Yelp Can Help You Market Your Business

Is your small business on Yelp yet? We talk a lot about the various social media sites and how you can leverage your presence online. And nowhere is this more effective than on Yelp. Here’s why.

I have personally used the site recently to find out about restaurants that we wanted to try. My husband came home with tickets to a fundraiser dinner at a sushi place. Since we’d never been there (nor heard of it before), I checked it out on Yelp. It had high reviews. And those reviews were spot on. The place was excellent. That, coupled with some other experiences on the site, has prompted me to keep Yelp’s reviews on my trusted list.

So far, it hasn’t let me down. And based on the number of reviews on the site, it looks like many others feel the same way.

When customers go to Yelp they are seeking out a particular service. Restaurants, night life, shopping, professional services. It’s all there. People are looking for you. And with Yelp’s business owner’s section, you can really make the site work for you.

Yelp lists the following free tools for businesses:

• Communicate with your customers– privately and publicly
• Track how many people view your business page
• Add photos, a detailed business description, up-to-date information, history, and specialties
• Announce special offers and upcoming events
• Recommend other businesses

Think about it – you can respond to any reported problems in a review. Offer to fix it. By acknowledging a customer’s problem and then making it right, you have the chance to gain back a customer and possibly make new ones. When you fill out your complete profile, you offer extra information to customers. And you can partner with other businesses to promote each other.

You can put up offers and specials on your profile. See how many people are looking at your business page. Get notified when people review you. There’s so much you can do to better position your business. Yelp results show up in search engines, with the number of stars right there in the results.

If you haven’t claimed your business on Yelp, go check it out. And if you’re listed, seriously think about filling out all of the information about your business. Make it easy for people to find you. With the way Yelp is growing, it won’t take long for consumers to find you. Use that to your advantage.

(post topic inspired by this post and my own Yelp experiences)

image: clix on sxc.hu