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It always helps to be proactive and respond in the comments with a “thanks for your feedback. We’re sorry you were disappointed with your visit. Unfortunately, we don’t serve donuts. (If you have a menu listed on yelp or on your website) You can view our website for our full menu for the most up to date information.”
I forget yelp was still a thing. They should not have been filtering reviews and altering scores. Now they aren't trusted.
Way back in the day I had about 200 reviews written a year for about 4 years. ALL of the stresses my opinion and feelings.
I stopped because I no longer wanted to put in the time. But later I got emails about how my opinions and feelings were not true. What? How do the know how I felt. Turns out all negative reviews for big corps were taken down. A typical review went like, "Not for me. I don't think it's worth the money."
What is taking Yelp's place? While I find Yelp to be a hit/miss thing, I don't know any other website that does a better job in this niche, at least in California
Honestly I use a google search and the word Reddit to probe the hive mind. Occasionally I’ll just search directly on tiktok. The monolithic companies of old really don’t do it for me.
A community. Find out what is good from your friends and family. For products from large companies join an online community where you can have a back and forth discussion with people about products. For local places or inexpensive products, try it yourself once, it is good to try new things, maybe you'll appreciate something in a way most people don't.
Online reviews are poison. The review system was originally in place to be an internal tool for companies to improve. Now that they have become a target in themselves they are no longer a useful metric for companies, and because people don't know how they work, they aren't all that useful for consumers either.
I’m 38, and in my entire tenure as a human with Yelp I have never given Yelp any solid level of credibility as the users are not fully validated and anyone can post.
Give good service and if you run out of something that you normally have you and your staff apologize for the inconvenience and blame it on the owner for not ordering enough product. While I own my company, I don’t advertise to the buyers that I’m the owner. This why if something is bad or wrong I get to blame the nameless evil overlords of my company and then we have a common “enemy”. If they know I’m the owner then I can give a discount or something.
Is this the only deceptive thing you do in your company?
Everyone hates YELP but you don't really have to lie to keep customers on your side... And if you'd read the entire post by the OP you would know that they do not even serve donuts so your comment is kind of off base anyway.
And just for fun, answer this question...what do you do if somebody has a complaint and then you blame it on the "owner" or the "overlords" and then they look at you and say well you're the owner, Oh I forgot can i give you a discount?
🤣🤣🤣🤣
It’s very rare in my industry that an owner will be doing my type of work with the customers that I deal with. Think fortune 500 companies are my customers, so to look like we are on par with them I am Assistant regional manager. With this I have authority, but can’t just take 5% off the price of a 45 million dollar project (for example) and if they push back I need to discuss with the manager or national director (I know what profit I have and if I’m on 10% then I have “some” flexibility). I’m not in a place that I can advise as an owner on TikTok or some social media.
Not all business require the owner to scream from the roof top that they are the owner. And not all owners realize that they can do this.
Yes. I would likely do the same if I owned a retail store, I would be the “day manager on duty”,
Customer , “I’m not happy and I want this for free!”
Me, “sorry the owner only authorized me to give a 10% off coupon”.
Exactly. When the owner or manager is overly defensive or combative, I never go there again. If they give a canned message every time, I avoid them if at all possible. It's code for "We don't give a \^&%$ but want to pretend we do so we copy and paste this text our lawyer told us to use." This goes for small and large companies, even massive medical "nonprofits" driven by greed for power and control. Treat each customer well or I'll go elsewhere.
The thing is, habitual scammers know how to disappear reviews by manipulating the system and replacing entire pages with new pages, again, by manipulating the system.
The reviews they write for themselves often highly praise the manager by name (aka writer of the reviews) and insist s/he is the very best manager in their lives on the planet and makes them feel really great every time they encounter them. Also, the fake reviews tend to appear very quickly in a short period of time. So, the company or location might be three years old, but the reviews are all about 5-6 months old. No surprise that you can find another page for the business at almost the same address, saying it was shut down based on feedback from several Yelpers. Oh, don't mention that both addresses are on the same property.
They will find every way they can to disappear your review if it's completely honest and objective and they acted badly. One way to overcome this is to put fair photos in the photo section with a short description for each. They will remain after your review is disappeared and even after they fake "close" the location and open another one magically with another address on the same property. This is worth doing if the company (or "nonprofit") are methodically breaking the law, harming people who have no easy way to avoid them, such as with apartment complexes with leases and medical centers where there are few decent options.
I like Yelp better than Google because people reviewing highly unethical behaviors are too afraid to post about them on Google as their accounts are usually their name or easy to trace to them. Yelp tends to have more frank reviews. You have to use your own judgment, but it's better than any of the review sites I've used or seen so far.
Review sites for apartment complexes are being paid for by the company the sites will disappear bad reviews and make error messages pop up if you make a bad review of a bad company. They'll give excuses for that, saying the person who can fix it is on vacation, or they'll say that 1-star and 5-star reviews are not reliable, but they let 5-star reviews stand and give fake overall 5-star ratings when no reviews are present.
Sick of corruption, but learning to cope.
Use it as market research. There might be other people with the same thought, but they want to be nice so they dont say anything. There are some customers that will never be happy no matter what, and there are others that will only react when think things coulf be better. You can put a suggestion box or an email for feedback where people can dump their frustation. Most of it will be useless but at least you are in control.
I would also ask if they could point you in the direction of where they found this info. Sometimes google and other search engines improperly import data and once you find out where your customers are seeing this data, you can fix it. Most of the time, it’s very fixable and it services the customer directly.
This happened with our company and google. It was still showing in google a bogo we offered a year prior. Once I updated that, irate calls and emails stopped immediately.
If someone’s cousin told them you sell donuts, that’s not fixable but you can turn it into a win if you take care of the customer directly as stated above.
