Beautynet Blog

Help with Yelp!

What do you do when you love or hate a business? You Yelp it out.

The basics:

When I talk with salon owners, they almost always cite “word of mouth” as their primary source of business. After all, those stunning cuts, colours and textures are a walking ad for their salon. If you depend on word of mouth too, it’s time to make Yelp your friend.

Yelp is an online and mobile rating service for everything, including salons and spas. Your customers can easily find your business on their phone or online and give it a star-rating, add comments and reviews, list some of your features and even include photos they take of your business.

Anyone can read the reviews and ratings of your business, or use it as a way of finding a salon near them. Reviews are pinned on a map with pop-up ratings so people can quickly find you.

If someone is new to the area or looking to make a change, they might use Yelp to find highly rated businesses nearby to try out.

The pros:

If you have a customer come in and have an awesome experience, they might write a glowing review of your business on Yelp, complete with top ratings and flattering photos. You’ll see your review pop up on the map showing your business as a top-shelf spot where new customers should go.

The cons:

But, you might also have a cranky client have a less than spectacular session in your shop and unleash their frustration on Yelp. Worst case scenario is they vent a fiery volley of harsh words, complete with low ratings and nasty photos. You’re pretty much left defenseless since this protected against libel by long use agreements and legal provisions for something called “fair comment”.

How to wrangle Yelp:

So, how do you make Yelp your pal? Try any or all of these suggestions;

Tune your team. Have a staff meeting and let everyone Yelp is out there and a new force. All staff are vulnerable to be named in Yelp, along with your business, so it’s important everyone is aware of Yelp. Set an annual goal to have 90% positive reviews and celebrate with a big dinner out.

Encourage positive reviews. Take your top 20 customers and ask them if they use Yelp. For those who do, ask them if they’d be willing to write an unbiased review of your salon. Offer incentives such as a complimentary retail product on the next visit if that works for you. At the very least, a huge thank you.

List your business. Get a leap on Yelp by taking control of the page that lists your business. At least the information will be accurate. See Yelp for more details.

Brag about your rating. Doing well on Yelp? Nice work! Yelp has door stickers to let people know you’re popular and well loved. Add “See our Yelp reviews” to your ads, business cards and even voice mail recordings.

Got Yelp negatives?

Learn from it. Read the review and take it as a cue to improve - address it all point by point in a staff meeting (but avoid pointing fingers). If the review was written by a toxic client, give them a coupon to your competition. They’re bad for business.

Reach out to the reviewer. People who post reviews on Yelp can edit their posts. Reach out to the poster and address the comments without being defensive. Offer them a make-good. If it seems appropriate, ask them for an edit or a revision.

Pile in the positives. Now is the time to drown out the negatives with more positive reviews. Rally your best customers to post positives.

Get on Google! If you’re not already, open an Adwords account on Google. List “great salon reviews” and “Yelp” in your keywords. This will give people searching for your salon a mini distraction from Yelp links.