DeFord: Got a comment about a local business? Get some Yelp

What people say about your business has always been a way to make or break it. Having a great experience at a restaurant, for example, might compel you to share that experience with others. Conversely, what do you do if your experience was less than ideal, or downright horrible? Enter our app for this month — Yelp.

Yelp is not just a tool for giving your reviews and experiences with local restaurants. It also provides reviews of any business that offers a product or service. When you chronicle your experiences with Yelp, others have the opportunity to read your review, leave comments or decide whether or not to patronize the business you have reviewed. Even the owners of the business you are reviewing can log in and leave responses.

I have used Yelp personally for many months and enjoy logging in when I am at the restaurant and especially when I have had a very good experience. Yelp is free in the app store and runs on iPhone, Blackberry, Android, or Windows phone.

Several months ago, I saw a show called “Kitchen Nightmares” with chef Gordon Ramsey. The restaurant he was sent in to rehabilitate and overhaul had had very negative, and well-deserved reviews on Yelp. Part of Ramsey’s relaunch of the troubled restaurant was to bring those “Yelpers” in to comment on their negative experiences first hand, and to have an opportunity to re-experience the restaurant after the renowned chef’s changes. It was at that time that I realized the power of the Yelp offering.

Yelp’s slogan is “Real People, Real Reviews.” A quick look at the 65301 zip code within the Yelp website, yelp.com, yields hundreds of local businesses that have received reviews, from local gas stations and grocery stores to restaurants, pubs and self-storage locations. The list is exhaustive, and even contains two reviews from “out of towners” who read the Sedalia Democrat when they come to town.

As with any review site, I would be concerned about the potential for abuse from competitors or people with hidden agendas. Yelp offers a Conflict of Interest guideline that compels the user to be unbiased and objective in all reviews, and that they should not submit reviews of their own business or that of a competitor.

When you sign up for Yelp, look me up and add me as a friend. That way we can communicate about the best businesses that Sedalia has to offer. My online Yelp name is Richard D. and my profile currently has a photo that is of me almost 30 pounds ago.