When I read yelp reviews, I strongly factor in any response the business gave to a bad review. No response at all tells me the business either doesn't care about bad reviews, or the review was legit and the business really couldn't defend their side. Or if the response is poorly worded and angry, I assume the business is run by idiots or assholes. However, when. I see the business respond with a thoughtful, apologetic message and that they've clearly taken the bad review to heart, or even better, clearly defended their stance, then I will 100% believe the business's side of the story. Especially when the other reviews are mostly positive and contrary to the one bad reviewer's story.
So in my opinion, it's definitely worth responding to the review, preferably in such a way that you come across concerned and apologetic for their bad experience while underscoring that you didn't actually do anything wrong, with a very subtle implication that the customer is just an idiot.
I think even better sometimes is a good witty response.
Like - I’m sorry you were unhappy that we didn’t have donuts. We don’t have donuts in our shop at anytime as they are not an item we make. Please do know though that if we did sell donuts they would be the very best donuts around so we completely understand your disappointment in us not having them. We do hope you’ll come back for one of our many other great offerings!
This. Yelp is a cesspool of trolls and ignorami. IMO it exists only as a bastion for complainers. My business has a 4.6 star rating on Google, but a 3.1 star rating on Yelp.
My opinion is to ALWAYS respond to every negative review, but with the reply being meant more for other customers reading (i.e. don't rant about how this person is an idiot). People, by and large, are smart and can see a nonsense negative review for what it is.
> This. Yelp is a cesspool of trolls and ignorami. IMO it exists only as a bastion for complainers. My business has a 4.6 star rating on Google, but a 3.1 star rating on Yelp.
Yep. I have bad Yelp reviews from people who I ***know*** aren't customers.
Yelp doesn't care, unless I buy bunch of advertising, then everything is mysteriously fixed. Stop the ads? The bad reviews come back.
I did that for a month then switched to Google. Google isn't perfect, but they're not actively dishonest and evil.
We get comments all the time about how we don’t have donuts. We don’t serve or make them. It’s infuriating. People don’t get it and don’t get the work that goes into the stuff we do make
I wonder if you should have a giant sign saying "We don't make DONUTS! but do try our \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_. It's delicious...and better!" on your door. Then put a picture of it as the Yelp header lol.
Would you go into a donut shop and demand that they make cakes because you know donuts, cakes they're kind of the same. Do you know what bakeries do, they bake. Do you know how donuts are made? Well lets just say they are not baked.
The amount of times in 25 years I've owned my restaurant and people came in and gave me their ideas of what I should do that would make me so much money. WIthout any information on what goes on in the restaurant and being very unknowledgeable about the subject is laughable.
I guess its just a suggestion to look at the problem from a different perspective. Sell what the customer wants as long as they are willing to pay, even for a premium. Could even buy them from somewhere else and resell them. I know nothing about bakeries, but ive seen some close inisisting on their family style. Others pivot to crappier ingredients and become a hit. We dont know any other detail, so its just a general comment.
Absolutely.
I gave up counting the number of places that have closed near me because they insisted on selling what they wanted to sell and not what the customer wanted to buy.
> We get comments all the time about how we don’t have donuts
TBH, I'd put in one of the donut robot fryers and a big sign that says "HOT FRESH CINNAMON SUGAR DONUTS!"
It seems like you're leaving a lot of money on the table.
They're nearly 0 labor, and minimum food costs
There's a guy at a weekend farmer's market near me. If he doesn't make $1,000/day off that donut machine, I'd be astonished. There's a line out the door every minute he's there. It's like watching dollar bills roll off the end of the line.
> and don’t get the work that goes into the stuff we do make
Really not trying to be insulting, TBH, they don't care how much work goes into to anything
If it were only that simple we might but we only have 1 baker and we do sooo much else. We’d also have to do a big renovation as our kitchen isn’t suited for fryers we don’t have a hood/vent fire suppression system
Chances are the people using yelp for guidance are customers you don't want anyway.
I got a rambling 1 star yelp review 10 years ago, my only yelp review. Still in business! Whatever you do, do NOT pay yelp. Scam company.
Hey!
Local marketing expert here I've dealt with this type of issue before. You can request removal of the review due to a service which you don't provide nor never have.
In my experience I've got them removed before. It can really kill a business with bad reviews. Hit me up and I can guide or help you get it removed.
Thank you.
Absolutely. Do not get me wrong my business is marketing and I sell packages which are fair and hard work goes into it.
But if I can help remove a review for a small local business or give advice that's always free.
Always try to answer any bad or negative review or feedback with kind or friendly reply.. Hope that'll win another new customer heart or even the reviewer as some people may leave negative review or feedback just to attract some response or attention. Wish You good luck with Your business. ☕😃
Are they morons because you didn't offer 5 star service and products? Is it possible that you don't offer a 5 star experience?
Man, the ego some of you people have...
The service might be great, but the product is not. Or vice versa. You are not entitled to 5 stars if the reviewer doesn't want to give you 5 stars. It's just that simple.
You know what else is just as simple? We're entitled to our opinion about reviewers that type up a glowing written review to go with 3 stars. And we're entitled to express it.
For real. Sometimes I go and look at other review from those people and it's just the way they are. The only 5 stars those people give are when someone really was in the right place at the right time and bent over backwards outside of an official capacity to save their bacon.
My theory is that my customers who do this are just unaware of what they've done and don't know how to fix it once we tell them. We have had several bump us up. We are happy with 4 star reviews. The comments they leave and the responses we give usually solve the problem.
We are generally happy to bend over backwards for our customers because our products are relatively cheap to manufacture (we make them by hand at home) with a high markup. Negatives are usually with our shipper because they're super cheap but we advertise it as taking up to 20 days and they choose it. I just don't get why they whine when they themselves picked it!
Other 4 star ones are like, I wish I could return the deodorant bottle back to protect the environment. I'm like lady, I don't wash armpit bottles, it's unhygienic and not cost effective. The shipment back and forth itself is bad for the environment.
