So you own a business and have a Yelp page.
You see your competitor outranking you on Yelp for a keyword, but their business has fewer reviews, a lower overall rating, and/or has been established for a shorter duration. Why do they rank higher than you? Here are several ways in which you can take control and rank higher than they do on Yelp.
Claim your profile
Yelp wants to know that you want to appear higher on their lists. Help them out by claiming your profile, adding pictures, and business details such as location, hours, and contact info. In addition, Yelpers love seeing owners maintain their business image. It lets them know they care about receiving more customers.
Have reviewers use keywords
Studies have proven that keywords are crucial in having your business appear higher on Yelp. For example, if you typed in “Seattle sushi rolls” into the Yelp search bar, businesses with more matches of the keywords used (Seattle, sushi, and rolls) will have a higher chance of appearing higher in the search. The results from this SEO technique occur quickly.
As we can see, the first restaurant has six keywords used in the review, while the latter two have five and four keywords respectively.
Which keyword are you targeting?
Know which keyword you should be targeting. I might be making an assumption here, but when people search for “Chinese Seattle”, they probably mean “Chinese Food Seattle”. After all, restaurants comprise 29% of all Yelp searches. The image below shows that Yelpers are more likely to type in “Chinese Food Seattle” rather than “Chinese Seattle”.
A way to research keyword use is to use Google Adwords Keyword Planner. Just pick a set of keywords, and the keyword planner will generate a list of related keywords along with the average number of local and nation-wide searches for each keyword.
Contact negative reviewers
Try to approach the unhappy Yelper in a friendly and inviting way. Apologize for their experience – the customer is always right, right? Invite them back and promise a better experience (only if you can deliver it). Turning this negative review around could impact your ranking on Yelp because more customers are likely to visit your Yelp page if your rating isn’t in the drain. If reasoning with the reviewer fails, you can also try flagging the review, depending on whether they violated Yelp’s review terms.
Unfilter good reviews
We want those good 5-star (and maybe 4-star depending on your current rating) reviews to bump up our overall rating. More often than not, good reviews get filtered out while bad reviews stay unfiltered. Here are steps to help unfilter a user’s review. Respond to the review, friend the user, compliment him/her, and encourage him/her to complete their profile. Yelp filters think he/she is a fake account trying to bump up said business’ rating because he/she doesn’t have many reviews or friends. Don’t worry about those bad reviews that have been filtered; we will just keep them where they belong.
Respond to new reviews
Remember to respond to new reviews. See those buttons at the bottom of every review? Click all three! Well, maybe you can leave the funny one out.
Suggest popular items
If your business is known for making great burritos, make sure a reviewer writes about it! People will look at the review and think, “This person really enjoyed their burrito. I should try one.” When they do try one, they will hopefully realize what an amazing burrito they had. This will give your business a higher chance of getting a good review because they are rating a proven product or service.
Yelp can make or break a business. The higher you rank in a search result page, the more likely you will receive business. Take control of your Yelp page and exert dominance in whatever industry you are tackling with these seven easy tips.