mail towards the customer assistance will work!!

For example, You can mail them to remove bad yelp reviews under their terms of service violation. But, remember your approach should be like,

“Hello, this is to bring in to the company’s notice that I’ve flagged a review that violates terms of services of your company. The reviewer ‘ABC’ has mentioned one of our employees as ‘fat’ which is a personal attack. I would be pleased if the company takes the necessary steps and removes the review as it’s sounding too rude to our people.”

Unable to remove yelp reviews?

Contact a professional yelp review removal service to Get help.

• Don’t Retaliate

Retaliation is always a bad idea when someone is angry.

If your customer is facing a serious issue, take this as a chance to improve your service rather than retaliate. Retaliation can make the scenario even worse and hinders the chances to remove yelp reviews.

• Don’t Spam Positive Reviews on Yelp

The first idea that clicks you when you’re distressing over a wall of negative reviews is to add as much as positive reviews and rank them up, right?

Well, positive reviews undoubtedly help to push down the negative ones.

But, you can’t fabricate it.

This review spam has been growing for several years, where people set multiple networks to submit random reviews to a certain business.

Well, the idea of creating loads of fake accounts and using them to upload tons of positive reviews looks impressive but maybe in your dream.

Yelp algorithm can easily find fabricated reviews over time and remove them immediately.

• Don’t Buy Reviews

You’ve probably heard the popular phrase that says “there is no short-cut for success”.

This has been relevant for centuries.

So, don’t try to solicit praise to make people perceive your brand as trustworthy.

Once the yelp algorithm catches you doing illegal practices not only the reviews will be removed but also you’ll lose the trust forever.

How Will You Find Out Legitimate Yelp Reviews?

There might be people trying to frame you negatively on these digital platforms or there might be people who are extremely unsatisfied due to a poor service offered by you.

How will you distinguish a legitimate review?

Well, we can help you out with this. let’s take a few examples of legitimate yelp reviews.,

Note: When you find out a review is legitimate, make sure you improve your service to maintain your reputation in the future.

• Horrible Shopping Experiences

Irrespective of the size and scale of your business, it might slip up plenty of times. For example, a customer may face rude behavior from any of your employees or they didn’t find what they were searching for. Both ways may provoke the customer to submit negative reviews.

• Unsatisfactory Product

If a product doesn’t look the one was advertised, then your customers will be dissatisfied. It’s justified when they submit a complaint about unsatisfactory products. Especially if your refund policy is too complex or time-consuming.

• Constructive Complaints

Every review is an opportunity to improve your business. Especially when you are starting up a new business it’s important to take customers’ feedback and figure out the areas where you need to work on.

While you face a legitimate review there is no need to be freaked out. These reviews help you improve your service better. But, respond to them tactically rather than denying your fault.

How Will You Spot the Fabricated Yelp Reviews?

Unlike other platforms, you will come across fake reviews on yelp too. Despite the fact that yelp’s algorithm hides the content that violates its guidelines, some of the reviews slip through the cracks.

A majority of consumers can’t find fake yelp reviews on their own. But, we’ll help you out here to sniff them.

Let’s take a look at the examples of fake reviews,

• Review from Unsatisfied Employees

Sometimes, grudges may play out in the form of reviews from former employees who were fired by you once a time. They will try every means to slander your brand to take revenge and an online complaint is the easiest way to do so.

• Reviews from Personal Enemies

Not everyone likes you, right?

Sometimes these personal grudges are expressed on online reviews sites to make you look like the bad guy in front of all. These reviews are undoubtedly fake and if it falls under yelp T.O.S violation you can easily remote it too.

Don’t Let the Poor Reviews Define Your Faith!!!.

Discuss Your ORM Projects With Us today and Improve Your Presence.

• Reviews from Your Competitors

If your business is flourishing you’re inviting enemies to your door. These competitors may set up a network to submit poor reviews on yelp. But don’t worry yelp filters will take it down once it identifies that the review is fake.

How to Remove Negative Yelp Reviews? The Easiest Manner!