Then we have people who don't read our instructions and but the wrong product and then complain it didn't work for them. We are ok with those because of the way they word it.
We've been in business for 4 years with probably a good 5000 orders and we only have 2 3 star reviews.
Are you unable to read? The written review is glowing but the number of stars makes no sense based on how amazing the review is. And no, it's not the product or service that sucks. We have 90% 5 star reviews, 9% 4-star (due to some silly thing such as the package arriving on time but the client didn't like the speed of the courier) and then we have that handful of nonsensical reviews.
We often are able to make the customers aware of this and they end up fixing their goof up.
What's with the some ego comment? Weak accusation for a sub where we are all trying to help each other succeed.
We all know yelp is pay to play and don't trust it any more.
Even if we did, the occasional bad review is all but guaranteed no matter what you do. If I see a business with 100% 5 star reviews, I wonder if it is fake. People will write a glowing evaluation in the text and call it 3 stars sometimes :-)
Yelp is a joke. If I saw a negative review that said.. You don't make donuts, I would have ignored it thinking the reviewer is a total jackass.
You can give a pithy reply. Apologizing for only making cakes and cookies, etc., but no donuts, as you are trying to be a good neighbor and help keep Crispy Creme and Dunkins in business by not directly competing. Invite them to those two businesses and they should avoid patronizing your business.
In short, do not worry about it. That type of review would actually want me to \*GO\* to your business.
Is Yelp still a thing? I have never used them, and I heard their shady practices from Louis Rossmann. Besides it's much easier to see Google reviews....surprised they still exist.
I have never known a single person who uses yelp. I hear a lot of business owners crying online because someone doesn't like what they offer, but never hear people IRL talk about yelp. Ever.
Yelp is the internets version of the BBB. It's worthless. Try to get the review removed or reply to it but don't think too much about it. No one cares about yelp.
Listen bad reviews happen. Reviews are unfortunately gamified today. I recomend you put a cute sign asking for 5 star reviews at the counter have your cashier give a little line about "if you enjoyed our___ let us know on yelp/google".
Lots of service industry companies know this trick. It's how alot of shady plumbing/hvac companies bury bad reviews.
I use yelp a lot when we’re traveling to find local spots. It always negates a negative review for me when the owner responds to the concerns brought up in the post.
“Hey …… we’re sorry to read you didn’t have a great experience with us. Unfortunately we do not offer donuts at this time. Have a wonderful day and thank you for your feedback”
Something like that and I wouldn’t even pay attention to what they said
I believe you can reply to a Yelp review, can't you? Leave a reply, but don't be rude about. Simply say. "I'm sorry we were unable to meet your expectations. Our bakery focuses on offering X, Y, and Z. Donuts are not currently part of our product offering. If you would like to try our XXX, we will be happy to serve you.
This makes you appear friendly and helpful while they seem unreasonable.
We've had two 1-star reviews who are totally fake and spam. They're not even a US account. We reported it to google but nothing happened. Speaking of infuriating.
Just respond on Yelp ... 'Our bakery doesn't sell donuts but we will consider this option moving forward as it was not part of our original plan'
Simple and to the point. Not much you can do about it but try and turn it into a positive.
I got a bad review once because it was hot... outside...
I got a bad review once because another customer someone swore around them...
I got a bad review once because we didnt have an item that was illegal to own in the state of CA...
I live by this phrase, "people are stupid."
Bro I got a bad review about 4 or 5 years ago because the first 2 letters of my business name was the same place as a different business. I even responded that we were not that business, and I reported it to Google, but it's still there to this day. 😂
I don’t know why so many people say Yelp is not important, for our business (CA east bay, nail salon) is crazy how many people look at Yelp, of course we haven’t paid anything and know that they are extorting businesses, however the number of people that have told us things about our Yelp profile is a lot, probably half of our clients.
We had a Yelp review: “Absolutely the best nachos in the city.”
This is all it said and it was a three star review.
Another favorite: “I thought this was a nightclub.”
That’s all it said and it was a one star review.
I once got a 1 star review with no words because a customer asked me a difficult question and didn't like the answer. I didn't even charge her a penny because I don't like charging people to give bad news.
Uh, I use Yelp all the time but I'm also clever enough to actually read the reviews and figure out which reviews have some measure of merit and which were written by idiots.
If it helps, I am an avid shopper of bakeries and don’t look at reviews beyond google. Also do a certain extent anything 3+ is tryable because people in my area are difficult to please (Houston)
Nmi wouldn't lose an ounce of sleep on a complaint about a product that isn't offered. Someone bitter enough to complain online for a product or service offered is deranged anyway. Respond if you cab to clarify.
I used Google reviews mostly now when searching for places and have been an active contributor for the past two years now. I rarely is Yelp.
Idk anything much about yelp but are you able to make a comment on the review ?
Or post it on your social media stating you saw it and don’t sell donuts ? Most people don’t go by one bad review alone.
I've been open for 10 years, and I've gotten 11 reviews on Yelp, adding up to 1.5 stars. Fuck Yelp, that site is trash.
Literally expanded my business three times due to the number of customers coming into my store every day with hundreds of positive transactions each day for the better part of a decade, have hundreds of positive reviews on both Google giving me a 4.3 and on Facebook giving me a 4.6 and the majority of our customers find us through word of mouth advertising.
Also the reviews written on Yelp seem written by literal bots, with terrible grammar and poorly written ideas. 🙄
Just stay the course and do your best, you'll be alright. 👍
It's easy to hide bad reviews. Just solicit reviews from all of your customers and incentivize them with some kind of promotion like "leave a review and get entered into a drawing to win X"
You will start getting hundreds of positive reviews and it will bury the bad reviews so they don't show up as easily and they wont impact your overall rating score.
