Credibility of Reputable Yelp Users

Yelp has a large presence in the world of business. Not only are small businesses affected by Yelp, but large businesses as well. Reviews hold great influence over such entities. In a survey, 90% of consumers read reviews. Of that number of people, 88% trust the reviews that they read. Furthermore, 86% hesitate to purchase from businesses that have negative reviews (Ward). There is no doubt that Yelp has an enormous impact on the decisions of its readers because it allows them to make a wiser choice given first-hand details about their options. There is much to consider when reading reviews. First and foremost, is the reviewer credible? Unfortunately, businesses that are not doing as well in the market look to fake reviews in order to attract more business. The influence that Yelp has incentivizes businesses to falsify their ratings or even post negative ratings on the profiles of their competitors.

Figure 1: Percentage of Filtered Reviews by Quarter (Luca)

Are reviews still trustworthy in the face of these counterfeits? As much as it may seem that many businesses would pay for positive reviews, roughly about 16% of businesses are actually filtered in Yelp as suspicious (Luca). It is important to note that this percentage may be low due to the fact that it is hard to determine what is legitimate. There is no difference among the writers of real and fake reviews besides their intent. What’s important is that users know about the existence of these fabrications. In a survey, users that read reviews take cues on reputation based on the number of friends and reviews (Lim et al.). Furthermore, in a designed experiment with electronic Word-Of-Mouth messages, it was found that credibility in general can be damaged if there are too many positive reviews (Doh et al.). Therefore, hiring people to write positive reviews to help the business can backfire. Thankfully, this sets a limit on the extent that businesses can go out of their way in order to get ahead.

There’s one question that we ignored that becomes the underlying force of these reviews. Why do they exist? Genuine reviewers are not paid or incentivized materialistically so there wouldn’t seem to be any motivation to take time out of their day to rate businesses. Findings on these online communities show that a consumers’ inclination for social interaction, concern for others, and increment of self-worth drive people to continually post reviews (Hennig-Thurau). These reasons will not only keep Yelp alive but drive it to further influence our consumer lives in the future.

Works Cited

Doh, Sun-Jae, and Jang-Sun Hwang. “How consumers evaluate eWOM (electronic word-of-mouth) messages.” CyberPsychology & Behavior 12.2 (2009): 193-197.

Hennig‐Thurau, Thorsten, et al. “Electronic word‐of‐mouth via consumer‐opinion platforms: What motivates consumers to articulate themselves on the Internet?.” Journal of interactive marketing 18.1 (2004): 38-52.

Lim, Young‐shin, and Brandon Van Der Heide. “Evaluating the wisdom of strangers: The perceived credibility of online consumer reviews on Yelp.” Journal of Computer‐Mediated Communication 20.1 (2015): 67-82.

Luca, Michael, and Georgios Zervas. “Fake it till you make it: Reputation, competition, and Yelp review fraud.” Management Science (2016).

Ward, Cheryl, et al. “‘Yelp’Gives it Four Stars: Consumer Attitudes towards Ratings and Reviewers.” (2016).