People often ponder upon this doubt whether or not they’ll ever be able to remove negative yelp reviews.

The answer is yes for some people and no for others. Now that seems even more confusing, right?

Well, the fact is you can’t always remove bad yelp reviews.

These sites like Yelp, Google, Yellow Pages, Facebook hold the legal right to display user-generated content or UGC without being liable.

So, they can’t be forced to remove content unless you know the tricks to convince them.

Don’t worry, we won’t hide the secrets from you. You too can remove yelp reviews following these simple steps.

Let’s have a look,

• Request the Customer to Remove the Negative Review

One of the easiest go-to-steps in the process of removing a yelp review.

You can request the yelper to remove the negative reviews that he has posted.

Note: Make sure you don’t contact them directly on the yelp platform.

It’s best to find the details of the reviewer and contact them offline or at least of the review site.

You can take the help of the find reviewer tool to find out a yelper’s contact information.

Once you talk to them be it in person or over social media platforms, make sure you are polite while talking.

You’ve probably heard the word “kill me with kindness!!!” and it works most of the time.

Now follow the steps while requesting your customer to remove yelp reviews,

• Empathy Always Wins

If a customer is genuinely facing an issue and complaining about it, then it’s important for you to provide them a solution.

Show them how much you respect and how much you care for them. Your customers should feel the warmth while they are talking with you. They should feel that they are being respected and well treated.

• Clear Up the Misunderstandings

Sometimes you may come across a misunderstanding with your customers. For example, a product may not look like the one in the advertisement. Or your cashier might have overcharged for a product.

This may lead your angry customers to post poor comments on your service.

So, clear up the misunderstanding as soon as possible and ask them at least to modify the reviews.

• Offer A Free Meal

Well, if you’ve genuinely failed to serve up to the customer’s expectation, they deserve payback. Isn’t it?

Would you not enjoy a free meal once you find that you were not served up to the expectation?

So, you can make their mind up to remove yelp reviews by offering them a free meal at your café or sometimes a money back to gain their trust.

The Example of a Request Removal Letter to Your Customer

You may ponder over what to write when you’re drafting the mails to remove yelp reviews. So, here we’ve shown you an example,

“Hey ‘the name of the yelper’, we understand that you had to face such a horrible experience at our ‘place name’. Our team wish to let you know that we feel sorry hence we have taken proper steps to make sure the scenario doesn’t occur again.

We are offering you a free “gift name” at our “place name” as an apology gift from our end. We will ensure that every time you visit us, you won’t return being disappointed.

If that seems satisfactory, we would like it if you remove your complaint on yelp.

Please Note: The following instructions while you consider removing reviews from Yelp.

How do you Remove a Bad Review on Yelp: If You are Using a Desktop

• Log in to your Yelp account and head over to the reviews section.
• Click the “trash can icon” below each review you’ve posted.
• Confirm the same.

If You Are Using an iPhone

• Log into your yelp account and click on the “me” section.
•  Head over reviews.
• Tap the reviews which you want to remove.
• Confirm the same.

If you are using an Android

• Log into your yelp account and click on the “me” section.
• Head over reviews.
• Tap the reviews which you want to remove.
• Click on the overflow menu.
• Confirm “remove review”.

We would be pleased if you take a moment to remove the unsatisfactory reviews.

This is how you should draft a removal request mail to the unsatisfactory customers. It’s one of the easiest ways, and oftentimes the process has worked for several people.

But make sure you use a soft tone of voice while speaking to them.

• Report Yelp Reviews that Fall Under TOS Violation

Yelp algorithm is programmed in a way that catches any review which violates Yelp’s terms of services. Take a look at the review examples that fall under the TOS violation category designed by Yelp,

• Personal Attack or harassment.
• Violent threats.
• Defamatory.
• Derogatory.
• Attacks on race, religion, ethnicity, or any kind.
•  Promotional material.
• Leaking of acute private information.

So, you can draft a letter directly to yelp’s official mail address stating the terms of violation with added proof.