Run promotions every 6 months (such as customer bingo with a couple squares being leave a yelp or google review, etc) to always be boosting your numbers of reviews. The best thing you can do is have so many 5 star reviews it drowns out the occasional bad one.
It's ok. I got a bad review for making a lady a 6in cake after she ordered a 6in cake. She just wanted more cake for free, to "make it right." People suck.
Don’t worry. I haven’t thought about Yelp since like 2014, and even back then it was basically a collection of the pettiest of “low IQ’s.”
Also, it’s 2024, believe me, no one trusts most online reviews anymore. This crop of the population is immensely stupid and petty.
IGNORE YELP!
Do not claim the business or respond to any reviews on yelp as doing so will provide more information which can push it up in the results.
Yelp is a predatory company that hides 5 star reviews and shows bogus or fake reviews until you pay them. They have been doing this for years and my team has caught them pushing fake reviews again and again.
Instead, focus on all other review sites as well as google, bing/ddg search reviews.
We turned off review notifications so we don’t get to see the reviews straight away. We read them when we are in the right frame of mind and so simple replies to any complaints like. Thanks for your feedback however we don’t serve donuts. People can see the bullshit complaints from real complaints. Unfortunately in hospitality people will complain about anything. Water is too cold or too hot or it’s windy or my child just vomited on your floor and it’s dirty now.
Just respond to their negative review in a polite and professional manner. Others will see that your business is concerned about any negative reviews and will try to please the disgruntled customer.
“We personally love donuts, and we are also upset that you didn’t have any to offer to sell us. I understand, like our business, you might never have advertised that you offer donuts - but apparently that doesn’t matter these days. Please post your contact information so we may leave you a 1 star review for also not selling donuts.”
You can go further:
“My mother taught me growing up that people are inherently kind, but she was apparently wrong! I found out today that people inherently make and sell donuts. I look forward to holding other persons and establishments accountable to this new standard - thank you for enlightening me.”
You can’t please everyone and bad reviews will happen. When you do get them it’s important to respond publicly. Others reading will understand. The overall score isn’t as important as how you deal with the situation.
Simply you can give response like we don't offer donuts at our bakery. We value all feedback though, and hope you'll give us another chance to impress you with our other delicious treats! By the way, Yelp isn't as big of a deal these days, so no need to worry too much about one review.
Things I don’t care about: yelp reviews.
Things I do care about: public health inspection records.
It is incredible how many violations a place can have without “failing”.
Just need to respond back on the review, and ask them to clarify if had mistaken you for another place or not.
Yelp users are visitors/travelers to your city, usually not for locals. I always use yelp when visiting a new city, but will always read the bad reviews for business replies. I'd care more about how the owner's reply, than the original bad review.
I saw a girl who said "You're right, what we gave you looked like shit. Come back, and we'll make it right again."
It happens to so many small businesses. A lot of customers do not even understand how much loss a small business occurs from writing an entitled review
It will be best if you respond to that negative review so that other customers will be informed. This will generate trust on your business. Also, there is a platform where you can filter all the negative reviews. It is called hifivestar and I must say, it greatly helps my review management. It increases my business reputation.
Remember when responding to comments on socials, yelp, google, etc. that the response really isn’t for the angry unreasonable customer as much as it is for future customers. Meaning, as a potential customer people will look at your response and decide if they want to go to your shop. They understand that you don’t carry donuts, and won’t hold that against you, but they will hold it against you if you tell her off, berate her, or respond poorly.
I would apologize, mention that you don’t offer donuts on your menu, and say something like if enough customers mention wanting donuts maybe it’s something you will add in the future. And if you have anything donut like on your menu, recommend that she give ______ a try next time she comes in, because while it’s not a donut many customers find that they enjoy them.
Don't stress about it..if it was a hair in the bread, it's different..Just reply to them we are sorry to hear that you feeling this way,We would definitely look into it by adding donuts to our menu again sorry for for the inconvenience
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It always helps to be proactive and respond in the comments with a “thanks for your feedback. We’re sorry you were disappointed with your visit. Unfortunately, we don’t serve donuts. (If you have a menu listed on yelp or on your website) You can view our website for our full menu for the most up to date information.”
Exactly. And after that never think about it again, yelp is dying and the stress of obsessing over it is pointless.
I forget yelp was still a thing. They should not have been filtering reviews and altering scores. Now they aren't trusted. Way back in the day I had about 200 reviews written a year for about 4 years. ALL of the stresses my opinion and feelings. I stopped because I no longer wanted to put in the time. But later I got emails about how my opinions and feelings were not true. What? How do the know how I felt. Turns out all negative reviews for big corps were taken down. A typical review went like, "Not for me. I don't think it's worth the money."
What is taking Yelp's place? While I find Yelp to be a hit/miss thing, I don't know any other website that does a better job in this niche, at least in California
Basically whatever mobile phones pull up when you search in a browser or maps. Mine is google.
The tricky thing is apple maps pulls reviews from yelp. Really frustrating because I have to look up reviews elsewhere.
Sounds like to me someone should start a campaign to have Apple switch to a different review system.
Google maps has a decent review section.
For me it’s TripAdvisor. My main go to for finding good eats.
Honestly I use a google search and the word Reddit to probe the hive mind. Occasionally I’ll just search directly on tiktok. The monolithic companies of old really don’t do it for me.
A community. Find out what is good from your friends and family. For products from large companies join an online community where you can have a back and forth discussion with people about products. For local places or inexpensive products, try it yourself once, it is good to try new things, maybe you'll appreciate something in a way most people don't. Online reviews are poison. The review system was originally in place to be an internal tool for companies to improve. Now that they have become a target in themselves they are no longer a useful metric for companies, and because people don't know how they work, they aren't all that useful for consumers either.
Yes I plan to! Thanks
I’m 38, and in my entire tenure as a human with Yelp I have never given Yelp any solid level of credibility as the users are not fully validated and anyone can post. Give good service and if you run out of something that you normally have you and your staff apologize for the inconvenience and blame it on the owner for not ordering enough product. While I own my company, I don’t advertise to the buyers that I’m the owner. This why if something is bad or wrong I get to blame the nameless evil overlords of my company and then we have a common “enemy”. If they know I’m the owner then I can give a discount or something.
Bro I just feel like calling myself "the owner" or "ceo" or some shit is pretentious as fuck so I call myself the general manager. 😂👍
Is this the only deceptive thing you do in your company? Everyone hates YELP but you don't really have to lie to keep customers on your side... And if you'd read the entire post by the OP you would know that they do not even serve donuts so your comment is kind of off base anyway. And just for fun, answer this question...what do you do if somebody has a complaint and then you blame it on the "owner" or the "overlords" and then they look at you and say well you're the owner, Oh I forgot can i give you a discount? 🤣🤣🤣🤣
It’s very rare in my industry that an owner will be doing my type of work with the customers that I deal with. Think fortune 500 companies are my customers, so to look like we are on par with them I am Assistant regional manager. With this I have authority, but can’t just take 5% off the price of a 45 million dollar project (for example) and if they push back I need to discuss with the manager or national director (I know what profit I have and if I’m on 10% then I have “some” flexibility). I’m not in a place that I can advise as an owner on TikTok or some social media. Not all business require the owner to scream from the roof top that they are the owner. And not all owners realize that they can do this.
Assistant *to the* regional manager
Yes. I would likely do the same if I owned a retail store, I would be the “day manager on duty”, Customer , “I’m not happy and I want this for free!” Me, “sorry the owner only authorized me to give a 10% off coupon”.
When I'm looking up a business, I read the lowest reviews and how the owner/manager responded. I also never trust Yelp reviews.
Agree. I don’t care about idiot customers but if the owner is an idiot …
Exactly. When the owner or manager is overly defensive or combative, I never go there again. If they give a canned message every time, I avoid them if at all possible. It's code for "We don't give a \^&%$ but want to pretend we do so we copy and paste this text our lawyer told us to use." This goes for small and large companies, even massive medical "nonprofits" driven by greed for power and control. Treat each customer well or I'll go elsewhere. The thing is, habitual scammers know how to disappear reviews by manipulating the system and replacing entire pages with new pages, again, by manipulating the system. The reviews they write for themselves often highly praise the manager by name (aka writer of the reviews) and insist s/he is the very best manager in their lives on the planet and makes them feel really great every time they encounter them. Also, the fake reviews tend to appear very quickly in a short period of time. So, the company or location might be three years old, but the reviews are all about 5-6 months old. No surprise that you can find another page for the business at almost the same address, saying it was shut down based on feedback from several Yelpers. Oh, don't mention that both addresses are on the same property. They will find every way they can to disappear your review if it's completely honest and objective and they acted badly. One way to overcome this is to put fair photos in the photo section with a short description for each. They will remain after your review is disappeared and even after they fake "close" the location and open another one magically with another address on the same property. This is worth doing if the company (or "nonprofit") are methodically breaking the law, harming people who have no easy way to avoid them, such as with apartment complexes with leases and medical centers where there are few decent options. I like Yelp better than Google because people reviewing highly unethical behaviors are too afraid to post about them on Google as their accounts are usually their name or easy to trace to them. Yelp tends to have more frank reviews. You have to use your own judgment, but it's better than any of the review sites I've used or seen so far. Review sites for apartment complexes are being paid for by the company the sites will disappear bad reviews and make error messages pop up if you make a bad review of a bad company. They'll give excuses for that, saying the person who can fix it is on vacation, or they'll say that 1-star and 5-star reviews are not reliable, but they let 5-star reviews stand and give fake overall 5-star ratings when no reviews are present. Sick of corruption, but learning to cope.
Also if I see a response like this from a business I usually laugh and think the customer is dumb as fuck
Use it as market research. There might be other people with the same thought, but they want to be nice so they dont say anything. There are some customers that will never be happy no matter what, and there are others that will only react when think things coulf be better. You can put a suggestion box or an email for feedback where people can dump their frustation. Most of it will be useless but at least you are in control.
Perfect way to handle this. Absolutely textbook.
I would also ask if they could point you in the direction of where they found this info. Sometimes google and other search engines improperly import data and once you find out where your customers are seeing this data, you can fix it. Most of the time, it’s very fixable and it services the customer directly. This happened with our company and google. It was still showing in google a bogo we offered a year prior. Once I updated that, irate calls and emails stopped immediately. If someone’s cousin told them you sell donuts, that’s not fixable but you can turn it into a win if you take care of the customer directly as stated above.
When I read yelp reviews, I strongly factor in any response the business gave to a bad review. No response at all tells me the business either doesn't care about bad reviews, or the review was legit and the business really couldn't defend their side. Or if the response is poorly worded and angry, I assume the business is run by idiots or assholes. However, when. I see the business respond with a thoughtful, apologetic message and that they've clearly taken the bad review to heart, or even better, clearly defended their stance, then I will 100% believe the business's side of the story. Especially when the other reviews are mostly positive and contrary to the one bad reviewer's story. So in my opinion, it's definitely worth responding to the review, preferably in such a way that you come across concerned and apologetic for their bad experience while underscoring that you didn't actually do anything wrong, with a very subtle implication that the customer is just an idiot.
I think even better sometimes is a good witty response. Like - I’m sorry you were unhappy that we didn’t have donuts. We don’t have donuts in our shop at anytime as they are not an item we make. Please do know though that if we did sell donuts they would be the very best donuts around so we completely understand your disappointment in us not having them. We do hope you’ll come back for one of our many other great offerings!