For example, If the review looks like this,

Then you can remove yelp reviews for TOS violations. All you have to do is mail them directly with enough proof that the review violates yelp’s terms of conditions.

Note: Make sure you reply to the yelper too, informing him about your removal request as it falls under TOS violation.

• Show Prove Against a Fabricated Review

Every review site provides you the option “helpful” and “not helpful” below or side by side.

If you think any review has been fabricated against you then make sure you show them the proof and convince other people to click on the “not helpful” button.

Note: If everyone marks are unhelpful at the same time, the yelp algorithm will detect it as spam and ignore your message.

You can put genuine proof to show people that the review is fabricated. Also, you can draft a response like this,

“Our service doesn’t believe in unethical practices. You can visit our website and contact us for further details about any issue you face. We will be happy to help you”.

• Take Legal Action

This should be your last avenue as it’s an expensive and tedious one.

But, yes, of course, you can take legal action against a reviewer for whom your business is getting affected.

The first step is to draft a cease and desist letter stating the reviewer that if they don’t take down the review, they will have to bear legal punishment for the same.

Then find an attorney to get advice from.

Note: Make sure you have gathered enough proof to show that the reviewer is faking and planning against your business.

What if Your Yelp Review Disappears?

Sometimes reviews can go missing from the Yelp business page. This might leave you scratching your hair if it was a positive review, right?

So, why does it happen? Why would a review disappear for no reason?

Well, nothing really happens without any accurate reason. And disappearing yelp reviews has its own reason too.

The reason can be as followed,

1. Fake Review: It’s the most obvious reason as the yelp algorithm deletes a review if it finds its fake.
2. Deleted by Author: If the author deletes a review you won’t be able to see it again unless you convince them to review back with the same lines.
3. TOS Violation: Yelp removes reviews that violate its T.O.S guidelines.

So, the best way is to spread awareness to your customers as to how they should submit positive reviews to prevent yelp from removing them.

According to Yelp “They offer a rich narrative, a wealth of detail, and a helpful tip or two for other consumers”

Grow Your Reputation: How to Improve Your Yelp Rating?

The online reputation has very much become an unavoidable part while you run a business.  Every marketer knows how review impacts one’s reputation.

Hence, the review plays a big role in it. Whether you manage a small restaurant or a computer software organization, your consumers look for you through online platforms.

Reviews on top sites like Yelp is a boon for your consumer as it provides them a perception of the business.

So, you should improve your yelp rating to drive customers to your site.

But, wait!! How will you do that?

Well, it’s quite simple. Follow the steps mentioned here if you want to improve your yelp rating.

• Claim Your Business Listing

Claiming business listings on Yelp helps you to take more control over the comments.

This business directory site lists all the local listings on their page to help a user find out relevant information.

While you are on the list, you should claim it immediately. It will cost you some buck for sure but it is worth every penny you invest. You know why?

It allows you to respond directly to a review or even take any proprietary action against the reviewer if the review is fabricated.

• Get the Yelp Verified License Badge

The best way to prevent a wall of negative reviews on your Yelp business page is to have a yelp verified license badge.

In 2019 yelp announced that they will provide a business with YVL once their moderator checks the business’s trade license and confirms its good standing.

When you get a verified license it shows other users perceive you as a credible service provider.

So, people are more likely to avail of services from you when you have a YVL badge on your business.

The badge looks like this,

• Improve Your Service

No matter how many reviews you manage to remove from yelp, if you don’t consider improving your service, then all your efforts will be worthless.

Even if your customers consider to revisit you and they find the same issues, your reputation will be irreparable.

So, focus on improving your services while analyzing all the ways to remove yelp reviews from this guide.

Conclusion

It’s important to remove negative yelp reviews in order to shield your online reputation. Unlike Yelp, popular sites like Google, Facebook, also hold equivalent significance as a review submitting platform.

However, it’s advisable to take an expert’s help in order to remove such reviews efficiently and take legal actions.

If this guide helped you to remove bad yelp reviews, you can drop us your thoughts.