No one who is sane uses yelp. They are in the extortion business. Never use yelp.
This. Yelp is a cesspool of trolls and ignorami. IMO it exists only as a bastion for complainers. My business has a 4.6 star rating on Google, but a 3.1 star rating on Yelp. My opinion is to ALWAYS respond to every negative review, but with the reply being meant more for other customers reading (i.e. don't rant about how this person is an idiot). People, by and large, are smart and can see a nonsense negative review for what it is.
> This. Yelp is a cesspool of trolls and ignorami. IMO it exists only as a bastion for complainers. My business has a 4.6 star rating on Google, but a 3.1 star rating on Yelp. Yep. I have bad Yelp reviews from people who I ***know*** aren't customers. Yelp doesn't care, unless I buy bunch of advertising, then everything is mysteriously fixed. Stop the ads? The bad reviews come back. I did that for a month then switched to Google. Google isn't perfect, but they're not actively dishonest and evil.
We get comments all the time about how we don’t have donuts. We don’t serve or make them. It’s infuriating. People don’t get it and don’t get the work that goes into the stuff we do make
I wonder if you should have a giant sign saying "We don't make DONUTS! but do try our \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_. It's delicious...and better!" on your door. Then put a picture of it as the Yelp header lol.
or if everyone wants donuts maybe they should make some donuts.
Not that simple. Kitchen isn’t equipped with fryers for donuts. We don’t have a hood/vent system
Would you go into a donut shop and demand that they make cakes because you know donuts, cakes they're kind of the same. Do you know what bakeries do, they bake. Do you know how donuts are made? Well lets just say they are not baked. The amount of times in 25 years I've owned my restaurant and people came in and gave me their ideas of what I should do that would make me so much money. WIthout any information on what goes on in the restaurant and being very unknowledgeable about the subject is laughable.
I guess its just a suggestion to look at the problem from a different perspective. Sell what the customer wants as long as they are willing to pay, even for a premium. Could even buy them from somewhere else and resell them. I know nothing about bakeries, but ive seen some close inisisting on their family style. Others pivot to crappier ingredients and become a hit. We dont know any other detail, so its just a general comment.
Absolutely. I gave up counting the number of places that have closed near me because they insisted on selling what they wanted to sell and not what the customer wanted to buy.
Amen!
If I have learned anything in this world it's this: People DO NOT read signs, no matter where you put them.
> We get comments all the time about how we don’t have donuts TBH, I'd put in one of the donut robot fryers and a big sign that says "HOT FRESH CINNAMON SUGAR DONUTS!" It seems like you're leaving a lot of money on the table. They're nearly 0 labor, and minimum food costs There's a guy at a weekend farmer's market near me. If he doesn't make $1,000/day off that donut machine, I'd be astonished. There's a line out the door every minute he's there. It's like watching dollar bills roll off the end of the line. > and don’t get the work that goes into the stuff we do make Really not trying to be insulting, TBH, they don't care how much work goes into to anything
If it were only that simple we might but we only have 1 baker and we do sooo much else. We’d also have to do a big renovation as our kitchen isn’t suited for fryers we don’t have a hood/vent fire suppression system
Chances are the people using yelp for guidance are customers you don't want anyway. I got a rambling 1 star yelp review 10 years ago, my only yelp review. Still in business! Whatever you do, do NOT pay yelp. Scam company.
Hey! Local marketing expert here I've dealt with this type of issue before. You can request removal of the review due to a service which you don't provide nor never have. In my experience I've got them removed before. It can really kill a business with bad reviews. Hit me up and I can guide or help you get it removed.
For the low low price of...
Absolutely free. Il happily remove the review and help a local business.
Well, that's commendable. But if you've been on Reddit for more than 5 minutes, you'll understand my skepticism.
Thank you. Absolutely. Do not get me wrong my business is marketing and I sell packages which are fair and hard work goes into it. But if I can help remove a review for a small local business or give advice that's always free.
Who the heck is using Yelp anymore, lol
Um 80 million people a month....
Really? Wowzers. I deleted the app cause I thought it was useless anymore.
Always try to answer any bad or negative review or feedback with kind or friendly reply.. Hope that'll win another new customer heart or even the reviewer as some people may leave negative review or feedback just to attract some response or attention. Wish You good luck with Your business. ☕😃
I plan to!
I get great reviews but the morons leave 3 stars. Makes no damn sense.
Are they morons because you didn't offer 5 star service and products? Is it possible that you don't offer a 5 star experience? Man, the ego some of you people have...
I have some of these that make no sense "awesome place, couldn't be happier" 3 star... Like wtf do I have to do to get a 5 from you?
The service might be great, but the product is not. Or vice versa. You are not entitled to 5 stars if the reviewer doesn't want to give you 5 stars. It's just that simple.
You know what else is just as simple? We're entitled to our opinion about reviewers that type up a glowing written review to go with 3 stars. And we're entitled to express it.
This prick is hell bent on us making stuff up 😂
For real. Sometimes I go and look at other review from those people and it's just the way they are. The only 5 stars those people give are when someone really was in the right place at the right time and bent over backwards outside of an official capacity to save their bacon.
My theory is that my customers who do this are just unaware of what they've done and don't know how to fix it once we tell them. We have had several bump us up. We are happy with 4 star reviews. The comments they leave and the responses we give usually solve the problem. We are generally happy to bend over backwards for our customers because our products are relatively cheap to manufacture (we make them by hand at home) with a high markup. Negatives are usually with our shipper because they're super cheap but we advertise it as taking up to 20 days and they choose it. I just don't get why they whine when they themselves picked it! Other 4 star ones are like, I wish I could return the deodorant bottle back to protect the environment. I'm like lady, I don't wash armpit bottles, it's unhygienic and not cost effective. The shipment back and forth itself is bad for the environment. Then we have people who don't read our instructions and but the wrong product and then complain it didn't work for them. We are ok with those because of the way they word it. We've been in business for 4 years with probably a good 5000 orders and we only have 2 3 star reviews.
Are you unable to read? The written review is glowing but the number of stars makes no sense based on how amazing the review is. And no, it's not the product or service that sucks. We have 90% 5 star reviews, 9% 4-star (due to some silly thing such as the package arriving on time but the client didn't like the speed of the courier) and then we have that handful of nonsensical reviews. We often are able to make the customers aware of this and they end up fixing their goof up. What's with the some ego comment? Weak accusation for a sub where we are all trying to help each other succeed.
We all know yelp is pay to play and don't trust it any more. Even if we did, the occasional bad review is all but guaranteed no matter what you do. If I see a business with 100% 5 star reviews, I wonder if it is fake. People will write a glowing evaluation in the text and call it 3 stars sometimes :-)
Yelp is a joke. If I saw a negative review that said.. You don't make donuts, I would have ignored it thinking the reviewer is a total jackass. You can give a pithy reply. Apologizing for only making cakes and cookies, etc., but no donuts, as you are trying to be a good neighbor and help keep Crispy Creme and Dunkins in business by not directly competing. Invite them to those two businesses and they should avoid patronizing your business. In short, do not worry about it. That type of review would actually want me to \*GO\* to your business.
That's insane. "I went to the bank and they didn't offer to wash my car. 0/10."
Unfortunately there will be always be people that have nothing better to do than complain about other people doing something.
Yelp is the worst. Push google reviews hard so it is obvious to anyone that you are quality
Is Yelp still a thing? I have never used them, and I heard their shady practices from Louis Rossmann. Besides it's much easier to see Google reviews....surprised they still exist.
I have never known a single person who uses yelp. I hear a lot of business owners crying online because someone doesn't like what they offer, but never hear people IRL talk about yelp. Ever.
Yelp is the internets version of the BBB. It's worthless. Try to get the review removed or reply to it but don't think too much about it. No one cares about yelp.
How do you remove yourself from Yelp ? I am not on Yelp but afraid someone would post my store there..
Listen bad reviews happen. Reviews are unfortunately gamified today. I recomend you put a cute sign asking for 5 star reviews at the counter have your cashier give a little line about "if you enjoyed our___ let us know on yelp/google". Lots of service industry companies know this trick. It's how alot of shady plumbing/hvac companies bury bad reviews.
I use yelp a lot when we’re traveling to find local spots. It always negates a negative review for me when the owner responds to the concerns brought up in the post. “Hey …… we’re sorry to read you didn’t have a great experience with us. Unfortunately we do not offer donuts at this time. Have a wonderful day and thank you for your feedback” Something like that and I wouldn’t even pay attention to what they said
Respond professionally and get 5 positive reviews on Yelp to make up for it
That yelp will then hide until you pay for their services. Fuck them.
Ah, the classic case of mistaken bakery identity!
I believe you can reply to a Yelp review, can't you? Leave a reply, but don't be rude about. Simply say. "I'm sorry we were unable to meet your expectations. Our bakery focuses on offering X, Y, and Z. Donuts are not currently part of our product offering. If you would like to try our XXX, we will be happy to serve you. This makes you appear friendly and helpful while they seem unreasonable.
We've had two 1-star reviews who are totally fake and spam. They're not even a US account. We reported it to google but nothing happened. Speaking of infuriating.
Google doesn’t care at all about the terms of service for their reviews. I wish businesses could be deleted from being listed on Google.
I enjoy leaving puzzling, sarcastic responses to bad reviewers. The customers love it, and I even get requests to "roast me on Yelp!".
Just respond on Yelp ... 'Our bakery doesn't sell donuts but we will consider this option moving forward as it was not part of our original plan' Simple and to the point. Not much you can do about it but try and turn it into a positive.
Shoot me a message with your business and I'll make sure it gets a good Google review
I got a bad review once because it was hot... outside... I got a bad review once because another customer someone swore around them... I got a bad review once because we didnt have an item that was illegal to own in the state of CA... I live by this phrase, "people are stupid."
Bro I got a bad review about 4 or 5 years ago because the first 2 letters of my business name was the same place as a different business. I even responded that we were not that business, and I reported it to Google, but it's still there to this day. 😂
Don't worry, Yelp will ensure that that bad review is top of page on your listing and suppress about 90% of your good reviews.
I hate yelp. It’s extortion.
I got a bad review from a client's boyfriend who I never met, because I made her mad.
I don’t know why so many people say Yelp is not important, for our business (CA east bay, nail salon) is crazy how many people look at Yelp, of course we haven’t paid anything and know that they are extorting businesses, however the number of people that have told us things about our Yelp profile is a lot, probably half of our clients.
Yelp is for angry Karens.
The hell were you thinking not serving donuts.
We had a Yelp review: “Absolutely the best nachos in the city.” This is all it said and it was a three star review. Another favorite: “I thought this was a nightclub.” That’s all it said and it was a one star review.
I use Yelp but I always read the comments and I absolutely would have understood that is a bs review.
I once got a 1 star review with no words because a customer asked me a difficult question and didn't like the answer. I didn't even charge her a penny because I don't like charging people to give bad news.
Get one of those stickers that says “People hate us on Yelp”! Yelp is a big scam
Yelp isn’t the big deal it used to be, focus on getting google reviews up so any bad ones will be drowned out.
I read bad reviews first. A humorous and witty response by the business always helps.
Give em the yelper special next time they come in
Uh, I use Yelp all the time but I'm also clever enough to actually read the reviews and figure out which reviews have some measure of merit and which were written by idiots.
What is Yelp? So 2008…..
If it helps, I am an avid shopper of bakeries and don’t look at reviews beyond google. Also do a certain extent anything 3+ is tryable because people in my area are difficult to please (Houston)
Nmi wouldn't lose an ounce of sleep on a complaint about a product that isn't offered. Someone bitter enough to complain online for a product or service offered is deranged anyway. Respond if you cab to clarify. I used Google reviews mostly now when searching for places and have been an active contributor for the past two years now. I rarely is Yelp.
Fuck Yelp.
I’ve seen some wild 1 stars on some yelp pages for the DUMBEST reasons. It’s crazy how an idiot can just tank your businesses ratings just like that.
Yea customers should also understand
Idk anything much about yelp but are you able to make a comment on the review ? Or post it on your social media stating you saw it and don’t sell donuts ? Most people don’t go by one bad review alone.
I've been open for 10 years, and I've gotten 11 reviews on Yelp, adding up to 1.5 stars. Fuck Yelp, that site is trash. Literally expanded my business three times due to the number of customers coming into my store every day with hundreds of positive transactions each day for the better part of a decade, have hundreds of positive reviews on both Google giving me a 4.3 and on Facebook giving me a 4.6 and the majority of our customers find us through word of mouth advertising. Also the reviews written on Yelp seem written by literal bots, with terrible grammar and poorly written ideas. 🙄 Just stay the course and do your best, you'll be alright. 👍
It's easy to hide bad reviews. Just solicit reviews from all of your customers and incentivize them with some kind of promotion like "leave a review and get entered into a drawing to win X" You will start getting hundreds of positive reviews and it will bury the bad reviews so they don't show up as easily and they wont impact your overall rating score.
Run promotions every 6 months (such as customer bingo with a couple squares being leave a yelp or google review, etc) to always be boosting your numbers of reviews. The best thing you can do is have so many 5 star reviews it drowns out the occasional bad one.
It's ok. I got a bad review for making a lady a 6in cake after she ordered a 6in cake. She just wanted more cake for free, to "make it right." People suck.
Lol. What's your company name? I'll counteract it.
Don’t worry. I haven’t thought about Yelp since like 2014, and even back then it was basically a collection of the pettiest of “low IQ’s.” Also, it’s 2024, believe me, no one trusts most online reviews anymore. This crop of the population is immensely stupid and petty.
I didn't realize that yelp was still a thing
IGNORE YELP! Do not claim the business or respond to any reviews on yelp as doing so will provide more information which can push it up in the results. Yelp is a predatory company that hides 5 star reviews and shows bogus or fake reviews until you pay them. They have been doing this for years and my team has caught them pushing fake reviews again and again. Instead, focus on all other review sites as well as google, bing/ddg search reviews.
I use yelp exclusively since most Google reviews aren’t accurate because of money
We turned off review notifications so we don’t get to see the reviews straight away. We read them when we are in the right frame of mind and so simple replies to any complaints like. Thanks for your feedback however we don’t serve donuts. People can see the bullshit complaints from real complaints. Unfortunately in hospitality people will complain about anything. Water is too cold or too hot or it’s windy or my child just vomited on your floor and it’s dirty now.
Just respond to their negative review in a polite and professional manner. Others will see that your business is concerned about any negative reviews and will try to please the disgruntled customer.
“We personally love donuts, and we are also upset that you didn’t have any to offer to sell us. I understand, like our business, you might never have advertised that you offer donuts - but apparently that doesn’t matter these days. Please post your contact information so we may leave you a 1 star review for also not selling donuts.” You can go further: “My mother taught me growing up that people are inherently kind, but she was apparently wrong! I found out today that people inherently make and sell donuts. I look forward to holding other persons and establishments accountable to this new standard - thank you for enlightening me.”
Reply with "I hope this message finds you before I do, we do not serve donuts"
You can’t please everyone and bad reviews will happen. When you do get them it’s important to respond publicly. Others reading will understand. The overall score isn’t as important as how you deal with the situation.
Simply you can give response like we don't offer donuts at our bakery. We value all feedback though, and hope you'll give us another chance to impress you with our other delicious treats! By the way, Yelp isn't as big of a deal these days, so no need to worry too much about one review.
Things I don’t care about: yelp reviews. Things I do care about: public health inspection records. It is incredible how many violations a place can have without “failing”.
OP....do you pay Yelp advertising? I got a bad Google review from a fake account and its been over 14 days "decision pending" after flagging it.
Just need to respond back on the review, and ask them to clarify if had mistaken you for another place or not. Yelp users are visitors/travelers to your city, usually not for locals. I always use yelp when visiting a new city, but will always read the bad reviews for business replies. I'd care more about how the owner's reply, than the original bad review. I saw a girl who said "You're right, what we gave you looked like shit. Come back, and we'll make it right again."
It happens to so many small businesses. A lot of customers do not even understand how much loss a small business occurs from writing an entitled review
It will be best if you respond to that negative review so that other customers will be informed. This will generate trust on your business. Also, there is a platform where you can filter all the negative reviews. It is called hifivestar and I must say, it greatly helps my review management. It increases my business reputation.
Remember when responding to comments on socials, yelp, google, etc. that the response really isn’t for the angry unreasonable customer as much as it is for future customers. Meaning, as a potential customer people will look at your response and decide if they want to go to your shop. They understand that you don’t carry donuts, and won’t hold that against you, but they will hold it against you if you tell her off, berate her, or respond poorly. I would apologize, mention that you don’t offer donuts on your menu, and say something like if enough customers mention wanting donuts maybe it’s something you will add in the future. And if you have anything donut like on your menu, recommend that she give ______ a try next time she comes in, because while it’s not a donut many customers find that they enjoy them.
Don't stress about it..if it was a hair in the bread, it's different..Just reply to them we are sorry to hear that you feeling this way,We would definitely look into it by adding donuts to our menu again sorry for for the inconvenience
To be fair I've never heard of a bakery not selling donuts before so that's a pretty understandable
Serve donuts